Failed to Build Pressure Error on a Parallel Capillary Electrophoresis Instrument

Created by Shweta.S 7 months ago | Last modified by Shweta.S 30 days ago

This Information Applies To: 5200/5300/5400 Fragment Analyzer, Femto Pulse, ZAG DNA Analyzer and Oligo Pro II instruments, and their respective controller software.

Issue
Failed to build pressure error comes up shortly after starting a separation.

Resolution

Failure to build pressure error occurs when the system is trying to build pressure when liquid is being pumped during conditioning or flushing of the instrument. Possible causes and suggestions to address the issue are:

1. Empty reagent bottles - As first step, please ensure that there is adequate volume in each reagent bottle and that the respective tubing is in the liquid.

2. Leak - Please check whether there is any visible leak at the tubing (any visible liquid inside the instrument). Figure 1 shows various red tube fittings and other components of the side compartment of the fragment analyzer instrument. The points are going to be similar for other instruments as well. Check for leaks in these areas including but not limited to what is visible in the picture.

If there is any obvious and easily accessible leak, for example around the array bundle, reinstall it into the reservoir (Figure 1, (1)). If there is liquid at the F port (Figure 1, (4)) try to fix by tightening the red tube fittings.
If leak is from the tube that connects to the reservoir, then take a picture (Figure 1) and contact your local Agilent Support from Contact us page. This connection is not usually something users can tighten themselves so an onsite visit by Agilent field engineer will likely be needed.
If there is no leak and issue is not leak related, please proceed to step 3.

Figure 1. Fragment Analyzer side door compartment.

Various leak points are: (1) Top of the array bundle (2) Vent valve (3) F-port connections, located by red ferrules (4) Conditioning line (5) syringe.

3. Reboot - Perform a full system reboot following, see the steps in the article: Full Power Cycle for Agilent Parallel Capillary Electrophoresis Instruments. Full power cycle is recommended to address any possible component disconnects. If that resolves the issue, it is recommended to monitor for some time. If not, please proceed to step 4.

4. Pump related - To determine whether issue is pump-related, the recommendation is to execute a Conditioning Solution flush so that pump moves few times. Click Add to queue, select Full Conditioning or any method using Conditioning Solution and edit it to only contain the Conditioning step. Click OK twice to add it to the queue. (Figure 2). During the flush step, please monitor syringe and liquid movement.

Figure 2. Adding Capillary Array Conditioning to queue.

Syringe movement indicates that the pump is working.
If pump does not move, then the issue is likely instrument hardware failure. An onsite visit by an Agilent engineer will be needed. Therefore, please collect and share instrument Event and Error reports (Figure 3) from the instrument controller software (Admin > Error or Event Report > choose at least dates at which the error occurred) with your local Agilent support from Contact us page.

Figure 3. Steps to collect Event and Error reports from controller software