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Sometimes it pays to have a day job at an auto parts store right across the street from the movie theater.
On Saturday night the UPS unit in our projector started beeping. "Replace batteries," it said. I looked in the instruction manual and it said it might be possible to stop the beeping by letting the unit charge for 12 hours, but the batteries should be replaced ASAP. So, after the Saturday night movie I shut the system completely down to give the UPS ample time to charge up. I figured I had at least a few days to get batteries installed before the old ones were completely gone.
On Sunday, an hour before our matinee, the machine would not fire up AT ALL. Nothing. So I called up Technician Mark for ideas on what to do, and he said maybe take the batteries out of there and run them over to the store and put them on a charger for a bit, maybe that would goose them up enough to run through the day at least. While all this was going on, my wife called a battery store in Billings and also located somebody who was in Billings and would bring the batteries home for us, so if nothing else worked, we would at least have the evening show.
I took the batteries out of the UPS unit, and two of them had leaked. (Duracell batteries.) So, no point putting them on the charger. I was surprised they hadn't quit sooner. Just when I was thinking we'd have to cancel the matinee, my friend Steve (who is an electrician) called me up to ask what time the movie was starting. I told him about the problem we had, and he said, what about car batteries? Would that work?
I couldn't see why it wouldn't work, so I called up Mark to verify with him and after a long thoughtful pause, he said "Well....yeah. it should work, might as well give it a try." So we went over to the store and brought back four Die Hard batteries, hooked 'em up in series using two sets of jumper cables, and verified the voltage with a multimeter. Steve attached spade connectors and battery clamps to some 10-gauge wire, so we could connect to the pigtail on the UPS device and... we were back in business! The matinee even started on time.
I always get a kick out of situations where there is complete chaos going on behind the scenes while the audience is coming in, not even knowing anything was going on. The only thing out of the ordinary they saw was, we played a cartoon before showtime as a test.
On Saturday night the UPS unit in our projector started beeping. "Replace batteries," it said. I looked in the instruction manual and it said it might be possible to stop the beeping by letting the unit charge for 12 hours, but the batteries should be replaced ASAP. So, after the Saturday night movie I shut the system completely down to give the UPS ample time to charge up. I figured I had at least a few days to get batteries installed before the old ones were completely gone.
On Sunday, an hour before our matinee, the machine would not fire up AT ALL. Nothing. So I called up Technician Mark for ideas on what to do, and he said maybe take the batteries out of there and run them over to the store and put them on a charger for a bit, maybe that would goose them up enough to run through the day at least. While all this was going on, my wife called a battery store in Billings and also located somebody who was in Billings and would bring the batteries home for us, so if nothing else worked, we would at least have the evening show.
I took the batteries out of the UPS unit, and two of them had leaked. (Duracell batteries.) So, no point putting them on the charger. I was surprised they hadn't quit sooner. Just when I was thinking we'd have to cancel the matinee, my friend Steve (who is an electrician) called me up to ask what time the movie was starting. I told him about the problem we had, and he said, what about car batteries? Would that work?
I couldn't see why it wouldn't work, so I called up Mark to verify with him and after a long thoughtful pause, he said "Well....yeah. it should work, might as well give it a try." So we went over to the store and brought back four Die Hard batteries, hooked 'em up in series using two sets of jumper cables, and verified the voltage with a multimeter. Steve attached spade connectors and battery clamps to some 10-gauge wire, so we could connect to the pigtail on the UPS device and... we were back in business! The matinee even started on time.
I always get a kick out of situations where there is complete chaos going on behind the scenes while the audience is coming in, not even knowing anything was going on. The only thing out of the ordinary they saw was, we played a cartoon before showtime as a test.
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