Well for the last 3 days I have been building my pj box and positioning everything and i fired her up today and watched an episode of Naruto (ep 94 divx). I found some issues that have prompted me to ask the following questions...Does any one know of what would cause black lines to manifest on the screen? These lines don't go all the way across just in the middle of the screen and there are two of them, one at 1/4 from the top the other at 1/3 from the bottom... The other is that the picture is too big to fit in my room does anyone know how to shrink it? Now I have some bright spots and dim spots and have noticed that my lenses are not perfectly flat (the collector is kind of belly out in the center, would it be all right to place another sheet of lexan for this lense and clip it together so it remains flat? Would this fix my bright and dim spots? I have not attached my reflector yet and was wondering if this would in fact double my image brightness because my room has a 100 watt bulb and it kills my picture. i am also wondering if any one else is having trouble firing up their Ushio bulbs with the M59 ballast. I thought i had it going great but then it started acting up on me and now it fires up when ever it wants to and most times it doesn't want to so i had to go to home depot and buy one of their metal halide bulbs :angry: Does any one know how i could add a pulse striker to my M59 to light my Ushio bulb? Now I also noticed that on the inside where my projecion lense goes I get a blurry bright image of the bulb and it does not hit the center of my projection lense. i'd say its off bout a 1/2 inch low. Does this bright spot notbeing in the center of my projection lense affect the brightness of my image output? Should I cut another piece of wood and aim for this spot centered? The reason i ask is because i centered my lense with the center of the collecter (Theoreticaly any way and was wonderng where the blurry image cast on the inside of my PJ came from (i know it is the collection of light creating an image but was i supposed to get this inside my PJ? ) Also would like to say that the lexan is handling the heat great I recoment it to everyone and it also has a coating for UV so no need to worry... I found a diagram on a m155/135 ballast and it shows the attachment of the igniter blue/red/white wires to the coil and bulb. Could i also do this with the m59 coil http://www.venturelighting.com/VLPS/Ballas...MH/V90J7612.pdf
It looks like the blue goes tied to a wire that is in the coil though...hmmmm... Well thanks guys for your help I'll check up on here tomorrow morning and read what you have answered.

Thanks

Ezra

God, thaks for LumenLab and these awesome projectors...

Aligning everything and flattening your fresnel should help with bright/dim spots. I would think that glass would be better for mounting the fresnel as it it more ridgid than lexan and would probably do a better job of flattening it (mount to grooved side per Brain). Also hotspots are minimized by adjusting your lense/lamp distances(I am unsure of which adjustment is most critical) but not until you have everything aligned first. You should have an image projected centered and just covering your triplet on the inside. I don't think you want to try to tap an ignitor to your ballast unless you are skilled in winding transformers. I still have my doubts about the M59 ballast and a pulse strike bulb. Brain has had great results with his setup but the lighting industry will tell you it won't work. Possibly they say that because the M59 will not always light a pulse start lamp even if it usually does. Then again, you have unusually stressed your ballast with your capacitor experiment so you may not have a typical situation. You may need to buy a new ballast, whether you buy another M59 or an M135 is up to you. Personally I would get the M135(hiddirect.com $65) as any lamp change in the future would likely be a pulse strike. I think Brain will say that the M135 is not needed and he is not often wrong, but if you've got the extra $20 it can't hurt to get the recommended ballast for that bulb.

As to the lines on your projection, that could be a little scary. Do you see those lines on the LCD or just on the projection? If they are on the LCD you may have damaged your edge connectors. When that happens the lines usually cross the entire screen. I am unsure if you can have segments of lines with a broken edge connector. I don't think so but without a complete understanding of an LCD's matrix I would not be able to make that call.

Good Luck.

[eidt] Oh yeah, There are only two ways to shrink your picture, move your projector closer to the screen or buy the new varifocal zoom and matched fresnels from the Lumenlab store. You will have to lengthen your box, but if you plan to use this in church this may be your only option. The lense is kind of pricey but is a good value and you won't find better anywhere.

I have continued to work on my projector and am happy to update that i have corrected the lines problems i was having earlier. There was no damage to my lcd and it was not that there was anything wrong with my projector... (emberassed to admit but remaning honest at the cost of pride he continues) It turned out the old Pojector screen i was using had some folds kinked in a long time ago and it was these folds that I was seeing as black lines. This is why they were in the center and did not extend farther...The old Screen I'm using measures 8'*6' and my projection extends 1' further on the right and 2' on the left and is 3' on my celing. I continued to work on my projector and cut the notch on my norpro bowl and then made a mounting bracket for it. I also forgot to set the brightness and contrast levels the first time and now i have a much brighter image I also think i had the collecter backwards because i flipped it over (groves facing the lcd) and I no longer have bright and dim spots I have now watched Initial Sage D 4th Stage Ep4, Prince Of Tennis Ep125, HunterxHunter GI FInal Ep12, and am now watching Tantei Gakuen Q Ep21 (its running in the background as I type this) I thank you DeathRay64, I don't believe I have any issues with my ballast as it fires up my phillips MH bulb. This one has a shorter life span 12k hours and a lower lumen output 29k as it is a universal burn. I am all out of money now and need to get paid in order to get one of those M135 ballast. I will be ordering one later in the month and will get that ushio up and running... but for now i will settle with what i have working. Thanks Brian for such a great projector. i can't imagen how many hours it must have taken to get all this thought out and executed. It must have been a real pain sometimes and I thank you and your wife, especialy her for letting you put so many hours and so much $ into developing this awesome project.

A greatful and very happy

Ezra López

Well guys it 5.35AM here in lubbock and im still awake...Why? Because i wanted to finish already! This is so cool I get to type on my wall and its just neat to be able to have control of such a large screen Well I am now about 95% done as I just need to buy hinges for the covers and it looks like i may have to recut my projector lense's board because im off by maybe a 1/2 inch. Now this part i dont understand as i measured everything twice/thrice because i wanted to get it right the first time... my collector lense is creting an image at 4.5 inches from the inside floor. Now the math says that this is not possible because the center of the lense is (Oh wait a minute... I just got it... I know now why my image is not centered. Its because I forgot that the image is flipped and thus i need to measure from the celing down to where the image will be projected... I am actually a full inch off from thecenter of the projected image. Doh! Well my cousin is asleep so i cant' do any cutting but i'll cut it in the morning/afternood when i wake up and try to get some hinges by gathering all my change See you guys later!

Ezra

I've been running the pulse strike on the M59 with no issues...I really suspect your ballast.

Glad you got your projector running!

hold on ! before you re-cut the lens hole try lifting up on the forward ferensal. it should move the bright spot up and you can see if the result is any better.

Well guys i corrected the incorrect-image-height-on-the-projection-lense problem it turned out to be that i had my bulb half an inch too high, so i removed a half inch from the sup[port and got it centered where it was supposed to be. Brian, would you mind testing my bulb? i could mail it to you in the box i got and then i would know for sure if it was my ballast that wasn't doing its job. email me your address and i'll ship it out tomorrow or does any one near lubbock have an M59 that would be willing to test my bulb? The reason i dont think its my ballast is because it has no issues with the normal bulbs. however, if it is my ballast then i might as well get the m135 that DeathRay64 suggested or the one i am really looking into is the m47 for the 1000w MH. The price seems to be 135 plus shipping and about 50 for the bulb sh included... Today i was talkin to my greek friends about my PJand they said they would have me make them one for their restaurants only if they could be seen in a bright room. I pointed out the cheaper price and maintenace but they pointed out that a 60 inch projection could be seen across the room regardless of the inner lighting. So I now ask what it would take to condense teh image projected to a brighter one (dif fres lenses/optics) or leave the optics alone and resort to brute lumen force (1000watts). I want this projector to be brighter Help me guys...

Ezra

now 97.5% complete and 97.5%happier

That's awesome Ezra. I can't wait to get mine that far along. I'm going to start a new post with the beginnings of my pj project.
Dave

Be happy to test your lamp on my M59 coil. Email on the way.

Thanks Brian the bulb will go out to you tomorrow Now and update! Today I not go to work or leave the house (except to get something to eat) and have been watching movies on my PJ (Hidalgo,Monalisa Smile (GF requested), paycheck, Master Comander, and out of time. Now the movies have been great but I noticed and am anoyed at the lcds response time because i see these little black lines that move about as the pixels change color. Also am anoyed at the lcds color palate because even though this unit is rated at 16bit there are some colors it just can't or does not render correctly on my screen. Most times it has to do with hues of colors like a shading from brown (people) to black (shadows on their necks, cheeks, eyes) look Ugly! Does any one how to correct this issue? I am using my NVDVD player to watch these movies and have played around with the color/hue/brightness/contrast and have set the monitor for 100 brightness, 50 contrast and 9300k color. My video card is set at 1024*768 16bit color with a trinitron compatible 9300k color managment. Brian is the unclean coloring because i am using a PC? If I were to use an N6 would the colors be rendered corectly by my monitor?

Thanks

Ezra

Hey pebblejorge call me at 239-5049 (cell) or 684-5475 (home) so you can come over. Maybe you could give me some help/ideas on how to fix this color thing, you might even be able to explain it better than me....

Oh yeah, Does this MH lamp work something like a florecent that pulses faster than my eyes can see? because if so what i may be seeing is the response time (black lines) in slow motion or at least to the point that i can now see them. Hey your refreshrate does not affect LCDs does it? Im at 60hz should i move it up?

Ezra...again...

The black lines are just scan lines (interlacing)....you see them more in action scenes right?. You aren't using a progressive scan dvd player. The color temp should be way closer to 6500k, but ideally you would create a profile specifically for your projection. This would allow you to fine tune the color to your lamp temp.

Well I can see why you would call them scanlines but they appear more when there is black than anything else. When there is a lot of action you cant see them but they really stand out when there is little movement. I have switched the color profiles to 6300k and they are much better now. I have 100 brightnes and 100 contrast. I am watching paycheck rightnow and will update on how much better or worse this one looks like. Master and comander was really ugly do to the darkness in the movie and the lcds inablity to render shades/shadows well.

Ezra

Ill be back...