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Subject: Tri-lensed shutter woes
Date: 2009-06-06 08:39:45
From: David Richardson

Hello fellow TL-120 owners,

My experience has been the occasional odd speed not dialed when the batteries got low. Using an external gray-meter to determine speeds and such and stopped using internal for confirmation of exposure to extend life of button batts. The best solution so far for this individual beast is to cycle batts thru it regularly. Throwing bucks/batts seemed a better solution than asking DrT if this infernal thing had a warrantee.

Must admit to going back to my dependable old dual Mamiya 645 array more often due to wierd speeds on the beast. Dual Mamiya's also get fewer, "What the hell is that?" reactions.

Per previous posting. Grandpa was attacked by beloved granddaughter and the keyboard pressed combinations sent the text to Internet oblivion it seems. Hense this shortened repost.

Subject: Re: Tri-lensed shutter woes
Date: 2009-06-09 17:12:07
From: John Thurston

David Richardson wrote:

> Hello fellow TL-120 owners, My experience has been the
> occasional odd speed not dialed when the batteries got low.
> Using an external gray-meter to determine speeds and such and
> stopped using internal for confirmation of exposure to extend
> life of button batts. The best solution so far for this
> individual beast is to cycle batts thru it regularly. Throwing
> bucks/batts seemed a better solution than asking DrT if this
> infernal thing had a warrantee.

David,
Can you tell us how many rolls you are getting on a battery set?
Are you making very long exposures?

I can't dispute that you are seeing short battery life, but I
can't understand why. I've published my cameras' power
consumption figures before, and those numbers indicate my
batteries should last virtually forever if I don't shoot
multi-minute exposures.

John Thurston
Juneau, Alaska

Subject: Re: Tri-lensed shutter woes
Date: 2009-06-09 17:21:03
From: David Richardson

Hello John,

I will have to get back to you. Not having kept good records, once I discovered the problem, just got in the habit of new batteries every 50 rolls of film.

--- On Tue, 6/9/09, John Thurston wrote:

From: John Thurston
Subject: Re: [MF3D-group] Tri-lensed shutter woes
To: MF3D-group@yahoogroups.com
Date: Tuesday, June 9, 2009, 11:11 PM

David Richardson wrote:
> Hello fellow TL-120 owners, My experience has been the
> occasional odd speed not dialed when the batteries got low.
> Using an external gray-meter to determine speeds and such and
> stopped using internal for confirmation of exposure to extend
> life of button batts. The best solution so far for this
> individual beast is to cycle batts thru it regularly. Throwing
> bucks/batts seemed a better solution than asking DrT if this
> infernal thing had a warrantee.

David,
Can you tell us how many rolls you are getting on a battery set?
Are you making very long exposures?

I can't dispute that you are seeing short battery life, but I
can't understand why. I've published my cameras' power
consumption figures before, and those numbers indicate my
batteries should last virtually forever if I don't shoot
multi-minute exposures.

John Thurston
Juneau, Alaska

Subject: Re: Tri-lensed shutter woes
Date: 2009-06-09 17:43:17
From: John Thurston

David Richardson wrote:

> Hello John,
> I will have to get back to you. Not having kept good records, once I discovered the problem, just got in the habit of new batteries every 50 rolls of film.

This feels like another case of different expectations of
acceptable performance. I'd probably be perfectly happy with
that rate of use :P

With six exposures per roll, that makes 300 images per
battery-stack. At $2 per battery cell ($6/battery-stack), it
adds two cents per exposure. Since I estimate it costs me $2
each time I trip the shutter, the battery costs represent a 1%
increase.

At the rate I expose film, that expense is totally acceptable.
At the volumes of images. Your needs are different from mine and
it is obviously a larger issue for you.

John Thurston
Juneau, Alaska

Subject: Re: Tri-lensed shutter woes
Date: 2009-06-10 03:03:47
From: Mark

> At the rate I expose film, that expense is totally acceptable.
> At the volumes of images. Your needs are different from mine and
> it is obviously a larger issue for you.

I don't mind buying new sets of batteries. What I am totally pissed about is loosing shots and the unreliability of it.

I think an issue is load - so if you shoot a live event like me - you can drain the batteries enough for it to give temporary bad results.

Clearing some other to-do's then will write up my notes.

M