Welcome to LCQ user's club. It is a MAJOR pain; this ultramark stuff.
I will second what Matt and Dan have already stated. Most importantly is
to have a dedicated pluming for tuning together with the ESI probe
elements which come in contact with this solution. It will save tons of
time. I keep this stuff in a separate box labeled as such, so that it
does not get mixed with other hardware.
Simplifying your source (ala nanospray) is a good idea. It deposits less
of this stuff on the heated capillary and beyond, thus cleaning is much
faster. I have used fast flow nanospray needles loaded with 10uL (huge!)
tuning solution. If you don't have nanospray source, I also use a
simplified home-built source (a holder and one-piece fused silica line
(50um ID) to the syringe) which can be operated at 100's nL/min, thus
limiting the contamination.
A word about cleaning. After using the std setup for tuning (and also
using the nano setup but not as bad), I found it necessary to clean the
heated capillary, lens, and skimmer.
These parts were washed with MeOH/Hexane and ultrasonicated in MeOH,
where as, the heated capillary was washed by pushing/pulling some of the
same solution. Once all was assembled, I would bake the source at 250
overnight and pray.
Good luck,
Paul
>To: Recipients of ABRF List <abrf@aecom.yu.edu>
>cc:
>Subject: LCQ Calibration
>
>A question for those of you who have LCQ mass spectrometers. Has anyone
devised
>a cleaner calibration mixture for the LCQ--one not using Ultramark? We are
>finding that we spending a significant amount of time cleaning the
instrument
>after running the calibration mixture as prescribed by the vendor.
>
>Thanks in advance,
>Tom McClure
>-------------------------------------------------------
>
>
>
________________________________________________________________
Paul T. Jedrzejewski, Ph.D.
Barnett Institute
341 Mugar Bldg.
Northeastern University
360 Huntington Ave.
Boston, MA 02115
phone: 617.373.2857
fax: 617.373.2855 http://www.barnett.neu.edu
__________________________________________________________________