Chromatography Forum

Has anyone replaced an EM in an Agilent 5973N and used the ETP brand (Restek sells them)? Opinions? The price tag shows a significant savings but if they're not as rugged or they don't work as well in the first place, it's not worth it.

I'm just looking for some advice here. Thanks.

I have replaced all of my 5973 and one of my 5975 with them and they work great. They seem to last longer and start out normally with less than 1000v needed for tuning. First time I ever tried it the default was 1200v and it would always fail autotune until I saved an atune at 900v before starting autotune.

The only thing you want to do is watch the clearance on all of the connections, some of the wires on them get very close to grounding, but once you see where those spots are it is easy to make sure they are not touching anything.

I replaced the one in our 2004 Agilent 6890N/5973inert system with an ETP 01/16/15. I'm tuning at 1388EV at present. Its used exclusively for 8260 P&T volatiles. I bought mine with a core exchange from Full Spectrum Analytics for $1100 plus over night shipping charges. Thats lower than present RESTEK. But it was also 3 years ago.

Edit: I'm also running a EPT in my 5971 system which gets a lot less use. I think that one has been in there since 8/24/2011.

Edit2: Just realized the higher RESTEK price includes their mount. Their present cost for just the detector is pretty comparable.

Been using ETP multipliers since they first came out for the 5970s. I highly, highly recommend them over other options available on the market.

Another thing to think about, Agilent used those multipliers in their 7500 series ICP-MS units and ABSciex uses them in their LC/QQQ units.