About EUROSCAN Series
EUROSCAN series were being produced by Electron LTD Company, based in Athens – Greece. Started back on 1978, Electron is a very successful company, designing and exporting to more than 65 countries Lighting Management Systems, like its famous Dimmer Packs.
Nowadays, Electron produces LED management systems, for architectural lighting. At late 80’s, the first line of Euroscan series came at the discos, pubs, bars and concert venues and TV studios, all over Greece. Simple design and projection characteristics, the moving mirror fixtures offered a few gobos and colors, while the most successful of them were using Osram HTI 400 lamps, together with their bigger brothers, those with MSR 1200 Philips lamp. DMX control wasn’t available yet to these models, they used their own console and their programming abilities were connected on the model of their lighting console.
The second generation of scanners arrived later, with their yellow strip on their sides, making them differ from their predecessors, which had red line instead. The chassis was the same, but they offered more color and gobo choices. Later on, the “smarter” Euroscans arrived with DMX512 control, rotating gobos, prisms, motorized focus, zoom and CMY color mixing.
Since 2011, I am searching and collecting abandoned scanners, from the Euroscan Series. Their age differs depending on the model and year of production. Nowadays, they are between a range of 22 – 18 years old. The flagship of those series was the Euroscan Zoom FX, which I was lucky enough to see it, back on 2003. This scanner was huge, the biggest one I’ve ever seen. Bigger than scanners from ClayPaky or Martin. The extreme size of the fixture were causing it to twist during transport and installation, so the positions of the optical sensors of the effect wheels were misplaced. It was a torture for the technicians and riggers back then, according their descriptions!
In spite its functional issues, I would love to have that masterpiece in my collection. Until that moment, I wasn’t able unfortunately, to recover one of them.
But, I’m keep on searching!
Restoration Projects
2011, I think it was February, when I got the first vintage lights. They were two Euroscans HTI 400 with their console. That model offered 15 gobos, 15 colors with a shutter for black out and strobe effects.
The lack of experience in repairs and my fear of damaging these already tired by time and usage fixtures, I decided not to completely disassemble the fixtures, just to clean them internally and paint them externally, without tearing apart the chassis completely.
It was a poor quality of work, at least the internal clear, but that changed 5 years after, when I’ve changed the fans with new and I performed a detailed clean. Well, better late than never!
The fixtures were in a perfect condition, as they worked in a rental company and never in a club or venue.
As about their light performance, ballasts were replaced and reflectors were installed with GY 9.5 holders, in order to accommodate an MSD 250 metal halide lamp. HTI 400 lamp was not an option, because of its extremely high price. Their light performance is not bad at all with the MSD-250 lamp.
The first couple
The Compacts
After a long pause, but not inactive in lighting, I got another couple, the Euroscan Compacts. It was February of 2014. They were tired and damaged by usage, installed in a night club, the fixtures were full of dirt from nicotine and all the shiny metals were yellow. 3 to 5 motors were working, but luckily the electronic board worked properly.
There were 3 variations of that model depending of the lamp source: The halogen HLX 400 and the metal halides HSD 200 and MSR 400. The MSR 400 version was a disaster, as it was extremely powerful lamp for such small chassis with poor airflow.
The models that I’ve got had the HLX halogen lamp, so it was extremely easy to upgrade them with an MSD 250 lamp. The scanners were working nicely, but I didn’t like the temperature that the chassis was reaching. So months after, I downgrade them to an HQI 150. The scanners have a decent light output, while the temperature is at below normal levels.
The Compact model offers 5 colors and 11 gobos, plus a shutter for black out and strobe effect.
Euroscan 3 MSR 1200, or the King of Euroscans, as I love calling it, was my first challenging restoration. The fixture was operating in to an open air summer club by the sea. It was exposed to dust and humidity and sometimes even to rainy conditions.
The corrosion was deep, many bolts / screws were stuck and the gobo / color wheels were almost permanently connected to the motor axis.
For once again, electronically the scanner functioned in 100%, plus all of its motors were working properly.
The scanner used an MSR 1200 lamp, but that was about to change. I’ve started the tests, as soon as the chassis restoration finished, with an MSD 250 lamp and some months after, a CSR 575 lamp from Sylvania has been installed. Despite the small aperture of the wheels, the output brightness is impressively satisfactory.
That model offers 19 gobos, 16 colors and a shutter.
The King of Euroscans
The Islanders
After 4 years, I got two more of the HTI 400 model! I wouldn’t say no, even if I’ve already had the same model. But I like them a lot and they are not too big and heavy, in comparison with other models of their age of course. These two fixtures came from Kythira Island. They were working on a night club. So, you can guess. Island, sea, humidity, night club, lucking of maintenance. The scanners were in terrible condition. I had another challenging restoration, which finished after 4 months with a brilliant result, which exceeded my expectations.
In the meantime, I was experimenting with their light source. Since the other two had MSD 250 lamps, I wanted to make a brighter version of them, with installing a CSR/MSR 575 lamp. But there were two issues. The reflector size and the temperature increase. Despite the two Sunon fans, temperature was at high levels with the 575 lamp. So I gave up my plan and I’ve ended up installing an MSR 400 lamp, which gave the scanners the brightness which had with the HTI 400.
The only thing that will reminds me that attempt of improving their lighting power, is their names on their yellow stripes! I had renamed them to “EUROSCAN CSR 575 Plus”.
Vintage Disco Lights -Euroscan Scanners- | Before & After
DMX512 generation
It took me approx. 5 months to complete the restoration of both MK 5 scanners, but as usual, I enjoyed the procedure. The failures were quite simple to repair, as they were only in stepper motors and some infrared sensors, of the wheels. The scanner is a cheap version of the original MK5, which I suppose it was made just for clubs. In the official Electron catalogue, some characteristics are differing. This scanner has 5 colors, 5 rotating gobos, 3 prisms and a single blade shutter for black out and strobe effects. In the prism wheel are two empty spaces, so I’ve added two extra dichroic filters, in order to create more color combinations.
