paulears Posted August 26, 2006 Share Posted August 26, 2006 the rapid development of these things is crazy - changing the number of DMX channels and bringing in new features on what are sold as the same unit make replacing or adding rather a risky process. I have 11 of one type and one of the other (one went back for repair, but got replaced!) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lxkev Posted September 15, 2006 Share Posted September 15, 2006 I've been after some of these LED for ages....read all the threads :P And now im really :P about which to get as thomann have 2 different types of 56's.....one not being showtec http://www.thomann.de/gb/led_light_led_par_56_black.htm £46.92 http://www.thomann.de/gb/stairville_led_pa...alu_schwarz.htm £45.54 or the stairville par 64 version........(Are the led spread out more in-sided or is it exactly the same as 56?) http://www.thomann.de/gb/stairville_led_pa...alu_schwarz.htm £53.13 See I'm buying them for a one of event out of my own pocket, which are the more reliable????? from the pic the 1st 56 has 8 dips.....cant tell on the others...... does anyone know if the stairville 64 has a "strobe".... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Entbbe Posted September 17, 2006 Share Posted September 17, 2006 Take a look at tha Coemar LED lights they seem to perform very well. Anyone got some who can comment ?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
niclights Posted September 17, 2006 Share Posted September 17, 2006 I would be inclined to buy the cheapest. Reliability and brightness is likely to be the same for all. The only real difference you might find is ability to address higher depending on number of dips. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peter Posted September 17, 2006 Share Posted September 17, 2006 Has anyone else found the cord grip doesn't grip the standard EU flex+plug which comes fitted to the unit? Giving a relatively light tug on the cable pulled it out of the unit considerably. Thusly all of mine have been replaced with 1.5mm H07 which seems to be gripped ok by the cord grip. Mine have the following channel allocation:1 - Color Mode2 - Red3 - Green4 - Blue5 - Speed and were sold as "Stairville LED Par 64" (bought from Thomann, for £54 each.) This channel allocation is definately different from the Showtec ones. I've started a Wiki article for LED Pars. If people have different channel allocations, could they post them on there, please Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bruce Posted September 17, 2006 Share Posted September 17, 2006 I have some of the stairville PAR56 units. Looks like the same channel allocation - I would suspect that they are identical inside, and the only difference is the tin... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lxkev Posted October 9, 2006 Share Posted October 9, 2006 Well I bought the stairville par 64 version....... 6 came today......... first one....... I turned on, I was impressed I thought they would be a lot worse..............left the unit running in demo mode........................blue and green magicaly disapperaed :-( 2nd unit ........no green 3rd unit...............no red 4th unit..............nothing 5th + 6th ok............ Opened first unit, found a bolt on the pcb shorting 2 pins.......removed bolts......new fuse..........all worked......then green went away....... 4th unit had no earth, but they had nicely weird live to the case...... Contact thomann ....... they replyed........ "Dear Customer, The quantity of e-mails is currently quite high. Answering e-mails will take some time but we are doing them in the order they come in as quickly as possible. Thank you for your understanding." My view of thomann at the mo is ****ing ****ers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian Posted October 10, 2006 Share Posted October 10, 2006 this is the text of a PM I've just sent to lxkev... I was very surprised to see the fuses appear in the Stairville version. The Showtec PAR56 version I started with didn't have them and I'm not quite sure why they've fitted them. I think they are trying to protect the control PCB from shorts caused by object getting onto the front LED pcb but it's not really the right way to do it. It feels like a retrofit to me. As you've spotted the overall build quality isn't that great. I've just taken delivery of two of the Stairville units and on the one I've taken apart the soldering is very poor with lots of whiskers which are likely to cause shorts. Mine also arrived with the front PCB unplugged and one of the support pillars loose. The whole situation of pillars being so close to pcb tracks is a huge foul-up on the manufacturer's part - trying to solve it by fitting plastic washers everywhere isn't really a solution. As for what causes the fuses to blow, I can see 3 possibilities... 1) Mechanical Shock - small current fuses have a very fine bit of wire in them and aren't really designed to rattle around freely inside a metal box. 2) Short Circuits - as mentioned the mounting pillar location is an issue. 3) Current rating wrong - if short circuits aren't the problem then this one certainly is. The blue fuse on my first unit went within the first second of operation. On investigation, they've fitted F100mA fuses. I measured the LED currents on each colour with them at full on and found... Red Peak = 165mA, Average = 130mAGreen Peak = 175mA, Average = 145mABlue Peak = 185mA, Average = 155mA ...so I'd suggest that a F100mA fuse is a bit on the small size. As an interim solution I'd suggest upping the fuse to F250mA or even F500mA. Longer term I'm thinking that solid-state fuses are the way to go and this is something I'll be trying. [EDIT]I've just unpacked and tested the second unit. The green leds didn't work at switch on and guess what - the fuse had failed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paulears Posted October 10, 2006 Share Posted October 10, 2006 It does look like the sheer number of 'brands' and variants sharing the same chassis, that we have the beginnings of abit of a minefield here. I've got a dozen of what I thought were Showtecs, from Thomann. Brian sent me some new chips to try, so I brought one home to do the swap there. When I first got them, one had a rattle, and I repaired it by tightening up one of the three nylock bolts. While doing it I had a look at the circuit board and other components. They are not the same as the unit I brought home. This is very odd - all delivered in one batch, 12 identical boxes. I also wonder if this also explains some of the unusual behaviour. When powered up and in normal use, they are all identical - however, in my venue, the control is the last thing to be powered up, so the power to the bar with the pars on is often on, with no DMX input. 4 or 5 of the fixtures do identical random things - colour flashes, or strobing, or flickering - exactly the kind of random DMX thing you see. The others either come on dim blue and remain static, or stay off. If they are all the same, logic says they should all do the same thing. These are two separate 'random' states. I never really thought about it as as soon as the control is powered up, they all goout, and operate exactly as they should. This is a quirk - but does suggest continual development, and to some degree bodges being introduced to remedy issues, that are now creating new issues. My concern is that we may have a fixture that is not replaceable. Swapping one out of a rig in a years time might be impossible. Just think of the pain if the DMX implementation has changed - a 5 minute swapout becomes an hours worth of reprogramming - not a good prospect. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lxkev Posted October 11, 2006 Share Posted October 11, 2006 After I got Brains advice and got similar ratings when I tested mine. I ran down to maplin and bought some 160ma and 250ma fuses (time delayed). This seemed to resolve the problems.... However Some units still blew the fuses ;) After looking closely I found that two tracks on the LED Board have been broken. On the units which had faults there were signs that some one had try to cut the tracks, But dint do a good job...So I made sure the tracks were broken and put in new fuses and now the units work fine. :D Looks like starvil made a batch of faulty boards and tried to fix them... on another note :-s one unit does not like DMX address 75...it just stays on a orange colour. hmmmm But I have to say now that they are working, I am very happy with what they can do:-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
3guk Posted October 25, 2006 Share Posted October 25, 2006 Right Guys, A few months ago when the LED par topic was in its infancy, I decided to buy two of these purely to test them out on a white wall and see how they faired in general. I'm still playing around with them, I wanted to know if anyone wanted any pictures or anything, I remember there being quite a few people asking for different pictures and stuff, so I thought since I have two to play around with I could get anything you wanted with regards to them !! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stutwo Posted October 25, 2006 Share Posted October 25, 2006 I'd be interested in seeing pictures that show how much light these things give out. I realise they're mainly architectural, but how would they do if they were on in an average stage wash? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
3guk Posted October 25, 2006 Share Posted October 25, 2006 So do you want pictures with the source 1m away 2m ect ?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
niclights Posted October 26, 2006 Share Posted October 26, 2006 Are you aware I did pics way back here? The forty units I installed are still performing well all under individual control. No failures after approx 9 months. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarcT Posted November 1, 2006 Share Posted November 1, 2006 Well, I decided to invest in 8 of the Showtec ones (Thomann Part #188397), not the "Stairville" ones (which are Thomann Part #193247). The decision was that as per earlier posts, the only thing going for Stairville is a better paint job. Stairville also appear to have internal fuses which are under-rated - though they are marginally cheaper. These Showtec ones use six DMX channels - RGB, "Macro", "Speed/Strobe", and "Mode".They have full range DMX addressing (ie 0-512), and the LSB (ie decimal 1) is the left most switch (numbered 1), which caught me out & isn't mentioned in the instructions. I expected the left most dip switch to be the MSB (ie decimal 256).There is a sound to light sensitivity pot & a DMX present LED, but no other controls. They have a thin sheet of clear plastic mounted directly in front of the LEDs, on PCB standoffs.There are no internal fuses. The internal header connections have been (badly) hot glue-gunned together. Anyway, one unit had a green LED permanently stuck on and the rest of the greens in that row failed to work. I opened it up and it was fine whilst in bits. It turns out the PCB which the LEDs are mounted on was shorting on its mounting pillars (also PCB standoffs) because the tracks are too close to the screwholes. I just stuck LX tape over the end of the standoffs & put it back together. Fixed. Being anal, before plugging the DMX (into a splitter), I metered out the loop of all 8 fixtures and was surprised to find no continuity on XLR pin 3. I thought I had a bad cable, but no - one of the fixtures has no continuity on pin 3 between DMX in and DMX out. I've taken the little PCB which houses the XLRs out, and the solder joint connecting pin 3 from the XLR socket has lifted away from the PCB breaking the track. I'm going to bodge it back together by soldering wire links in place. Anyway - thought I'd share this. I know someone else reported a unit which stopped responding to DMX. Could be the same issue. I think these things are good value for money, but they're obviously built to a price and it shows. Marc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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