I want to buy six TECHNOBEAM made in 1998. Are there problems known on the machines manufactured this year there? Are they good machines? I am sorry, but my English is very bad because I am French.
I have 16 Technobeams, manufactured in several different years. The problems I find seem to be common to all designs. First off: the LED displays. Out of 16 I have only 4 with full LED's. They tend to break off at the pins soldered to the circuit board from the stress of opening and closing the cover. It's an easy fix, but it is very annoying. Also the buttons next to the LED panel... They fall off sometimes, and when they do a tiny metal disc falls out, flutters to the stage, never to be seen again. Now the button doesn't work. I have 6 out of 16 fixtures that are missing buttons... some of those don't even have working displays, but I've determined the channels they've been addressed to and work around it until I find time to fix them. I've found that the FX wheel has a tendency to lose alignment in older fixtures, giving you the "eye" shaped beam. I've also found that fixtures running the older software (v15.xx) sometimes begin to lose "home" position, ie: the pan and tilt settings are off by a bit after a few hours running. My number one complaint is the mounting hardware. There are three hex-head screws and one handle-screw on each side which screw into a flat bar which is mounted so it can slide along a channel in the fixture. Both the screws and the threaded holes in the bar tend to get cross-threaded and destroyed very quickly if the mounts are moved often. ...oh yeah: there is a plastic cylinder mounted next to the focus lens carriage. I've had it break off of 2 fixtures after a trip on a very rough road. One of them jammed the focus carriage causing the motor to burn out... Despite these problems though, I enjoy working with my Technobeams. They are a fast, versatile fixture with nice intensity and rich color. Plus they are light and easy to wrestle around while standing on a ladder. They are the most practical mirrored fixture I've used for club shows and small arenas. For the money, they're great.
I have 16 Technobeams, manufactured in several different years. The problems I find seem to be common to all designs. First off: the LED displays. Out of 16 I have only 4 with full LED's. They tend to break off at the pins soldered to the circuit board from the stress of opening and closing the cover. It's an easy fix, but it is very annoying. Also the buttons next to the LED panel... They fall off sometimes, and when they do a tiny metal disc falls out, flutters to the stage, never to be seen again. Now the button doesn't work. I have 6 out of 16 fixtures that are missing buttons... some of those don't even have working displays, but I've determined the channels they've been addressed to and work around it until I find time to fix them. I've found that the FX wheel has a tendency to lose alignment in older fixtures, giving you the "eye" shaped beam. I've also found that fixtures running the older software (v15.xx) sometimes begin to lose "home" position, ie: the pan and tilt settings are off by a bit after a few hours running. My number one complaint is the mounting hardware. There are three hex-head screws and one handle-screw on each side which screw into a flat bar which is mounted so it can slide along a channel in the fixture. Both the screws and the threaded holes in the bar tend to get cross-threaded and destroyed very quickly if the mounts are moved often. ...oh yeah: there is a plastic cylinder mounted next to the focus lens carriage. I've had it break off of 2 fixtures after a trip on a very rough road. One of them jammed the focus carriage causing the motor to burn out... Despite these problems though, I enjoy working with my Technobeams. They are a fast, versatile fixture with nice intensity and rich color. Plus they are light and easy to wrestle around while standing on a ladder. They are the most practical mirrored fixture I've used for club shows and small arenas. For the money, they're great.
