Wybron Forerunners to an ETC express board

[jakethejake]

I'm attempting to setup a forerunner color scroller system with my ETC express lightboard.

I saw a previous thread from 2009, that talked about a person having a similar problem (that is, they just aren't working) and they didn't go into much detail.

I'm setting them up to the second output universe. I saw on that other thread, that one person said this output had to be enabled on the board. That is my first issue, I cannot find how to 'enable' it. My dimmer # is 1024, so it seems it already is, but is there an extra step I'm missing?

I'm going from that 513-1024 out, to the power source in. Then going out to the color scrollers, for the purposes of this thread, lets just say 1. (although I am setting up a total of 6)


What I've done is to set the address to 1, which would correspond to 513 on the board. So I'm patching a channel with dimmer 513, to correspond to the scroller with address 1.

I'm getting no response from the scroller at all. There are 2 lights on the bottom, one is supposed to show that power is connected, and the other is supposed to show a proper dmx connection with proper address. The power light is on a constant red, while the other light slowly blinks a dim green.

Any suggestions? This is for a show coming up, so any help would be greatly appreciated!

 

[BobHealey]

Under Setup, on the Express, select Option 2, and make sure that the second output port actually starts at dimmer 513. I've never had any trouble with Forerunner + Express before. I have used them both as dimmers and with a custom personality (1 channel, 8 bit, LTP, Independent) so that people who like to ride the grand master won't scroll the color by accident.

 

[jakethejake]

I made sure to check that, and it does. Very strange...

 

[ScottT]

My dimmer # is 1024

Can you expand on this? What exactly do you mean?

 

[jakethejake]

I mean, when I go into setup, my maximum dimmers is 1024.

 

[hobbsies]

I've used wybron scrollers all the time on express boards. Id suggest taking down the psu and a scroller and plugging them into universe 1 and just try to get the scroller to work. Adress it to 1 and patch dimmer 1 to ch 1. Make sure the patch isn't profiled in any way. If bringing up ch 1 to 50% causes the scroller to move, it's likely a patching issue or dmx cable issue. If it doesn't move then there's a couple possibilities. 1: bad dmx cable, 2: bad psu, 3 bad scroller.

Use a diff 5pin dmx and test again. If it still won't work, use a diff 4pin dmx. Still nada then use a different scroller. If not then, its likely the psu. If the scroller works then the first scroller sucks.

 

[ScottT]

I've used wybron scrollers all the time on express boards. Id suggest taking down the psu and a scroller and plugging them into universe 1 and just try to get the scroller to work. Adress it to 1 and patch dimmer 1 to ch 1. Make sure the patch isn't profiled in any way. If bringing up ch 1 to 50% causes the scroller to move, it's likely a patching issue or dmx cable issue. If it doesn't move then there's a couple possibilities. 1: bad dmx cable, 2: bad psu, 3 bad scroller.

Use a diff 5pin dmx and test again. If it still won't work, use a diff 4pin dmx. Still nada then use a different scroller. If not then, its likely the psu. If the scroller works then the first scroller sucks.

Try this, then get back to us.