My first studio in Miami, circa 2000, with a Speedotron 2401A pack and an old Larson Softbox that I brought south with me. A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far, away.

This is just note which I think needs to be posted occasionally to inform some of our newer participants and just to remind the older ones. I've just gone through one of my periodic maintenance cycles for all my studio strobes (pack and head and monolights). All of these lights operate with capacitors which first hold a charge, then release it to fire the flash tube. Flash capacitors are funny things, they don't like to sit around in storage for extended periods of time. I have damaged three packs over the years because for one reason or another they just sat around too long without being used.

My first pack which had this problem was my old Speedotron 2401A (2400ws) pack. For over twenty years I used this pack almost daily, and it performed flawlessly (except on two occasions when assistants working alone unplugged heads while the pack was still powered up, (It was apparently a religious experience, because they spoke of in in Biblical terms!). Then I got some mono lights (guess what brand, no cheating!), and two Zeus pack and head systems (1250ws and 2500ws), The heavy old Speedo's got put away in a closet for a rainy day. Then a year or two later a friend came down from New York to shoot a cosmetic line and asked if I had a Speedotron pack he could borrow for a few days. Great, happy to help, until I got a call from him later on the first day. The pack was dead, DED, dead.

And I didn't know why, it had worked perfectly up until I put the Speedotron pack away in storage. But it was gone, and with repair costs being what they were for those old packs, I just went online and bought another used 2401A (they are remarkably cheap!) and promptly put it in storage for another rainy day! For those familiar with the care and feeding of studio strobes, nothing could have been more inappropriate. Naturally when I finally did take it out to use it, it was dead, dead, dead. And I was mad, mad, mad. And that's when one of guys at a rental house here in Miami (Apertures) explained to me about the need to periodically use the packs to keep the capacitors fresh (I think the term is reforming the capacitors).

And while I have been discussing power packs, I believe this is true of monolights as they use flash capacitors as well. Currently I have a number of monolights (including a ring light which is a monolight), and a pack and head system (the Zeus 1250, I lost my Zeus 2500ws pack to disuse.). And I'm slow to learn, but even I get tired of losing the use of perfectly good equipment for no good reason. So now every two months I get all of my monolights and pack and head systems out and spend a few hours just plugging them in and firing off the lights. It is a pain in the ass, but no where near as big a pain as the one I feel in my wallet when one of my lights dies for no other reason than I haven't used it for awhile. My current situation is part of the problem, I have a lot (as in a lot) of studio strobes, but I don't have my own studio where the lights would be constantly set up and used. So, while I do use studio strobes frequently, they tend to be the same ones over and over. And I cant remember which one I used last! So, the only solution is to periodically drag them all out, power them up, and fire them off.

(There is a proscribed way to refresh your strobes, and I suggest Googling "reforming studio photography lights" and following the instructions. But, in any event don't let your lights sit idle for long periods, even just  pulling them out and firing them off will help keep them from dying!)

Anyway, for most people who have a light or two and use them all the time, you can probably ignore this message. But for those who have a few lights, and may not use one or two all the time, keep this note in your head. And this is also true for those who may have bought a light or two and for one reason or another haven't had a reason to use them lately. Pull those lights out and fire them off! If nothing else it may remind you of some project you have wanted to do and forgotten about.

John
---
John Fisher
700 Euclid Avenue, Suite 110
Miami Beach, Florida 33139
305 534-9322
http://www.johnfisher.com

I'll add on with some old Norman's that the wiring gets hot and in time it cracks.  Don't know if more flexing helps there, but some wires got brittle.  Think of some old car wiring where you bend it to fix something and it cracks.

I found an old Vivitar 285 probably from the 1960's-70's in some drawer.  Put some AA batteries in it and turned it on.  Took a long time to charge up the first time, but it still works.  Actually, the color balance of it is much better than the new strobes in that the old film strobes had a yellowish filter or reflector that made them warmer back then.  New digital ones are very cold (blue) and the ones I got back from Nikon service run about 6,500K against what Nikon calls 5,250K as their daylight.

Old paper-wrapped capacitors did dry out, but newer sealed ones may not have that issue and might last longer.  Hopefully the plastic wire covering is better too.

Good post. Just yesterday, I pulled the Profoto kit out and fired them up. I'll have to look up the paper maintenance as I usually plug them in and sit, turn them down all the way, pop a few times and work my way up to full power.

Funny, I started out with a used Speedotron 2401A kit and blew the pack a few years later while using a generator on location. It made quite the pop when it overheated. Lesson learned, turn the recycle to slow when using a generator. It was replaced with a 1205 pack then sold for a Profoto Acute kit and I've stayed with them since. Remember when a strobe kit was about a dollar a watt second? A new Acute1200ws kit was about $2400 and now they're over $4K.

i had a balcar i got used back in 1970. it served me well for 20 years using it everyday, all day, 6 days a week. when i retired n stated selling off... i plugged it in to test it....

it stated smoking an acrid gray smoke as it browned out the neighborhood.

i unplugged it as fast as i could n the plug was hot as hell.

i guess the newer boxes are much kinder.

Thanks for the post.  I have three sets of lights and not all are used regularly.  I have four orion lights and I think they get used around once every 2 months.  I love my dynalites and they have become my regular daily lights.  I also have 4 nice foto battery powered lights and they are used every week.  I need to make sure my orion lights are rotated in instead of collecting dust.

John, you are absolutely right. One change I would suggest in your maintenance schedule. Plug in and turn on all of your packs, but DON'T fire the strobes. Just leave them on, if you can, for a couple of hours. This is the advice my strobe repair person gave me (and I just did a quick search on reforming capacitors, which seems to confirm her advice).

John, I visited you in that studio back in 2000. We had a great talk, I drank a few gallons of coffee, and then I shot with a model you introduced me to who was stunned that I could pull together a shoot in the arts district of an American city on a sunny day.

Wonders never cease.

I have 8 Norman packs, 800 to 4000 watts.  I power each pack, with head or heads attached,
every 30 days and let this run for 45 minutes.  I have packs that I purchase in the early 80's that
still work like new and I am ruff on my equipment....

The above was taught to me by Bill Norman when he still owned the company.