Posted by Steve Kraus on 10/04/06 21:03

I bought a two year old Panasonic PT-DW7000U-K which is a 3 chip 1366 x 768
6000 lumen projector. Anyone familiar with this or similar models?

Unfortunately a mistake was made in shipping as they shipped with the very
heavy lens in place. It was noticeably loose on arrival. Opening the
projector so far as I could tell nothing was actually broken but some
screws holding parts of the lens mount had worked their way loose. I
tighted what I could but there are two maybe 3 which I cannot get to
because of the projector housing. The projector is fully functional aside
from this.

The way it's laid out the plastic top of the projector also forms most of
the sides. The bottom of the projector (also plastic) curves up and forms
the bottom couple inches of the sides. As far as I can tell there is no
single chassis inside that would lift out everything. It seems that most
of the bits and pieces are screwed to the bottom. In the critical optical
area the TI DLP light engine and the lens mount are attached to a
substantial metal casting which is in turn attached to the projector
bottom.

The screws I want to tighten are on the sides of the lens mount aera but
far enough down as to be blocked by the part of the bottom that comes up.
What I'd like to do would be to lift the whole casting and everything it
holds up a couple inches. Alas while I can undo 3 holddown screws I can
see there is at least one if not several more I can't see or get to and the
stuff that is blocking the way...well...like I said, there doesn't appear
to be any one thing but lots and lots of small parts that would seem to
have to come out first. The space between screws and cabinet are too small
for a sideways driver although I will try when I get a chance.

So here are my options:

1. Give up and send it off to Panasonic's authorized repair depot (only one
in the country for this model, they said). Cost would be $130 to diagnose
and I would guess a couple hundred for the repair and maybe 100 for
shipping both ways. This is a great projector and not inexpensive but is
it worth it if it really only needs some screws tightened? Also small risk
of additional damage in shipping.

2. Try to figure out the disassembly technique and of course take a chance
of f---ing up the projector where it doesn't work at all anymore.

3. What I am leaning towards: Drilling a couple of small access holes
through the plastic cabinet and tighten the screws through them. I really
would hate to do that but it seems almost logical to sacrifice the
perfection of the like-new cabinet for the sake of avoiding either of the
above. One saving grace would be I think I could make the holes in a spot
that would be hidden by a warning sticker. I could use some kind of
plastic filler and then put the sticker back over and it would be
invisible. Or drill to some particular size for which plastic filler plugs
are available to make it more tidy.

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