GC-MS issue

[maldiniyan]

Hello, everyone, I need some advise to find out the problem of the 5975c MSD in our lab. It has been working good for three years, then suddenly it gives no signal when we are running our routine samples. One bad thing I can tell is that the light from the front panel window, which should always turn on when the MSD is switched on, is no longer on. Autotune doesn't give normal signals either. We called Agilent and was told we probably need to replace the side board inside the MSD, which costs $5000, but I highly doubt it will solve the problem.

Does anyone here experience the same issue and can give me some advise? Thanks!

[MSCHemist]

The light you speak of is called the filament and it is a consumable (they wear out and need regular replacement ~$125). YOur mass spec should have two one on top and on on the bottom. Try switching to the other one first from the tune menu. Next make sure all the wires are attached. to the filaments.

[BMU_VMW]

We called Agilent and was told we probably need to replace the side board inside the MSD, which costs $5000,

Wow good advise for a broken filament

[Peter Apps]

As an alternative hypothesis the light is the LED on the front panel. If this is dead then all sorts of other things propbably are as well. It could just be a faulty LED of course.

Peter

[MSCHemist]

As an alternative hypothesis the light is the LED on the front panel. If this is dead then all sorts of other things propbably are as well. It could just be a faulty LED of course.

Peter

Yea that was probably it. I'm sure Agilent tech support could troubleshoot a dead filament. If it was just a dead front instrument pannel the instrument should still be operable with the instrument software/computer. Therefore the electronics are probably boned. You could have your facilities electrician poke arround at it before replacing the whole thing. Otherwise I've seen refurbished boards arround for less than $5k alternately I'm sure one of the instrument refurb companies or perhaps Alpha Omega can see if they can fix it for a price.

[James_Ball]

As an alternative hypothesis the light is the LED on the front panel. If this is dead then all sorts of other things propbably are as well. It could just be a faulty LED of course.

Peter

Yea that was probably it. I'm sure Agilent tech support could troubleshoot a dead filament. If it was just a dead front instrument pannel the instrument should still be operable with the instrument software/computer. Therefore the electronics are probably boned. You could have your facilities electrician poke arround at it before replacing the whole thing. Otherwise I've seen refurbished boards arround for less than $5k alternately I'm sure one of the instrument refurb companies or perhaps Alpha Omega can see if they can fix it for a price.

Did they add an LED to the front on the 5975C model? My B model only has the alpha/numeric display at the top, no LEDs on it at all. I would assume the "light" that comes on each time the run begins would in fact be the filament lighting up, unless they did add an LED on the C models.

[Peter Apps]

Hi James

My guess that it was an LED (or could be the display panel) was that it "should always turn on when the MSD is switched on", which a front panel light does, whereas the filament only glows when a sample is actually being analysed.

Surely no service tech (even one with targets to meet) would recommend a new main board for a broken filament, would they

Peter

[James_Ball]

Peter,


I would certainly hope not, but I guess it depends how well the problem was explained over the phone.

[maldiniyan]

Thanks for your advise. We just replaced both filaments and this time the MSD works beautifully. However, the front panel light is still not as the same as before, I guess the LED light in the side board is also broken, but it doesn't affect the sample analysis. Does anyone know how to fix the LED light?

By the way, one weird thing is that ChemStation now ask for login information every time I restart the program. After several calls I was told the user name and password both are "manager".

Thanks again, everyone!

The light you speak of is called the filament and it is a consumable (they wear out and need regular replacement ~$125). YOur mass spec should have two one on top and on on the bottom. Try switching to the other one first from the tune menu. Next make sure all the wires are attached. to the filaments.

[James_Ball]

Thanks for your advise. We just replaced both filaments and this time the MSD works beautifully. However, the front panel light is still not as the same as before, I guess the LED light in the side board is also broken, but it doesn't affect the sample analysis. Does anyone know how to fix the LED light?

By the way, one weird thing is that ChemStation now ask for login information every time I restart the program. After several calls I was told the user name and password both are "manager".

Thanks again, everyone!

The light you speak of is called the filament and it is a consumable (they wear out and need regular replacement ~$125). YOur mass spec should have two one on top and on on the bottom. Try switching to the other one first from the tune menu. Next make sure all the wires are attached. to the filaments.

You have activated the security which is causing it to ask for the password each time. If you use the security menu item you should be able to deactivate it using the default password. We did this by accident once also, was worried I would have to reinstall the software lol.