Automated Fixtures Mac 250 with DMX issue

ocafully

Member
Hey Lampies.
I have 2 Mac 250 Entours which have identical DMX problem.
The issue is when the fixture is free from DMX, everything is fine. but as soon as I plug DMX, it will change home position and loose control from the board.
These 2 fixtures probably had bad DMX signal while it was on the rig, but my colleague told me bad DMX won't damage fixture itself.
I checked with other DMX line, continuity test from port to PCB, changed PCB to what I believe to be new, cleaned those DMX ports. soldering for sensor? for DMX seems nice and firm I haven't changed this one.
Its version is 1.8.0. The PCB is for 250Kr, but I was told they share the same PCBs.
I'm totally stuck..... Has anyone got any ideas what I can do anymore?
 
The address I'm using is perfectly fine, I use the address for different shows and they are fine....

but I changed the port, and one of the fixture resolved its original problem... now it gives me HOT error... will investigate.
The port looked absolutely fine, so it was weird....
Thank you for your advice, tho!!! Really appreciated!!!
 
Mac250's and 300's have abnormal behavior if their heat sensors go bad. I have a couple 300's that have suspicious behavior I've come to learn is likely just a cooked sensor that needs to be replaced.

Not sure that's your issue, but supposedly the 300's and 250's share this long-term maintenance problem.
 
As silly as it sounds your hot issue may be resolved this way. Open the side arm that has the ignitor card in it, you should see two wires come from the base where the ballast is to the card, then two going out to the lamp. If memory serves me correct they are blue and brown and they create your signal flow from ballest->ignitor card-> lamp base. Take a precision screw driver and make sure that these cables are really snug going into the card, I think there are terminal block they go into. As weird as it sounds if one of those cables is lose, is not really snug to the connection the fixture will give a HOT error. I had a ton of these in a club back in the day and it was a common problem.
 
Another thing with your finicky fixtures if your running data in a lighting network or any kind of installed infrastructure and you get weird dmx issues, run your data direct out of the console, easy way to see if the issue is from the console or somewhere in between console and fixture.
 

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