“My house is clean enough to be healthy and dirty enough to be happy.”
That quote was on an etched-wood plaque that hung on my mother’s kitchen wall for years, and for the longest time, I’ve used it as my personal philosophy concerning cleanliness…..at least in the kitchen and house. When it comes to gear, it’s a whole different game.
I recently had a died-in-the-wool tour guy lament about how one of his two “identical” video racks (which contained servers, switches, UPS’s and various other rack-mounted expensivities) kept “locking up” (his term). He went on and on about checking the software versions, the motherboard updates, the connections….all to no avail. He even reseated all the connections and adapters with some D5 as if to say, “It’s thoroughly clean.” But one kept “locking up.” I went around to the back and was amazed at the obvious layer of pelt-like dust that covered the fan intakes (and outlets) like little warm blankets of destruction. Could this be the culprit? With no blinky red light or loud-ass alarm clanging, it’s hard to say. Dirt, in and of itself, is not always the cause of a piece of hardware failure — but it’s the first thing I point my finger at.
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had colleagues bring computers to me with the complaint of “maybe it’s a virus or something my kid downloaded, but it just won’t start.” Or my other favorite, “it’s really slow to start, and then it doesn’t do anything.” I smile and nod, and say I’ll do my best. The first station I stop at is the compressor. I don a dust mask and crack the case. Then, and only then, after the cloud settles, can I feel a little more confident about my troubleshooting skills.
It’s a Dirty World
We live and work in dirt. It invades our lungs and gear like plague, and just because our lungs are better filters (or maybe that we can hack up the dirtball and blame it on the last pack we smoked), doesn’t mean our gear is going to fare any better. Admittedly, some environments are dirtier than others. I’ve done gigs in the middle of a cornfield and on the beach and the dirt factor is a little more obvious there. Now count the greasy back halls of any convention center or ballroom in the country. While not as readily apparent as a dust/sand storm blowing through the video rack, it can be pretty nasty back there. I’ve also worked in studios where you could eat off the floor, and even that gear got dirt in it, albeit a little more slowly. Or maybe the studio folks just have a lower tolerance for it. Whatever the case, your gear is going to get dirty — there’s no avoiding it — and the only remedy is diligence and a cleaning/maintenance schedule that needs to be adhered to. The other axiom in play here is one I learned while honing my cooking skills on a chef line — “time to lean, time to clean.” The hour or two that you can devote to the more obvious cleaning jobs that exist, the longer you’ll stay employed.
If you are lucky enough to work for a rental house that has a “check in,” or a team of people that usually get referred to as “the shop folks,” then you probably have no idea how dirty gear can get. I used to work in a shop that had an inspection department and we were required to do more than just open the case and count the cables that came back. Mind you, this was back in the days of actual tape machines, so we had a ready supply of swabs, denatured alcohol and D5 on hand. It’s quite the Zen exercise to open the case of a $30,000 digital tape machine and rub the helical heads with a piece of lint-free paper and some 99 percent isopropanol, swab the capstans with a foam stub and some Rubber Renue. Ahhhh, the good old days.
Now, there are as many cleaning techniques and procedures as there are products to do it with. And there are almost as many opinions about how to do it and what works out there. The best practice is to follow the manufacturers recommended solution. And if you are really concerned about legality and safety, you should consult the MSDS sheets that are available to you…they are available, right? Some cleaning and maintenance techniques are beyond the scope of this article and really need to be done by qualified personnel. If you are that person, read on. Even if you’re not, read and learn. BUT — the key is to do it regularly and thoroughly. And we are talking about chemicals so some common sense is needed. I don’t mean you need to don a BL4 Hazmat suit — just don’t be stupid. Also, we’re talking about gear that has various electronic components in it (like capacitors and circuit boards) that retain potentially hazardous voltages. If you don’t know what you’re doing, you could get killed. And if the gear is really expensive, you could get killed by the owner of the gear when you inadvertently fill the power supply with WD40. When it doubt, send it out.
Cleaning Tips
Let’s start with the basics.
Visible dust: Nothing will overheat a piece of electronic gear faster than a nice layer of dust build-up, and what kills gear? That’s right — heat. Well, that, and so-called “gravitational events,” but that’s for another article. Use cans of compressed air liberally. The intake/outlet fans are the biggest culprits. Best to locate where the power supply is, and go from there. Pro-tip: Turn off and unplug the gear, insert a tweaker (or the end of a cotton swab) to stop the fan from spinning, and spray away. I know it sounds cool when you use a compressor and no fan stopper, but you run the risk of redlining the fan’s RPM limit and ruining whatever bearing/motor it’s attached to. If cracking the case voids the warranty, then obviously don’t do it. But if it’s an older piece and you’re feeling adventurous, unscrew the captive screws and carefully remove the outer housing. Again, there’s stuff that can kill you in here, so just use your can of air and give the circuitry the once over. Have a look for any PC board components that are obviously bulging or ribbon connectors that are not seated.
Use a vacuum — and not just a standard Shop-Vac. (You want to get rid of dust and dirt, not the components you’re cleaning.) So use an electronics vacuum that’s designed for the purpose. I’ve used a DataVac for years, and it’s paid for itself many times over.
Clean contacts: Any technician worth their salt will tell you that contact cleaner is the most important liquid in the toolkit. Well….that and the after-gig beer. Please don’t use WD40. Keep that for your transportation and farm implements. Invest in anything from Caig or MG. Remember that different cleaners are for different surfaces. A lot of what we deal with is metal-to-metal, but there are a lot of various precision plastics out there too. If you’ve ever cracked open a recent smartphone, you know that there are alien-like metal/plastic hybrids that are best left alone (unless, of course, you’re an alien).
Swabs, cloth and paper: Use any decent lint-free swabs for precision work. Quality, lint-free cloth is a must. Sometimes just a nice wipe down will do the trick. Paper (or perhaps your unused business cards that the shop insist you carry) works really well for contacts when used in conjunction with the previously mentioned Isopropyl. Please remember to not sip the alcohol.
Yes, It’s That Important
The point is this: Clean is not just a state of mind. It’s also your job security and an indicator of how professional you are. If your gear constantly does not work, it follows that neither will you.
Jeff Gooch also writes about large-format projection, projection mapping, video, and all the technology that makes them go on the blog at www.projectionfreak.com.
