Dear Pat, I too am shocked by the extra-long lifetimes the current batch of MM filaments have. I've had filaments in both our instruments (a M007 and an M007 hf) since August and they are still going strong.
Not long ago I would replace a filament before it blew if I knew there was an important data collection scheduled on the same instrument. It used to be 12 - 16 weeks on average, on this occassion it's over 30 weeks for each filament. Good to see we are getting our money's worth ;) Mark _____________________________________ Dr Mark Agacan Scientific Officer, Division of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Microbiology, Wellcome Trust Biocentre, College of Life Sciences, Dow St., University of Dundee, Dundee, DD1 5EH Tel: +44 1382 388751 Fax: +44 1382 345764 _____________________________________ >>> Patrick Bryant <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 28/02/07 1:18 PM >>> Dear Colleagues, During more than three years of operation, I have recorded considerable difference in filament lifetimes on my Micromax007: roughly in the range 500-2000hrs. Some of this may be accounted for by poor manufacture and Rigaku have, in the past, noticed this problem and replaced some filaments. For the last three filaments fitted, two have lasted about 500hrs and the third about 2000hrs. These filaments were replacements. My generator running protocol has been constant throughout. Interestingly, the filaments show no visible sign of wear or damage (even the 2000hr one) and are only changed when the generator starts to shut down on OL or FC limits. I recall earlier Rigaku generators that would give 2000hrs when well maintained and they ran at 5.4KW compared to the 800W of the Micromax. I would be grateful for any comments or suggestions from other Micromax operators. Sincerely, Pat Bryant Dr Pat Bryant Senior Experimental Officer Macromolecular Crystallography Core Facility Faculty of Life Sciences Michael Smith Building The University of Manchester Oxford Road Manchester M13 9PT, UK Phone: +44-161-275-5090/5658 Fax: +44-161-275-1505 email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Intranet:http://www.intranet.ls,manchester.ac.uk/facilities/research/xraycrystallography Internet:http://www.ls.manchester.ac.uk/research/facilities/xray
