Control/Dimming Lost my DMX Iris control overnight, need help.

bcbIV

Member
Hey CB,

Came into my space today, and somehow between our rehearsal last night and this morning, my DMX Iris from City Theatrical has developed a calibration issue.

When troubleshooting I plugged in the 4-pin in from my ICue, it began its calibration (with a lot of racket) and then its "calibration failure" light starts to blink. After this Iris stays open, and my board does not control it, while the ICue still maintains its control (so I know its not DMX). Not entirely sure how to reset calibration.

ive swapped out with another iris, and the other one is providing the same error. Both of these were working yesterday and I find it highly unlikely that they are actually failing. I am just not sure what I am missing and am out of ideas.

Really need some help on this one, as soon as possible - as I've had to go without focusing my special all day.

any thoughts?
 
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My first guess would be the power supply. What power supply are you using ?

Try hooking up just the icue. Any difference? Hook up just the iris and not the icue. Any difference?

If one of them works correctly with no warnings or errors it's probably power supply. Even if there is no change it still could be a power supply issue.
 
Are these irises new? If so there may be some calibration that isn't documented in the user manual you need to do. I know this is sometimes the case with Apollo DMX Irises. Have never worked with a new City Theatrical one.

Beyond that, if the Iris is after the I-Cue in the chain of cable, I'd remove the cable from the I-Cue and plug it directly into the Iris. If the problem stops, then you know it is likely the cable between the I-Cue and Iris. Replace it. If the problem then persists after swapping out the cable, there is a problem with the I-Cue in passing power/data forward. You may need to to run a second cable to the PSU for the time being or swap out the I-Cue If the problem persists with the Iris directly plugged into the PSU, then remove the Iris and connect it directly into the PSU with a different cable than anything you've used so far. If the problem persists, it is likely the PSU. If it is resolved, then there is the possibility that the cable running to the I-Cue is bad.
 
Time for some clarification (being trapped in the middle of levels has prevented me from really being detailed.)

The Irises are not new unfortunately. They were purchased used from PRG. They have also been used in the past 3 weeks, and the one that intitially was the problem was working perfectly yesterday, and when i showed up in the morning to do my flash-thru, it no longer worked, YET NOTHING HAPPENED IN THE SPACE! The manual for the City Theatrical Irises is pretty weak, and doesnt really offer any suggestions regarding calibration.

When I noticed the Iris faulting, I could still control the ICue perfectly, I reversed the dataline (so instead of Dimmer-PSU-Icue-Iris, it ws Dimmer-PSU-Iris-Icue), the problem remained.

I then took the dmx accessories out of my Express' Universe 2 and added it to Universe 1. ICue still worked and Iris did not. I then plugged the PSU directly into universe 1 on the board(ensuring it wasnt any cabling issues) and the fault remained. I then grabbed another PSU cut out the I-cue, and just wired up the Iris. Nothing.

So, I am at a loss and am dying for some answers.
 
Two thoughts.

First you say your set up is "dimmer-psu-<device>". You will probably have better result if it is "power-psu-<device>. Ie powering the PSU through a dimmer is usually a bad thing. ( unless you have replaced a dimmer module with a relay style non-dim)

In terms of further debugging, what happens when you swap the good iris and the bad iris. Does the fault follow the iris or the location?
 
In the PC business, those of us 'privileged' to work with SCSI had a mantra:

It's the Terminator, stupid!

You haven't mentioned termination; do you have a hard-terminator on this run? If not, do you have one you can put in?
 
Time for some clarification (being trapped in the middle of levels has prevented me from really being detailed.)

The Irises are not new unfortunately. They were purchased used from PRG. They have also been used in the past 3 weeks, and the one that intitially was the problem was working perfectly yesterday, and when i showed up in the morning to do my flash-thru, it no longer worked, YET NOTHING HAPPENED IN THE SPACE! The manual for the City Theatrical Irises is pretty weak, and doesnt really offer any suggestions regarding calibration.

When I noticed the Iris faulting, I could still control the ICue perfectly, I reversed the dataline (so instead of Dimmer-PSU-Icue-Iris, it ws Dimmer-PSU-Iris-Icue), the problem remained.

I then took the dmx accessories out of my Express' Universe 2 and added it to Universe 1. ICue still worked and Iris did not. I then plugged the PSU directly into universe 1 on the board(ensuring it wasnt any cabling issues) and the fault remained. I then grabbed another PSU cut out the I-cue, and just wired up the Iris. Nothing.

So, I am at a loss and am dying for some answers.

Have you tried plugging the iris in while it's out of the unit and watching it calibrate? Does it open and close completely on it's own? I.E, is it a mechanical error or is it a logical error?
 

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