May 2008 •
Lighting&Sound
America
TECHNICAL FOCUS : PRODUCT IN DEPTH
This month, we are examining the Clay
Paky Alpha Spot 300 HPE (Fig. 1). That’s a
mouthful of a name for what is actually quite
a compact unit. At 300W, it’s a few watts up
from the more usual 250W units, but clearly
competes for the same market segment.
How does it compare with its many rivals?
You won’t be surprised that this review
follows the usual format. I take a single unit
supplied to me by the manufacturer and
measure everything on that unit as
accurately as I can, then give you the basic
facts and figures so you have the information
to draw your own conclusions. To try and
keep things logical, I always start at the lamp
and work forward, ending at the output lens.
The Alpha Spot 300 HPE is fitted with
universal power supplies and will run on the
standard worldwide voltages of 100-120V or
200-240V 50/60Hz. For these tests, it was
supplied with a nominal 118V 60Hz and
consumed 3.85A for 450W of power at a
0.99 power factor.
Lamp
This is the first time I’d seen this lamp, the
Philip’s MSR Gold 300/2 FastFit (Fig. 2). The
arc tube configuration is conventional, but it
uses a smaller variation of the fast-fit base
that we’ve seen on larger lamps. In this case,
the base is somewhat simpler than its larger
cousins and is symmetrical, so the lamp can
be fitted either way round. (The larger lamps
have one large pin and one small, so they
can only be inserted in one orientation). As
always with this system, the lamp change
was simple and quick. Remove some captive
screws, and the rear plate comes off,
exposing the lamp base (Fig. 3). As you can
see in the photograph, there are also three
lamp-adjustment screws for setting lamp
alignment. These screws are also accessible
through holes, without having to remove the
rear plate. Next is a conventional faceted
cold-mirror glass elliptical reflector, but this
was not followed by the usual hot mirror. I
guess that, at 300W, Clay Paky didn’t need it.
Right beside the reflector is the high-voltage
ignitor connected back to the electronic
ballast mounted in the top box (Fig. 4).
Uniform field lens
You would normally expect to see the dimmer
next in the chain, but Clay Paky has added a
novel optical element. The company calls it a
uniform field lens, and, as can be clearly seen
in Figure 5, it’s constructed as a piece of
textured glass with an aperture in the center.
Through a DMX512 channel you can select to
have this in the optical train or not. When
inserted, it does as its name suggests and
noticeably flattens the field. The photometrics
later in this review tell the story fully, but I
should mention now that one frustration with
Clay Paky Alpha
Spot 300 HPE
By: Mike Wood
Fig. 1: Unit as tested.
Fig. 2: Lamp.
Fig. 3: Lamp change.
Fig. 4: Reflector and cooling.
Fig. 5: Uniform field lens.
It’s been a while since we last looked at a Clay Paky luminaire,
but that’s not to say that the company has been idle. Clay
Paky has always been a prolific producer of new automated
lighting products ever since those first Golden Scans
appeared back in the mid-1980s. Back then, Clay Paky and
Coemar were two of the largest companies manufacturing
automated products (all mirror-based scanners at the time).
Both of them were, and still are, based in northern Italy and
had access to the innovative design engineering that centered
round Turin and the Italian automotive industry. The Italian
design flair is well-known, and their products have always
been distinctive. However, our concern here is, of course,
more performance-centered than aesthetic.
Copyright
Lighting&Sound
America May 2008
www.lightingandsoundamerica.com
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