CurtPalme.com Home Theater Forum

[Nashou66]

I just received some Marquee 8 inch tubes in the housings and are mint. I have no experience with LC units and want to know if its common for the Bellows to seep through when pushing on them.The rubber feels nice and firm but has this slight sweating of glycol only when pushed on. I wont be using the tubes for a long time and when i do they will be Ceiling mounted so if there is a chance of Glycol leaking more it wont get into the boards. So should I be concerd when I get to that point and for storage should I remove the Glycol and flush out the chamber. the glycol is nice and clear as well, so i could save it but how should this be stored as well.

I aslo bought a set of HD10's as well they came form a 1292. the sicker only says HD10's no other letter, what exact type is this in quality and possible change of throw distance compared to the HD10F's and HD10E's and HD10 GT17's. I read through the lens sticky but cant get a real idea of what actual users may have noticed.
And I think I gat a great deal too 825 for the whole deal...Shipped!!!


Athanasios

[PaulB]

My bellows certainly had sweat on them when I first got the pj but the sweat did not get any worse when the bellows were pushed.

The bellows are actually quite thick, 1 maybe 2mm so I'd be surprised if just pushing them made any liquid squeeze out, they are porous but not that porous - sure its just not condensation or maybe surface glycol just gathering where you pressed?

I eventually changed mine out but to be honest, cleaning the outside with a cloth would probably have been just as effective (after changing the glycol for fresh). I had other issues with contamination and a C-Element change that made me decide to change out the bellows, not a difficult job but time-consuming (easy compared to the magnets ) I have heard that they do sort of leak more the older they get but that might just be a build-up of sweated glycol rather than an increase in the amount actually sweating out if you follow me. I'm sure I read it was something like a 5 year life span or something but maybe someone else can confirm. Mines were about 10 years old and seemed in pretty good shape, I wouldn't change them unless there was a definate problem.

Try to look in the tube face with a torch to see if the bottom of the glycol fill holes are corroded or have silver looking bubbles coming out, thats the dreaded aluminium filler hole plague that marquee's suffer from. You may recall various threads on how to (possibly) prevent this (stainless steel screws, locktite etc).

If all does indeed look good then I wouldn't bother changing the glycol. Should store just fine if kept out of direct light.

[Nashou66]

Thanks Paul, I'll look for the corrosion at the filler screws, it doesnt come out right away when I push , I have to hold it in for a few secondes before the very tiny droplets form. And it is glycol (slippery greasy feel).

Athanasios

[PaulB]

Hmmm, let me try that, wait one.

Nope, not a drop! And your right, greasy is glycol. Possibly you could vent the bellows, they should be soft to touch and not too firm - too firm means it could be overfilled with glycol. It could be its getting forced out by being too pressurised. My glycol level is just below the filler screw holes, I followed the advice on this forum about venting the chambers http://curtpalme.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=6522&highlight=vent

If you vent, take care - I had large spurts from all my tubes when I opened the filler screws! I took the precaution of using lots of paper towels and cloth towels to surround the holes and cover the rest of the tubes and it still caught me out by the sheer volume of glycol that came out.

Once you start doing the shleimflug thing, it adds pressure on the bellows so having an air-gap allows the bellows to absorb any squeezing by pushing out air instead of liquid through the pores - air molecules are smaller than liquid (obviously) and having left a sufficient air-gap in the chamber the bellows can be squeezed without causing damage to either the bellows (forcing out glycol) or in-extremis possibly the tube-face.

[PaulB]

HD10's, if they are straight HD10's, are not as good as G17's or the 10F's - More here http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=759316 and likely more here on Curts site. Straight 10's are bottom of the league but still actually quite good. HD10L's are better but only good for smaller screens. Of course the best are the HDQ900. The better lenses it is said improve upon overall focus especially in the corners.

I've only tried 10's and 10L's and can only go by the good and authorative experience of others on the other lenses.

Essentially, a modded marquee needs at least GT17's I would suspect to get the best out of the mods. I'm guessing here but I think your H144's are the 8inch equivelent of HD10F's ? And you will know how good HD144's are over the, what is it HD8's or something?