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Eliminate battery for Canon Speedlites
I bought this product called the Battery Eliminator. http://www.batteryeliminatorstore.com/i … =category. I then connected it to my 430 EX II. I then turned it on and the screen would just flash on/off. Please see this video. https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/272 … G_3890.MOV The website for the battery eliminator says it is 6V DC. On the 430 EX II it graphic reads 6V. I can only imagine that it is turning on/off like that because it is not drawing enough power. What do you guys think? To answer some questions you guys might have for me. + Sometimes I just feel like using a speedlite indoors as opposed to a strobe. + I dislike changing batteries a great deal. + I do also own the 580 EX and 580 EX II. + I also own the Turbo AC that feeds wall power to the 580 EX, but it still requires batteries to be inserted for the LCD screen. So while it is a okay solution, it is not a 100% perfect solution. 100% being never having to change batteries again. Sep 12 13 09:37 am Link It may not be supplying enough current. Sep 12 13 09:45 am Link I emailed the battery eliminator people and explained the problem. They offered for me to mail them my speedlite for them to test. I'm going accept their offer. Sep 12 13 10:43 am Link poiter wrote: Geeez, it is not so worth your time. That thing they are selling does not provide you with enough amp. What so big deal or problem with changing batteries. Use Sanyo Eneloop rechargeable, it will last longer than alkaline batteries. I have not bought batteries for years. Sep 12 13 11:19 am Link poiter wrote: Even with a Quantum Turbo 3, you still have to have AA batteries in the speedlight. Sep 12 13 11:25 am Link If a product not sold/found in stores, I will be very skeptical. Simply put it, the stores buyers would not buy that product. Does that tell you anything? Also, you mail your speedlight to them for test. Are you paying for the return shipping? Plus, what happen if they just let it sit there for months? It'll cause you more headache then what you are getting now. Sep 12 13 11:30 am Link You will never see that flash again  Buy an external battery pack and some decent rechargable AAs Sep 12 13 11:32 am Link problem to me looks like there is only one battery with any power to it, the other three are fillers. Now if I remember electrical correctly, if they are hooked in series then that's fine since it's the total power from everything going into one out wiring. But if they pull power from each battery separately, then you have one live and three dead batteries which will never power anything. I think they pull power separately for the capacitor to charge more quickly, I might be wrong since it's been a long time since I've talked to people who really know electronics. I use high end rechargeable batteries and can shoot pretty much an entire wedding without changing them in my 580EX. My Quantum is even better. Much rather change the batteries once than deal with cords that need plugging in and limit my options for placement. Sep 12 13 11:35 am Link poiter wrote: I wouldn't advise shipping them your gear. You may have difficulty getting it back in a timely manner - or ever. What happens if they damage or misplace it? Sep 12 13 11:40 am Link MC Photo wrote: a Q flash is going to be in my very near future for multiples of reasons..the elimination of AA's boing one Sep 12 13 11:57 am Link Bad item. They sell for $9.95 wholesale in China. That's a simple sign of "No, No, Noo" Perhaps you should buy a super cheap speed-light from amazon and use it on that before your Quality canon speed-light becomes destroyed by a pointless product with an AC cord. Sep 12 13 11:59 am Link I change the batteries of my 430EX II. I don't find this to be a problem even on location. Sep 12 13 01:16 pm Link You're gonna hand over $300 speedlite to be the test mule for their $60 sketchy product? how does that remotely make any sense? Sep 12 13 01:32 pm Link poiter wrote: Seems legit. Let us know how that works out. Sep 12 13 01:35 pm Link Yingwah Productions wrote: He finds eyebrows challenging. Sep 12 13 01:36 pm Link Thanks everyone for your feedback and suggestions! A few thoughts + I decided to mail out the speed light anyway, despite many recommendations here not to. The man who answered my initial email from the battery eliminator store was very professional in tone. In addition to offering for me to send it to him for testing, he also offered a refund in the initial email. So his intentions sounded quite reasonable. + I am by nature very lazy, and I hate doing repetitive things. Before being recommended to buy Einsteins in a different thread here recently, I used to use 16 speedlites in my warehouse for the short flash duration. So when I change batteries, which is usually after every second shoot, I'm switching over 64 at a time, which takes about 12 mins end to end. I did this for a couple of years, so at this point I'm pretty tired of changing batteries. + Now that I've switched over to Einstins, I don't use as many speedlites anymore. In my currently work flow I only use three. The issue is that I never know when the battery is going to die. And they don't necessarily die in sync either. When I'm shooting, paying attention to lighting is lower on my list of things to think about. So if the battery die in one of multiple speedlites and I don't notice, then I either write off the images from that time period, or I spend extra time fixing the images in post. + If I had to choose between money or time, I value time over money. So if something can be fixed with money, then it should be. I also have a decent size budget to spend on one time things. Henry Ford once said something along the line of "If you need something and don't pay for it, you'll eventually learn that you've paid for it but don't have it". + Yes I will be happy to pay for return shipping. I have a lot of built up angst about changing batteries from doing it so many times over the years. + If I don't get it back, or they break it, I'll chalk it down to a learning experience. + Q Flash is interesting, never seen it before. I'm considering it. Thanks for the recommendation. + "He finds eyebrows challenging." Yes I do. Hopefully one day soon I won't Sep 12 13 02:41 pm Link Chris Rifkin wrote: You can run the 580 off of the same battery that you'll use for the Q Flash. The recycle is nearly instantaneous. I spread out the cost by buying the battery first. Sep 12 13 06:40 pm Link poiter wrote: Instead of buying that. Why not go to Costco and get the Eneloop batteries? Sep 13 13 12:07 pm Link So I think it was maybe last Wednesday I mailed out my speedlite. They got it on Saturday and by Saturday night emailed me back to say they got it working. The gist of it was that even though on the 430 EX II it reads 6V, it actually draws more than 6V initially to power up. So it was causing the previous battery eliminator to auto shut down to protect itself. So they replaced it with something with more power. Here's a video to show you guys of me testing it out this morning. https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/272 … G_4006.MOV So far so good. I'll probably keep testing it for a few weeks and see if it doesn't burn out my speedlite. If it continues to work fine. I'll probably buy some more. Since they were so nice to trouble shoot this for me, I'm going give their store a little shout out - batteryeliminatorstore.com. Obviously if you decided to buy from them, email them first so they know the correct one to send you, especially since they are now experienced with powering Canon Speedlites. Sep 19 13 09:02 am Link In the last couple of hours I fired the speedlite 300 times. The first 200 times was every now and then. Then for the last 100 times, I just counted up to a 100 and fired the light upon each count. I had the speedlite on 1/8 power which is what I typically would use it at. So in my tests so far, the battery eliminator seems to work great Sep 19 13 02:16 pm Link |
