Followspots, oil, and smoke; oh my!

[rcopley]

I had a pretty experienced tech a few years ago (I think he may have been a light op for that show, but was experienced with almost every position) that did not like the amount of noise resulting from operating one of the spots so he thought it would be a good idea to use a drop of oil on the controls. That drop of oil got onto the spot's lamp and smoked like you would not believe. This was the same person who accidentally reset a lighting controller by trying to use his thumb as a key (don't ask me how he managed to do that, but that's another story for another thread). The spot itself was fine, we had to run it outside to allow the oil to burn off of the inside, and as you can guess the lamp was fried, but it runs fine.

 

[chris325]

Any technician with even the slightest bit of knowledge/experience should know that stage lighting gets hot, and oil is flammable.

I've seen stupid moves by experienced techs, but this is ridiculous.

 

[rcopley]

Any technician with even the slightest bit of knowledge/experience should know that stage lighting gets hot, and oil is flammable.

I've seen stupid moves by experienced techs, but this is ridiculous.

As I said, it happened a few years ago, so I may have gotten a couple of details wrong. It's possible he may have been using the oil for something else and a drop got in the spot, or he could of has a lapse in judgment because the show was about a week away and there was a lot that need to be done, who knows. I guess it could have been worse though, he could have decided to try it during a dress rehearsal.