Miniscan LED conversion

[sourdine]

Hi gyro_gearloose,

 

First thank you for sharing your nice experience.

After some times of use, your modification is always good ?

I'm interested by your parts...

I sent you a message, please check it :)

[gyro_gearloose]

Hi Sourdine

 

Not sure why, but I haven't received your message.

 

Thank you for your interest in my Miniscan conversion. Having used my pair of Miniscans for a little while they are still working very well. However I am thinking of selling them as I don't use them that much.

[sourdine]

Hello,

 

I re-sent you the message, please try to sent one to me maybe it works in this way ! ;)

 

Yep, it seems these machines are built with high quality components. I think the price is now affordable due to the emergence of LED lightings.

 

Do you think your solution is always interesting nowadays if I find these scanners ? (in terms of quality/price comparison)

Correct me if I'm wrong, you said you sell the necessary parts for the mod ? ...How much it costs ?

If you sell your miniscans, how much ?

 

Thank you

(sorry for the english, french guy with not a very good score in toefl :P)

Edited August 6, 2014 by sourdine

[gyro_gearloose]

Hi

 

Yes, the Miniscans are well made. If I were looking for a modern replacement, I'd look at some of the LED kit already available rather than try to convert a discharge fixture. To be honest, I only converted my Miniscans as that is what I already owned. If I were going to convert another fixture, I'd look for almost anything with condensing optics (an aspheric lens and plano-convex lens pair), but preferably a moving head.

 

I can make the plastic parts to convert your Miniscans, if you already own some, but I wouldn't suggest buying some Miniscans just to convert them. The conversion does require some electrical knowledge to safely remove the parts you won't need (ballast, ignitor, lamp wiring, fan) and fitting the LED power supply and driver electronics. You'd also need to partially dismantle the Miniscan, and then build the holder for the LED and lenses. Finally you'd need to make a semi-circular disc to act as a tilt lock, as the Miniscan becomes quite unbalanced after the ballast and ignitor are removed.

 

If you want to buy the ones I've got, I'd sell mine for about £400 for the pair and I might be persuaded to convert the other two Miniscans that I've got. Shipping them to France will be expensive though :D

[sourdine]

Thank you for your detailed answer and your advices which confirms my fear about the "complexity" of the conversion and to go to new LED models.

...I forget the idea but keep monitoring on your subject :)

[IainB]

Would love to pick your brains over this if possible?

I have 6 project lights that would be ideal for converting, unfortunately photobucket sucks these days so although I can get to your main page.... I cant click on pictures!

[gyro_gearloose]

I was not aware that Photobucket had stopped their free service. What would you like to know?

 

LED technology has moved on somewhat in the 6 years since I started this project. I'm not sure that the LED I used is even available anymore. However you can get much more efficient LEDs that will produce more light for the same power. Newer LEDs all seem to have a much larger emitting area so I'm not sure how well they would work with the Miniscan optics. They ought to be fine since condensing optics like those used in the Miniscans should cope better with larger emitters than a simple reflector would. It might be worth experimenting with a low power LED to see what happens

[royzinrotherham]

It seems the pictures have been blocked , I have 6 miniscans been in store for years I cant bear to let them go , .In the 90s I ran a large disco roadshow but they just took too much power . I am really interested ,

[IainB]

I was not aware that Photobucket had stopped their free service. What would you like to know?

 

LED technology has moved on somewhat in the 6 years since I started this project. I'm not sure that the LED I used is even available anymore. However you can get much more efficient LEDs that will produce more light for the same power. Newer LEDs all seem to have a much larger emitting area so I'm not sure how well they would work with the Miniscan optics. They ought to be fine since condensing optics like those used in the Miniscans should cope better with larger emitters than a simple reflector would. It might be worth experimenting with a low power LED to see what happens

 

Could you still produce the kits / mountings?

 

Ive started to look into this as this would mean I can get mine out much much more than they currently go out, as power consumption is a bit of an issue occasionally. In theory I 'could' buy new moving heads, but where is the fun in that ;-) (that and I run 'old skool' nights so being able to use the mini scans as they would have been in the 90s fits in with the theme rather than a modern moving head)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[gyro_gearloose]

I'm currently looking into getting the parts laser cut. This will be much faster than me trying to cut all the parts out on my CNC machine.

 

As for the LED and driver, I won't be repeating the setup I originally used. There are plenty of mains-powered LED drivers available these days so I won't need to use separate power supplies and drivers. The Cree CMA1840 4000K, 92CRI LEDs look promising as for the same Wattage they provide twice the light output of the LedEngin I originally used, and the colour temperature should be closer to that of tungsten.

 

Here are some links to the parts that I'm thinking of using: Cree LED. Osram LED driver.

[gyro_gearloose]

Okay, I've just got the quotes in from the Laser cutting companies that I've contacted. Due the minimum size of sheet material that they will work with, I can fit four sets of lens holder parts onto one sheet. I can therefore only supply the parts in multiples of four, unless more than one of you want to go ahead with his project.

 

One set of four holders will cost you £60, and I will need the money up front before I have the parts made. The laser cutting company I'd use take up to 7 working days to produce the parts.

 

Unless the mods have any objections, can we keep any messages about this project in this thread? That way if a few of you only want six holders, for example, you can combine your orders. Otherwise I'd have to sell each of you two sets of four holders.

[IainB]

Superb - I have 6 units, though would be happy to convert 4 to start (which leaves me with 2 units for 'spares') unless someone else wants 2 or 6 doing - in which case I will go to 6

Let me know how you want payment and I will get it sorted for you, will be SO happy to get these out more!

[gyro_gearloose]

If you want some Miniscan spares, Halo Lighting have a pile of parts for sale on their website for the princely sum of £5! It looks like you could make one or two complete units out of all of the parts.

 

I've found some of the old photos I took when I first started this thread. Heres one showing the first unit I built. The LedEngin LED wasn't fitted when I took this photo. It got clamped between the heatsink and the plastic plate. Because that plate was specific to that particular LED, it won't be included on the holders I send you.

 

Link to the image. I had to do it this way because the forum doesn't appear to support Google photo sharing <_<

 

For a heatsink, can I suggest that you use something from an old Pentium D? The Pentium D had a thermal design power of 95 Watts, so the heatsink should keep a 40-50 Watt LED comfortably cool. You should be able to get some for a few pounds each secondhand. Try and find some that have a flat base with enough space to drill a few holes for the LED holder. I've got a couple of these which I rescued for free from some old PCs that were being scrapped.

 

To power the fan, can I recommend keeping the mains powered fan which sits under the lens holder, and scrapping the small fan that sits under the ballast? You can then use the power supply for the small fan to power your PC fan. However, I seem to recall that the power supply to that fan is 24 volts DC, not 12, so you'll need a DC-DC converter to power the PC fan. You may find that the Clay Paky fans have a small PCB attached to them. If so then your fans already have DC-DC converters. I think Clay Paky did this because they couldn't source the 24 volt fans any more.

 

Because soldering COB LEDs can be somewhat tricky, you can now buy holders which clamp the LED down, and have electrical contacts built in. No soldering required! For the Cree LEDs I linked to a few posts back, I'll be using this holder. It has the added benefit of allowing me to attach a range of reflectors. You wouldn't need them for your Miniscans, but I'll be making a test LED rig to try out in profiles and Fresnels.

 

If you want to go ahead with this can you pay via Paypal?

[IainB]

If you want to go ahead with this can you pay via Paypal?

 

Yes - PayPal will be fine, drop me a PM with details and I will get it sorted

 

Thanks for this, very much appreciated

[gyro_gearloose]

I've gott all the parts together now and I'll be posting them to you tomorrow (26/3/2018). I've put together a quick guide on how the parts go together. Sorry about linking to the photos rather then embedding them. Apparently this forum won't let me embed images from Google photos :(

 

Heres a photo of (almost) all of the parts. It doesn't show the plastic tabs or spacers which will be used to hold the lenses in place. The parts.

 

Step 1. Attach the lenses to the front and rear plates.

Step 1 photo.

• You need the aspheric and plano convex lenses from your Miniscan, two plastic plates with the large holes in them, 7 M3 Allen bolts with washers and spacers, 1 M3 countersunk bolt with washer and spacer, and 4 square clear plastic tabs.
  
• Attach the PC lens to the plate with the smaller hole using 3 Allen bolts and the countersunk bolt.
  
• Use the remaining bolts and plastic tabs to attach the aspheric lens to the other plate. The plastic tabs sit between the metal washer and the Nyloc nut.
  
• Do not tighten the bolts too much. The lenses needs to be free to move about a little.
  

 

Step 2. Attach the side plates to the rear lens plate.

Step 2 photo.

• Attach both side plates to the aspheric lens holder using 4 M4 countersunk bolts.
  
• It can be a bit fiddly getting the nuts to stay in place while doing up the bolts. It helps if you use some PVC tape to hold the nuts in place.
  

 

Step 3. Attach the rear and side plates to the base plate.

Step 3 photo.

Attach the rear and side plates to the base plate using 4 M4 countersunk bolts.

 

Step 4. Position the base spacers.

Step 4 photo.

Place the four base spacers on your metal base plate as shown in the photo.

 

Step 5. Bolt the base plates together.

Step 5 photo.

Bolt the plastic base plate to the metal base plate with the 4 M4 pan head bolts.

 

Step 6. Attach the PC lens plate.

Step 6 photo.

Finally, attach the PC lens plate to the holder using the remaining 4 M4 countersunk bolts.

 

As I don't know which LED you'll be using, I haven't included an LED holder as I mentioned earlier. If you want to use the mounting holes I used for my original conversion, see this diagram for the hole spacings relative to the LED.