Has anyone explored using third party tip options on the i-series? It appears that 40ul tips are the smallest volume offered by Beckman for the span-8. However, I was perusing the Labware Type Editor on Biomek and came across some instances where non Beckman tips have been used.
I know no one in our lab group has experimented using anything other than Beckman brand tips. I’m guessing these definitions have found their way onto our install via imports by Beckman FAS.
If third party tips are feasible, I would be curious to explore the ability to use smaller volume and more importantly shorter tips. One of our workflows currently uses 40ul tips to transfer 7ul to high density fluidic labware (similar to 384) which is located on a Positive Positioner ALP. It seems that the combination of tip length and slight variation of probe alignment tends to create a scenario where one or more tips have a tendency to clip/collide the top of the labware.
Third party tips always just copies what beckman offers and are meant to be drop-in replacements. You probably won’t find any improvements in functionality from using third party tips. Additionally there are slight differences in manufacturing that could lead to up to 0.5 mm differences in pipetting height due to the tips seating differently onto the pipettors. Usually the juice isn’t worth the squeeze, unless your lab is trying to save a few bucks.
Beckman offers “P20” tips that are shorter than the “P50” tips. These work better for 384 since it decreases the effect of lateral deviations. If it’s still not enough, then you’ll want to get a Beckman tech to come in and realign your probes.
It’s been awhile since I was exploring this option so I may be incorrect. I thought that either the P20 tips ended up being the same length(height) as P40 or that P20 tips could only be used with the multichannel.
When the i-series was launched, there was an attempt to clarify the tip naming but it doesn’t seem to have worked….
The FXp/NXp tips were names P20, P50, P250 and P1000. But the actual volume they could take varied depending on the subtype (i.e. filter or not). The P50s were originally developed to go into deep well plates using the multichannel head as the P20s weren’t long enough. This allowed low volume pipetting in deepwells.
The new tip types changed their names to list the maximum pipettable volume. So the P20s are now T40 (with filter) or T80 while the P50s are T50 (with filter) or T90. All tips on the i-series are compatible with both the MC or S8
I normally feel this way about 3rd party tips, but if these 3rd parties do not have the rampant tip production issues that Beckman Coulter had for years, I would rather figure out what the tip seating difference is and account for that, rather than deal with constant instrument crashes due to faulty tips.
I genuinely hope they have things under control as that was not fun to deal with.
