Shapna Mazumder wrote:


> I am having problem with the Conflo Reference Injection Valve.  The reference
> valve for N2 is very sluggish going into the inject position, it stops halfway
> and then creeps down.  Due to this std dev is all over the place when running
> Std ON/OFF's.  Don't know what effect it will have when running samples.  The
> solenoids are working fine.  Air Pressure is OK at 60 psi.  Greatly appreciate
> any help in fixing this.  Thanks in advance.

I had one of my pneumatic valves fail early in the life of one of my
Conflo IIs. You can 'test' it by manually trying to push the suspect one
down and then try one of your known good ones. On mine I could really
feel the snag in the cylinder. It would randomly stop anywhere from half
way down to all the way down. Unfortunately, Finnigan/Thermo used valves
that were only available in Europe (I'm in North America BTW). There was
no direct North American replacement at the time, from either the
original manufacture or anyone else. There was nothing even close
really. And to get one from Europe was going to take over 3 weeks, and
that was directly from the manufacture. For whatever reason, they don't
like to sell their European products directly to US customers. Getting
it from Finnigan turned out to be even worse, since its not a part they
stock. In the end it would have been quicker for me to take a row boat
to Italy, break into their factory, make one myself, and then row home.
So, if that is what has failed, be prepared to be down for weeks, unless
someone on this continent has started stocking them, or the company that
made them is a little more agreeable on doing priority/rush shipping of
their exclusive European products.

Howard


--
Howard Sanford
919-513-3039
North Carolina State University
Dept. of Soil Science
Box 7619
3114 Williams Hall
Raleigh, NC 27695
http://www.soil.ncsu.edu/services/sims/