We experienced two interruptions over the weekend. Fortunately, and as luck would have it, I reveiwed our booth procedures with the operators at a Saturday morning meeting, so everything went smoothly.

I'm curious to know what your procedures are, not only from the standpoint of the booth, but down on the floor as well.

Also, our Director of Operations was present Saturday night and got some interesting comments from patrons (Are we going to see the show? Are you going to start the movie over? Where shall we go?).
Any anecdotes on your experiences?

Do most theatres have surge suppressors or other protection against nearby lightning strikes? How many have backup generators or UPS units for critical electrical and computer systems?

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If there is a partial outage (some lights work, others don't, etc.) someone should race to the AC breakers and turn them off.

Surge supression at the main entrance makes good economic sense.

And don't forget to turn off the popper ... hey, is something burning?

[I disclaim all liability resulting from the use of these procedures]

Yesterday there were thunderstorms and we had 4 power surges. In one instance Shrek switched to non-sync and it was a few minutes before sound was restored. The customers wanted the film "rewound", as they always do. A manager asked me to cut the film (already 10+ minutes into the feature) and restart it from the beginning but I had to say no. We were likely to have more power surges (which we did), and I was getting behind schedule as it was.

quote:

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What usually happens is some of the movies will shut down, and others will switch to non-sync but keep running.

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As soon as the lights flicker, all staff run and check all screens. If we do find a xenon that needs restruck we have to wait for the bulb to cool sufficiently to restrike. we could change the tappings on the rectifier to give us a higher strike voltage, but we'd have to wait then for the rectifier to lose charge enough to work on it safely, so it's 6 and half a dozen! Never had any other probs, though, with automation changing to nonsync or anything else.

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Make sure you have all three phases before you attempt to restart them. This is easy to determine. Does everything come on? If it does, chances are you will be OK. If roughly about 2/3d's of everything comes on, you can safely say, "Houston, We Have A Problem", and you better scramble to shut down all your three phase units if you have not previously done so. Otherwise, you more than likely wind up toasting your HVAC compressors or any three-phase motor you have in the building.

Usually, if you just drop one phase, the motors will continue to run under these circumstances, but will shortly self-distruct due to overloading. Most 3 phase motors are very unforgiving about operating with one phase missing, unless they are impedance protected.

Although "phase rotation" is usually not that important for HVAC compressors, it is important for blower motors and three phase motor-generator sets.

We have had the power company apply power with phase rotation accidently reversed. Our MG set for the black stick carbon arc lamphouses ran backwards, and did not produce enough current to light a firefly. So happens the lamp vent was also a 3 phase motor. It ran backwards, too.

HVAC units don't really care if their compressors run backwards or not.

So, make sure all your motors are running in the correct direction. A squirrel cage tumbler will blow air no matter which direction it is running. But, if it is running backwards, the amount of air it will move is almost ziltch!

OK - wrong thread for this, but it still fits power bumps.

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