Paul C. Buff, Inc. Technical Forum

I was wondering if anyone else had encountered this problem: The small, rolled steel pin in the shaft of my 64" PLM V2 (the pin that stops the forward motion of the slider when opening the umbrella) fell out and vanished. This is the pin I'm referring to (51" PLM in photo):



When I went to open the PLM, the slider shot all the way to the hub where the 16 umbrella ribs are secured.

An emergency field "fix" was required to make the umbrella usable:



PCB Tech Support hadn't encountered this issue before and offered no solution other than sending a replacement rolled steel pin if one could be found (I haven't received one so, apparently, one could not be found). If the loose pin in my PLM was the result of an out-of-tolerance hole having been drilled in the shaft, a replacement pin would no doubt suffer the same fate as the original.

The pins on my 51" and 86" PLM V2s seem secure. However, as the pin is a friction fit whose integrity is dependent upon the precision with which the holes in the umbrella shaft have been drilled, I would expect this particular type of failure to occur to others. You might want to verify that the pin in YOUR PLM isn't loose.

Dave F.

An easy fix that PCB or users with these units already can do is take a pair of pliers and crimp the ends ever so slightly so it becomes oval and no longer slides out.

I don't know if we have any replacement roll pins, but we may have shafts from other PLM's that failed inspection. I will check and someone will let you know monday via email what we can do.