b_Regal78 Posted December 7, 2010 Share Posted December 7, 2010 I have 4 commercially purchased IP65 rated DMX wash lighting fixtures. They are all setup to be independantly addressable. During my animated normal show, they run fine; however, this show only runs Thursday through Sunday. For the other three days, I run a "static" show where I repeat the show time every 30 seconds or so and the house gradually changes color every minute. The show itself only consists of this static sequence only, which lasts about 5 minutes before looping again. When I first turn on the static sequence, the DMX lights will be on anywhere from 30 to 60 seconds and then all 4 of them will shut off simultaneously. When the sequence loops the DMX lights will stay on a bit longer before all 4 shut down at the same time. After the static show has been running for 20 minutes or so, they seem to be working fine, more or less. Well, the DMX lights seem to stay on longer. When they are off, they may turn back on when the color change occurs. I understnd how DMX works and this makes sense, but my question is, why do they shut off in the first place. Note that this behavior is not seen on any standard type lights plugged into a LOR controller. Is it a temperature thing? (it's 25 degrees outside), and if so, is it the lights, or the iDMX? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-klb- Posted December 7, 2010 Share Posted December 7, 2010 Is your static show an animation sequence, rather than a musical sequence? Do you have more than one track, and items duplicated between tracks? Have you change the length of one of those tracks, (and only one) not realizing that unlike musical sequences, tracks in an animation sequence may be of different lengths?If that is not it, are your units 3 channel, or 5 channel? (RGB) (RGB, dim, strobe) Or some other channel config? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Fischer Posted December 7, 2010 Share Posted December 7, 2010 Ed:Just a sanity check: Can you bring up your DMX light static in the HWU DMX console, and leave them on for a few minutes and have them stay on?Just making sure there isn't an issue with the lights themselves... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
b_Regal78 Posted December 8, 2010 Author Share Posted December 8, 2010 It is a musical animation. I play a repeating annoucement of showtimes. As far as channel duplication, I'm using the same channel configuration. The lights themselves are 9 channel lights. I did use the hardware utility while I was playing with them inside and gave all four of them a good test (4 or 5 hour test, under different conditions, all colors on, each individual color on, and repeatively running through a test sequence). A difference here was I had them all set to the same address. Before I put them out on the lawn I did change the addresses and used the HU to verify the addresses, but at this point, they were not on long; only long enough for me to verify the channels.I was leaning towards something temperature related as it was nice and toasty during the test, but it is 20 degrees outside. I did check the manual to ensure that the lights could perform at that temperature and it is well within the limits.The reason whyI thought the lights work during my normal sequences as opposed to my static one was because the are always doing something, even if it is not much. That is, they are always receiving instructions. During the static musical sequence, they sit there on a single color for about a minute. I'm not sure if this is iDMX related, light related, or commincation related, but it is strange. It did make sure the LAN cables are as far away from the power cables as possible, and I am using an ELL to get from inside the house to the controllers / iDMX. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
terrypowerz Posted December 8, 2010 Share Posted December 8, 2010 Is the IDMX powered by the network or a separate power supply?It would be interesting to know if the IDMX is losing the "heartbeat" as well when the floods are dropping out. (is the light solid the whole time?) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
b_Regal78 Posted December 8, 2010 Author Share Posted December 8, 2010 It's powered by a controller. The unit itself is outside with the controller, cover by my pattened black plastic trash bag method, so I have no idea what the little blinky light is doing. Unfortunately, the controller that it is plugged into is used very sparingly so I can not correlate the controller activity to the DMX wash lights. The iDMX is mounted on a stand that supports 3 controllers. The information for the 3 controllers is received via an ELL. After the 3rd controller, the iDMX is the last item in that chain. Other controllers are fed LOR commands through other ELLs. So maybe your thinking the iDMX is losing communication with the rest of the LOR network and the light will be blinking at that time? I'll give it a look...in the cold...in the dark...by myself... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
terrypowerz Posted December 8, 2010 Share Posted December 8, 2010 Second thought... is this one event in the seq with the issue... or is it broken up so that there are several events. Time divisions)? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-klb- Posted December 8, 2010 Share Posted December 8, 2010 Just a comment, the iDMX is rated to -40, so I don't think temperature is likely to be a problem with it. But if you are collecting moisture in the bag, the iDMX might have an issue with condensation... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
b_Regal78 Posted December 9, 2010 Author Share Posted December 9, 2010 I checked for moisture and there is none, but I took the trash bag covering the controller / iDMX off anyway. As far as it happening the same time in the same sequence - no, it seems tobe a random thing. So, last night I sat outside in 20 degree weather with a bit of a breeze blowing staring at the little red light. Of course, watched water doesn't boil and wash lighting doesn't quit. Go inside, and BOOM! So I gave up on that said, it is what it is, but then I saw it occur on one of my sequences I was doctoring up for tonight. Carp...To top it all off, I lost the "red" in one of the lights (not a LOR problem, but a physical problem with one of the lights itself). So, now I am left with 2 problems... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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