Help with Waters XEVO TQ-GC
Dear MS Community,
We recently inherited a Waters Xevo TQ-GC from a nearby company, and I just had the time to setup the instrument and put it on the bench. It's a 2021/2022 system with an Agilent 8890 and PAL RSI 85 autosampler. Unit looks brand new, and the GC counter has fewer than 100 injections total. We were told by this company they purchased the unit for an R&D project that never took off - given we're academic, we were very happy to inherit the instrument.
I'm having a hard time figuring out how to tune the instrument as the unit doesn't appear to generate any ions. I've tried to: clean the inner and outer source components (making sure everything was re-aligned properly), replaced filament 2 (it didn't ignite / produce current), played with all source settings, changed the PTBFA to a new bottle, and more. I was able to produce a few ions (69 and 219 m/z) when the source pressure was higher; however, I've been unable to replicate this after the unit has pumped down. I have helium as the carrier gas at 1.4 mL/min through a DB-5MS column and argon into the collision cell. After a lot of fuss, I was able to get the autotune at 219 m/z to work for 10-15 minutes; however, after the pressure further reduced, I cannot see the 219 ion at all, nor the 69 m/z ion. I never saw the 502 ion needed to calibrate the MS.
I have virtually no experience with the Waters GCMS nor LCMS platform, and given the instrument is like-new, I'm sure I'm missing something simple here. I'm attaching some screenshots for additional information. That blip of signal on the TIC pane on the last screen is when I leave the PTBFA reference gas off for 10-15 minutes and then turn it back on. This makes me think there's possibly a leak in the PTBFA delivery mechanism?
Any help or guidance or recommendations on who to contact would be very much appreciated.
Thank you.
