Quote:
Originally Posted by jase
What is the reasoning manufacturers haven't done this? Manufacturers make the assumption that ALL users cool and turn off their camera each session?
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I can only speculate... First of all I haven't seen any evidence that thermal cycling damages seals: I've heard claims made by Brown of Apogee, but that could be an excuse to avoid fixing a thermal runaway problem while at the same time casting doubt on the integrity of the designs of his competitors as I mentioned yesterday. Clearly the air cooled Uxxx series has an airflow stagnation problem as we discussed. That obviously makes heat removal from the heatsinks less efficient than the way the Proline does it and the way the D09 does it (that appears to have adopted the same method used by the Proline which did it that way several years before the D09 was introduced). One thing is certain, it is a lot easier to make up a cock and bull story than it is to:
1) redesign the fans/heatsinks, test and deploy (cost $$$$)
2) deal with angry customers that want the 'fixed' version for free (and rightly so....)
it is much easier to claim you are the only one doing it right and the other guys are not... so long as no one can prove you are lying, of course....
So this entire 'thermal cycling causes seal damage' theory may be a case of chasing phantoms. But true or not, it should not be a big deal to change the control circuitry/microcontroller firmware to let the cooler run without turning on the clocks and power to the sensor.
Knowing the way the FLI guys operate, if anyone would be willing to do a customization, they would. I suspect all would do it if they thought it would bring in more business... But I rather strongly suspect this entire thesis about seals is a red herring. I'll go on record saying that I don't buy it and I have used lots of fancy cameras with big sensors over the years, and simply flip the switch off when I am finished: no damage...
I am currently overseas on biz but I have some reference material about the issue with ionizing radation/recombination for biased versus non-biased sensor storage that I should be able to make available. That is most definitely NOT a red herring.... however it will be about two weeks before I am home again and have access to my library
It would be a shame to see these observatory fellows damaging their sensors from radiation damage (leaving powered up) in order to avoid a suspected chamber seal hermeticity problem that really is a non-existent problem and was simply spin put forth by a cynical vendor that wants to avoid being held accountable for fixing what clearly is a demonstrable weakness in the cooling system mechanical design.
you can say what you want but Apogee's cooling behavior is singular in the industry and since I haven't seen a pile of trashed cameras sporting damaged seals or cracked sensors (their earlier party line position that they have since abandoned) from thermal cycling, I dare say there's more evidence piling up against the Apogee party line being true than evidence in support of it....
