[ RadSafe ] End of an Era

Tue Mar 6 03:04:48 CST 2007

Hi,
The lack of knowledge and support for older equipment is a concern. The
bean counters would like to think that the customer has to buy one of
their new instruments if they stop supporting the old ones. In actual
fact a lot of users may not have funds immediately available to do this
and struggle on. Come the time when they do have the budget for new
equipment they may remember the support (or lack of it) and go
elsewhere. I had a case with a "Thermo" instrument (non nuclear), made
before the original manufacturer was bought out, last year. Thermo were
happy to quote for a service call but inquiries indicated that they
actually knew nothing abut this particular model and would not have been
able to fix it. It looks identical to the current model (same model
number) but the internals are completely different. They were happy to
suggest we bought a new controller even though they did not have any
firmware for it! An inadvertent command up its RS232 port had upset its
firmware. Fortunately a bit of detective work located some old utility's
(non Windoze) for a different instrument that used the same controller.
Some work with these sorted the problem.
Some companies are trying to improve the situation. Agilent (formerly
Hewlett Packard) are actively making manuals and documentation for older
instruments available. This includes putting them on their own website
and allowing other websites to freely distribute information on older
units.
Ludlum are a great company with well engineered products and good
support. Let's hope they don't get bought up by Thermo or another big
group.

Robert.

-----Original Message-----
From: radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl [mailto:radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl] On
Behalf Of Flood, John
Sent: 06 March 2007 00:20
To: Sandy Perle; J. Marshall Reber; radsafelist
Subject: RE: [ RadSafe ] End of an Era

It is my understanding that much design and manufacturing is moving from
Santa Fe to Ohio, while calibration and repair will go to South Carolina
as stated earlier.  Some of the instruments come from the German part of
the Thermo empire, which has its own design & production, and that will
continue.  How many of the Santa Fe workforce will end up with a Thermo
job elsewhere, and how many will be laid off I couldn't even guess.

Bob Flood
Nevada Test Site

-----Original Message-----
From: radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl [mailto:radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl] On
Behalf Of Sandy Perle
Sent: Monday, March 05, 2007 1:09 PM
To: 'J. Marshall Reber'; 'radsafelist'
Subject: RE: [ RadSafe ] End of an Era

Are you sure that these operations aren't being consolidated in their
new
manufacturing facility located in Oakbrook, OH? Thermo employees do
monitor
this list, so we might get some more details regarding this.

----------------------------------------------------------------
Sandy Perle 
Senior Vice President, Technical Operations 
Global Dosimetry Solutions, Inc. 
2652 McGaw Avenue
Irvine, CA 92614

Tel: (949) 296-2306 / (888) 437-1714 Extension 2306 
Tel: (949) 419-1000 Extension 2306
Fax:(949) 296-1144

Global Dosimetry Website: http://www.dosimetry.com/ 
Personal Website: http://sandy-travels.com/ 

-----Original Message-----
From: radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl [mailto:radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl] On
Behalf
Of J. Marshall Reber
Sent: Monday, March 05, 2007 9:40 AM
To: radsafelist
Subject: [ RadSafe ] End of an Era

I've just heard that Thermo Electron (Eberline) is closing their  
Santa Fe operations.  All design, production, repair parts and  
service personnel there are being let go, many experts with more than  
30 years of service will disappear.  R&D will move to Germany, repair  
service will all be done in South Carolina.

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