Many laboratories found themselves shutting down their facility along with their many instruments due to inactivity in response to COVID-19 and their states rules on sheltering in place. We now find ourselves in a period of this pandemic where many states are allowing business to slowly reopen. So what are the next steps you should be taking when it comes time to return to work and safely power your laboratories back up?
Ideally you had enough notification to properly shutdown your laboratory instruments while leaving your Uninterruptible Power Supply unit (UPS) in operation. If your buildings power is in good condition, your UPS will be fully charged and ready when you return to start up your instrument.
But what if you did have to unplug your UPS without turning it off first? The UPS will simply assume the utility power had gone out and would continue running on the internal battery until it is depleted and eventually the UPS will stop running as well. When you return to work and plug it in it may or may not be able to start on the depleted battery based on how long it has remained in this state. If your batteries have not been replaced in the past 3-6 years and they are weak, the UPS may be completely dark and unable to start. A battery replacement will be in order.
If you did properly shut down your UPS before unplugging and you still return to a dark UPS that will not respond to the startup, it is likely you may have had batteries that were completely gone prior to shutting down and the battery charger was holding up the UPS. You too should order replacement batteries.
If you decided to leave an instrument idling and the UPS on and return to find both shut off, this may be due to a power outage that depleted the UPS batteries resulting in the UPS and the instrument powering off. When power returned, if the UPS batteries are in good condition and not completely depleted resulting in the UPS batteries will recharge. Simply start the UPS and instrument and resume operation.
If you do find you are in need of battery replacement, Franek Technologies is still operating with minimal staff onsite to ensure you can get your batteries replaced or a new UPS shipped to you as soon as possible. We have a full inventory of UPS instruments and batteries in stock to meet your laboratory instrument needs. In addition we are now selling masks and hand sanitizer made with 80% alcohol to WHO formulation at a FDA registered site.