An advisory for Pluto II owners

[Bradfo69]

I sent her a rather lengthy e-mail last night and touched on a lot of different areas regarding the Pluto II from a customer standpoint. Likes/dislikes, suggestions, philosophical ideas, etc. Hopefully someone really has a good command of the English language because there was a lot there!

[buffo]

If you remove the pattern board that comes with the Pluto II, there is room to install the Stanwax ILDA board. You'll want the one with the ribbon connectors that go to the ILDA ports though - not the one that mounts directly to the port.

Adam

[Bradfo69]

This was accompanied with photos that I'm not going to deal with saving and pasting here.

Hi Brad,

Thanks for your email and many kind comments on our laser products.

Our replies below in black colors,

________________________________________
laser-lightspace

From: Brad Billet
Date: 2014-09-04 07:17
To: 'laser-lightspace'
Subject: RE: DHL 9974632835

Hi Omar,

It was received this morning and I’ve successfully replaced the touchscreen board and it works fine. I just finished installed the new green and driver board a few minutes ago and am doing the alignment this evening. The actual dot on the wall with the module out of the projector certain looks to be smaller than what the previous module was displaying. I expect to get the old parts shipped back out tomorrow morning.

Thanks Brad, we are now also testing new lens and the new 1.2watt 520m to ensure better beam quality as well as good laser power. please kindly sent the package to the following address:

...

There are a couple of things I’d like to simply pass along from the viewpoint of a customer and one who now has several projectors from Lightspace.

I don’t know if you’ve noticed the thread on PL but, there seems to be an issue that several members have all had within the last month or so and that is really more of a part sourcing issue you may want to address with your suppliers but, there are at least four or five people who all have had the fuse holder break inside the projector for no apparent reason. There is a picture in the thread showing where the break has occurred and has often caused the fuse to end up loose into the inside of the projector. My guess would be it’s just a batch with bad plastic or a design flawe. We’ve all be able to simply go to a local electronics store and pick up another one – they’re only about $3 US and install them but, it something you should be made aware of.

We have been crazy busy because of new Venus II launched recently and deal with orders before the Mid-Autumn Festival holiday, and don't have many times to go through the forum posts. But about the fuse holder, we have stopped using the old one since middle of June(about that time can not remember clearly which day). We got many feedback at last Prolight+Sound frankfurt show about the fuse holder, and we found another supplier and change new holders since then.

The new one we are using now is shorter and with different material, we have tested them and it is much better than before.

The 1st photo is the fuse holder we used before in Pluto II, the second/ third one are the one in our Pluto II and Venus II and other series lasers now,

I personally have also had an issue with 3 of the power cords where it appears the wires were not stripped far enough back before inserting into the powercon connector and securely tightened down. Again, a simple problem, and an easy fix but, not something one should expect to have to do. Especially on three projectors. It’s just a quality control issue.

Sorry, I am not quite understand this issue, the wires were not stripped far enough? Sorry its my problem, my English is not so good.

With these last two that I received, I will say that there “seems” to be just a little bit of a drop in quality of the build – like perhaps a newer, less trained employee was putting it together but, that wouldn’t stop me from buying more in the future. The Pluto’s are still great projectors at a fantastic price.

Sorry to make you feeling down, for this problem, I am sure it is not only the employee's problem. Every laser projectors has go through 48 hours tests before they left our factory, we won't let it go if we have found that problem here. After we got the faulty green diode, we will check out the fundamental problem and see what should be improved.

We here in the US have been very appreciative that Lightspace has been so willing to integrate safety features to help make the Pluto’s easier for legal use in this country such as the interlock switch and shutter and emission indicator etc. There are a couple of things that would need a little refinement. You may have been contact by Jon Robertson of Daystar Lasers and may also be contacted by William Benner from Pangolin regarding the shutter. It really needs to react much faster than it does. It’s basically a stepper motor whereas it should probably be a much faster moving actuator like a VRAD or something like the GM20 or Ledex solenoid. I know it may add a little more to the cost of the Plutos but it may be worth at least talking with Pangolin about discounted VRAD actuators in place of what you are using.

About the shutter motor: We know it is a bit slow, but who can make things perfect for the first time? Lightspace's purpose: be brave enough to make the first step, and will make it better and better.
When we "have it", then we will find ways to get it improved! In fact, we are working at the new electromagnetic motor which base on the technology of our scanner motor already. By the way, is there a standard request on reaction speed(like 0.2 second or 0.1 second? Now are can make it around 0.02 second)of the shutter?

Another minor thing is the placement of the emission indicator LED. Where it is physically placed now, when the metal aperture cover is opened, it ends up covering the LED, making it a little useless.

GOOD SUGGESTION!!

I’ve not fully tested the features of your safety board built into the touch screen but, I know in order to get them legal, we’ve had to remove the DMX circuitry and bypass it all together. With DMX being built into the new touch screen board, it really means we have to eliminate the touchscreen all together.

Personally, now that I’ve had a chance to see it, regrettably, it’s not that useful for many serious laserists purposes. It appears that once you attach an ILDA cable, it overrides the touchscreen board so things like invert x and y can no longer be done at the projector. The color gain controls have no effect when it’s being used by an ILDA cable. I personally, and I’m sure many others you will find, MUCH prefer the physical switches on the back of the Pluto versus the touchscreen board. It’s a neat novelty but, in my opinion, not that practical unless you’re just running the projectors own built in programs or shows off the SD card – which most serious laserists don’ t do. For a nightclub installation or perhaps a mobile DJ, it may be fine but for a serious laserist, they’re going to use something such as Pangolin or Fiesta or some other sort of proper software control.

The scan safety board is standlone, we began to use the scan-fail safety board 1.5 years ago for European customers, just before we still don't have the touch screen board. Now we only move this board to have less cable connecting. Note: The scan-fail safety board is not control by CPU, we just add On/Off on touch screen. Is that a problem?

Granted, perhaps serious laserists are using higher end projectors more like the Ascent or Saturn or something like that and, you’ve intended to aim the Pluto at the DJ market – and that’s fine but, I’m just conveying the fact that a lot of us prefer the original Pluto design over the new touchscreen. Many are hoping to buy more Plutos in the near future and would like the option of going with the original design.

It’s your business and a worldwide market so, Lightspace can do whatever they want. I’m just offering the opinions and observations of a (happy) customer and one that I know is shared by a number of other customers.

this touch screen is the 1.0 version, it has more to come...

I will say that your customer service has always been excellent and Lightspace has been an absolute pleasure to work with.

We do appreciate your email and your comments on our products,Brad. We are always happy to deal with customer service, as they are giving us valuable suggestions to make our products improved!

Thanks so much!

Omar

[drm916]

I agree about physical switches on XY invert. THat is a required function in my opinion. And it should be available when an ILDA cable is connected.

[Bradfo69]

I agree about physical switches on XY invert. THat is a required function in my opinion. And it should be available when an ILDA cable is connected.

Just to clarify - yes, the invert of X and Y work using the touchscreen board even with an ILDA cable attached. What doesn't work though, is the brightness, scan rate, XY size and RGB gain sliders with ILDA attached.

[drm916]

Just to clarify - yes, the invert of X and Y work using the touchscreen board even with an ILDA cable attached. What doesn't work though, is the brightness, scan rate, XY size and RGB gain sliders with ILDA attached.

That is with the assumption that we keep the touchscreen. My implementation will eliminate all that stuff and will be replaced with a stanwax ilda board. So that means I have to then install my own physical switches. Not a huge deal but then I have to drill holes, wire in and label the projector. Not to mention that physical switches are much easier to hit in a dark venue when your projector is up in the air.

[Bradfo69]

Agreed. What I'd like to get a little more information on from Lightspace is the actual safety board they are now using and see how it compares with the Stanwax board. It sounds like (and I haven't looked) that they now incorporate a separate safety board into the Pluto (and have been for Europeans for 1.5 years). My two new Pluto's have the safety board installed. It's not "built in" to the touchscreen board although, what IS bult into the touchscreen is the ability to turn on/off the safety board. Not sure why you'd want to do that but, it's there.

[drm916]

Agreed. What I'd like to get a little more information on from Lightspace is the actual safety board they are now using and see how it compares with the Stanwax board. It sounds like (and I haven't looked) that they now incorporate a separate safety board into the Pluto (and have been for Europeans for 1.5 years). My two new Pluto's have the safety board installed. It's not "built in" to the touchscreen board although, what IS bult into the touchscreen is the ability to turn on/off the safety board. Not sure why you'd want to do that but, it's there.

You will want to turn it off to allow for static beams. For use with mirrors.

My variance specifically mentions the stanwax boards. So I have to stick with them. Also they have the daisy chain of the estops

[Bradfo69]

Mine does as well - (remember, we have the same certification specs) but, still, I'd like to know how the two boards actually compare.

[drm916]

Well.. Their safety board looks like it just is a scanfail. Not sure what other safety it could have. All the other stuff is on the normal board.