Do I Have Any Options?

musictom

Member
Hi,
Again, my caveat is that I'm a sound guy, not a light guy, so pardon the stupid questions. :)
We recently pulled down some of our 15 y/o Strand Lekos, as they just weren't putting any light out (hardly) anymore. I decided to clean them all out and do the best I could at a bench focus.
As I opened up the first instrument, I was quite surprised to see what the reflector? (is that what this part of the instrument is called?) looked like. I'm assuming this should be a lot shiner, and not grey and bubbly? :)
So, my two questions: 1) Was this caused by somebody putting in too strong a lamp? I believe these are rated for 1K, and there was an FEL in the socket. More importantly, 2), is there anything that can be done to salvage this, or do I have a dozen instruments that I can now use for spare parts??
Thanks so much!!
Tom
 

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They're Alzak Aluminum and hate to say it, they're toast. Since they are rated for 1,000 watts my guess would just be that old age caused this. It happens. Curious, are these two different reflectors pictured? The reflector on the right looks like it has a larger center hole than the left one. Either way contact Strand, look on eBay ...etc. OR measure them and see if they're the same size as Altman's 360Q's. (Probably close at least). If you can't find the Strand parts (remembering the old saying "Strand-ed for Century-s looking for parts) You could probably retrofit Altman in a pinch. But yeah that would certainly cause poor output and they do need to be replaced.
 
Thanks for the info, Les. The two pictures are of the same reflector, just different angles. And the hole has become more of an oblongish opening, rather than circular.

I'll start looking around for replacements.

Tom
 
Yep, that’s no doubt toast. Non-pumice based metal cleaners or polishes, aluminum or stainless cleaners and non-residue glass cleaner at times can do some cleaning to reflectors but once the reflectors start to bubble up they have by than lost the reflecting surface in the area of this corrosion.

Could if you really wanted to give it the attempt at eeking out some light from them, try some metal polish with a car wax buffing wheel on a drill or grinder. Might be worth a try if you really work at it. At very least you could lighten up the discoloration. Almost as if something like heavy oil base fog fluid were burned into the reflector. Might clean up some but not much.

Strand might have this reflector still - note the honeycomb type reflector is a more 80's or 90's design to reflectors. Need to find and provide the model number / type of fixture when inquiring as to replacement reflectors. The lip on this reflector is different than that of a 360Q reflector but it might be possible to if no other reflectors are available, cut away some of that outer lip from a Altman reflector.

In seeing this, makes me wonder what the lamp base and wiring look like. I would suspect the lamp bases are also toast if not this burned in smoke is possibly from melted wire in the fixture. Or possibly if not fog fluid or melted wire, what someone at one point cleaned the reflector with in leaving a residue.

Should you clean the reflector with polish, remove/scrub off any residue from the polish with glass cleaner and a very soft cloth - something softer than a paper towel or dish cloth. Following that re-clean the reflector with denatured alcohol also scrubbing it. This should remove any residue.

Thoroughly inspect the wiring and lamp for discoloration, pitting and welding / heat damage and if bad replace them also. Trash the FEL lamps anyway out of principle, much better lamps on the market these days.
 
Thoroughly inspect the wiring and lamp for discoloration, pitting and welding / heat damage and if bad replace them also. Trash the FEL lamps anyway out of principle, much better lamps on the market these days.

Ship, thanks so much for the information. I'll definitely check out the wiring and the base.

And I already ordered replacement lamps last week, based on your posts I found doing an "FEL" search on this board!!!

Thanks,

Tom
 
Soft Scrub works wonders on metal reflectors. I use it directly on the reflector and use a paper towel. Be sure not to get it on your clothes b/c it will bleach them. I use softscrub on all of our metal reflectors and it leaves a nice clean bathroom smell :D.
 

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