P365 Jul07: Flash battery
- At July 07, 2007
- By Neil Creek
- In DIY, Equipment, Flash
1
One of the problems I’ve been having with the flash gear, is that it can have a hard time keeping up with me sometimes. It takes time to recharge the capacitor (the thing that holds the power before firing the flash), and too often the flash isn’t ready and doesn’t fire. As a result I’ve missed getting some pretty nice photos.
External power supplies are the answer to this problem, but they are very very expensive, even for relatively small flash units like mine. Fortunately, I found a way to “hack” a common, inexpensive battery, so that I can power my flash with it! It uses ‘dummy’ batteries made with wooden dowel and cheap electrical cabling. The details can be found on this thread on the Strobist Flickr group discussion board, and the hack will work with pretty much any small battery powered flash.
This is what my 580 EX looks like with the external battery attached.
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Koz
I’d say you’re doing a pretty dangerous thing there. Every time you charge your flash some heat is generated inside that flash. Several things heat up, like power transistors and transformer. The flash tube itself heats up as the flash fires. The heat has to dissipate somehow. If you shoot your flash too often it will overheat. That’s like asking for trouble.