Monday, June 14, 2010

Singer RoToR Fixup

You may remember the Singer RoToR, our colony replicator. This is a great device, but recently it has been erratic in lifting on of the plate lids.

We contact the nice people at Singer who sent us instruction on how to tune the sensor on the arm. This is very similar to an issue we had in the past with device after it was filled with agar. Tuning the sensor solved the problem but it would reappear.

Last week we got an email from Ian at Singer that he believes the problem is with a faulty relay in the electronic board. It turns out that the device (which is very thoughtfully  designed) comes with a spare relay. Ian sent us detailed instructions on how to fix this. The only problem was that it required opening the back panel --- meaning that we need to move the device.

We opened the instructions for securing the arm and plates. Fixed everything in place, again the design was such that given the instructions it was a piece of cake. We then moved the whole device onto a table.


Removed the back panel,

and switched the old relay with the spare one.


In 10 minutes we had the device back on the original table and working.

I can't say enough how impressed I am with the design and operation of the RoToR. It looks as though every aspect was thought of in advance, including how to best guide remote operators in dealing with issues and fixing problems. I'd wish some of the other devices we bought were that well thought out.

Ian also noted that they came up with a new board that does not requires these relays which can fail. So sometime soon we will do an upgrade to the new board. Given the ease of maintenance of the device, I am looking forward to that.

No comments: