Hello,

I am currently having considerable trouble with my Christie CA21 automations. They are all still under warranty. The problem is that they are not functioning properly when the failsafes are down or drop. What follows are some examples to help isolate the problem. I believe that a new EPROM must be made to fix the problem.

- Failsafes do not seem to be recognized by the CA21 100% of the time. For example, a movie will start and the platter take up will fail. One of two things will happen. In the best case scenario, the projector stops and the house lights come up. But the alarm does not sound anywhere in the building. We have a 16 plex and if a platter fails on the other side of the building, we need to know. The status panel does not display that the failsafes are down. It just looks as if nothing has happened. Usually it is the customers who do the informing. Every once in a blue moon the alarm will sound, and the status panel will reflect that. Worst case scenario is that the movie starts, platter fails to take up, and the automation does not see the failsafes at all, continuing to motor the film onto the floor! This has happened. Yes, the failsafes are properly hooked up and I can recreate the problem on any automation in the building. When the automation is in "exit" mode, raising and dropping the failsafes is displayed immediately on the status panel, so there is an obvious software glitch.

-Another bad thing is that it takes 9 seconds after the show has started before the CA21 even begins to look for the failsafes. In my opinion, the show should not even try to start if even one failsafe is down. The result of this 9 second delay (when the failsafes are actually recognized by the CA21) is tons of leader and film on the floor.

-Another big issue is that of power surges. Every once in awhile the power will go out for 4 or 5 seconds and come back on. This is enough to stop the platters, but not enough to stop the CA21 from telling the projector to keep motoring when the power comes back on. Yes, tons of film on the floor, even though the failsafes are down. I have discovered that (through tests I have performed) that when the CA21 is running a program and is shut off, it must be shut off for at least 10 seconds or so before turning the unit back on. If you turn the unit back on before this amount of time, it will tell the projectors to keep going. This is bad. The CA21 needs to shut off the projectors and exit whatever program it is running if power is disconnected for even a split second. The alarm should also sound. This wouldn't be a problem if the CA21 was able to recognize the failsafes.

Basically what it comes down to is this--- the CA21 should not even try to run if the failsafes are down, but it does. And if the failsafes drop for any reason, the CA21 needs to know to stop at once, and an alarm would be nice.

Hopefully we can nip this thing in the bud and get it fixed. I am willing to give you as much information as possible and run any tests that you need me to so that we can remedy this problem. I'm sure that you are already wanting more information. But just so you don't have to ask, here are the sequence of events on our CA21's:

1. Motor Start (timed start)
2. (Cue on leader) Auto Start, lights mid, volume adjust.
3. Lights down. Dolby Digital (if applicable)
4. Volume adjust up
5. Lights mid
6. Auto stop, volume adjust.
7. Timed delay for worklights
8. Lights mid
9. EXIT

We do not motor the leader to the '9' mark when we thread. That is pointless. Just so you know how we do things. Lately the platters have not been failing, but this is a major issue anyway, and needs to be resolved. Thank you in advance for your time and effort.

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"Software engineer is investigating problem and possible solution.

Bevan"

"Bevan,
I'm looking into the "problems" and will report shortly.
Note that some of his described behaviour (or misbehaviour) is in fact
expected behaviour and that the "software glitch" mentioned for status
panels is in fact intended.
Anyway I'll go through the issues in turn, and let you know, but I accept
that a PROM change will be required for some of the issues.
Mark."

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