Gobo Glass

[dicky]

Hi guys

I bought three Martin lights off a local guy on ebay yesterday (all sold faulty) for £35 the lot

Two Martin T-Rex (blowing new bulbs as soon as they are fitted)
One Martin Ego 1 (wouldn't light up even with a new bulb)

I don't have any bulbs at the moment (ordered some off ebay) but using my hurriedly thrown together test rig (two 12V car sidelight bulbs in series) I now have them all working - in as much as they light up.

The Ego 1 seems to be fully working now - even projecting weak gobos from the car bulb

One of the T-Rex had some of these funny little coloured glass squares rattling around in the bottom of the case, I say funny as they seem like mirrors that reflect one colour but look like clear glass of another colour if you look through them at a light source.

Taking the gobo wheel off it is obvious some of the coloured gobs have fell off and got lost as I only have 8 coloured ones on that unit

The other gobo wheel seems to have mostly coloured glass squres on it

Can I replace these with bits of coloured gels/acetates cut and glued to the wheel (gels are ok in contact with spotlight bulbs so I guess would not melt) or is it possible to buy a mixed bag of these little glass squares from somewhere? I wouldn't know what they are called to google for them though......

Or does someone have any scrap lights where I could rob a few glass squares from?

Still for 35 quid at worse I got the Ego working and enough bits of glass to get at least one of the T Rex running so it's not all bad

Cheers
Rich

[Excalibur]

Can I replace these with bits of coloured gels/acetates cut and glued to the wheel (gels are ok in contact with spotlight bulbs so I guess would not melt) or is it possible to buy a mixed bag of these little glass squares from somewhere? I wouldn't know what they are called to google for them though......

Link in this thread

[Andy P]

as they were so cheap perhaps 2 can become 1. Then just get a full mirror for the other and make a new effect

[dicky]

Well I now have the Ego fully working in sound active mode (found a broken connector that was stopping the parabolic mirror from rotating), After a good clean of the optics it really is working well.

Got one T-Rex fully working now in sound active mode with just a few dichroic glass missing

I'm just fixing up the gobo wheel off the second T-Rex using bits cut from coloured Acetate gel sheets and HA-6 Adhesive which is flexible and stable up to 200 degrees C. This is the one that had most of the dichroic glass missing

Once the HA-6 has set, I'll put that one back together and give it a good run, assuming it is fully working and doesn't require further repair. Will let you know how I got on using Gel instead of dichroic glass once I tested it properly. If it is beyond repair for other reasons I'll take the dichroics that are still attached and use them to fix up the other T Rex gobo wheel properly, otherwise if it's good and the Gel method works I'll do the same with the other one to replace the few missing colours

Happy days all round it seems

Rich

[dicky]

OK quick update on this

I have all three lights fully working

To recap

Ego 1 - one bad (burnt out lead to lamp) and another bad (broken lead to parabolic motor) connection
T Rex - nothing wrong with either, just fans and vents completely clogged with an accumulation of dirt and dust causing overheating and I guess that explains why they were blowing lamps, plus of course the missing the dichroic gobs

Replacing missing dichroic glass with pieces of acetate gel glued on with HA-6 http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/HA6-RTV-Ma...item5d419e5bad appears to work fine - I ran them for about 30-40 mins tonight, this stuff is stable up to 200C and the gels definitely do not melt, even if I left the lamp sitting on one gel gobo for several minutes, so although I accept that is not a thorough soak test I believe it is a fair indicator of performance

Visually I could not see the difference between the dichroic and gel gobos at all

Will run all three lamps on a live test this coming weekend to confirm results

Gonna keep the Ego 1 as I like it, and it has 'pacman' gobos so that is proper old skool!!! Will probably put the T-Rex's on ebay as working units in a while but will use them for now till I find something I like more.

Looking now for more spares/repair stuff to play with (anybody got owt broken going cheap?) and already have my eyes on something I spotted too

Maybe even get some proper electronics faults to fix on the next lot

In total the three now good working lights came in at £55 including replacement parts (bulbs) and I still have two spare bulbs included at that price so time for a well earned

Rich

[musicology]

Maybe a bit late but just spotted a job lot of glass going cheap
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Box-broken...item25a14b855c

[dicky]

Wish I had seen that earlier as I definitely would have bid

Any similar lots coming up I would be interested in



I actually ran both of the Martin T-Rex on a live gig last weekend

One of them cut out on me after the first hour or so and the other one (the one I put the gel gobos in) ran all night and looked great.

My best guess on the night was the one that failed must have a 'lazy' cooling fan which caused the bulb to over heat and fail........ but no, I was wrong.....

I had a look at it today and actually the fan runs fine and the bulb is also OK. the problem was caused by a burnt out connection in the ELC bulb holder

Fortunately brand new bulb holders are easy to come by at a good price so I ordered some and will replace both of them as they must be of a similar age even though only one failed.

Will run the lights again next week, but as much as they do light up the dancefloor well with moving light I will be offering them for sale at £80 the pair after I give them another good test (if anyone interested) otherwise they go on ebay as I now have my eyes on something even more powerful to repair

Rich

[mattydj50]

Wish I had seen that earlier as I definitely would have bid

Any similar lots coming up I would be interested in



I actually ran both of the Martin T-Rex on a live gig last weekend

One of them cut out on me after the first hour or so and the other one (the one I put the gel gobos in) ran all night and looked great.

My best guess on the night was the one that failed must have a 'lazy' cooling fan which caused the bulb to over heat and fail........ but no, I was wrong.....

I had a look at it today and actually the fan runs fine and the bulb is also OK. the problem was caused by a burnt out connection in the ELC bulb holder

Fortunately brand new bulb holders are easy to come by at a good price so I ordered some and will replace both of them as they must be of a similar age even though only one failed.

Will run the lights again next week, but as much as they do light up the dancefloor well with moving light I will be offering them for sale at £80 the pair after I give them another good test (if anyone interested) otherwise they go on ebay as I now have my eyes on something even more powerful to repair

Rich

Good lights, the Martin T-Rex. I used to have two of them but retired them a few years ago in my quest to lighten my load and downsize weight wise. If there was a similar thing LED wise, I'd be at it like a shot.