ABSTRACT
In 1986, Coemar, an Italian theatrical lighting manufacturer, started producing a 350 W moving mirror fi xture called the Robot. It had exactly fi ve control channels: pan, tilt, color, gobo, and shutter. At about $2500 each, they were popular sellers in nightclubs with a moderate-to-large budget. They sold well in Europe and North America but after several months some of them started failing. After the initial batch of installations, it was learned that the plastic Airtronics servo motors driving all the motorized functions were only reliable to a point, and that point was usually surpassed shortly after the fi xtures were turned over to the club operators. The robotic movement was such a novelty, it seems, that the club operators loved to program lots of very fast movements. The result was that the motors were getting thrashed to death. The motors were failing as fast as they could be replaced.
