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Problem with Pocket wizards and Vivitar 283's
HiSPL
Registered Users Posts: 251 Major grins
I have a baffling issue that I can't wrap my brain around.
I have 3 Vivitar 283's. I have been triggering them for a while with the cheap eBay radio remotes and other than some odd flashes from interference they work just fine. I would say the eBay remotes have a succesful trigger rate of about 95%, but they do have some random triggers sometimes when you don't want them.
I recently upgraded to some PW plus II's. I got 3 of them. The problem is that they will not trigger my 283's! They work on a 430EX fine, they will trigger my lone 285HV fine, they work fine on old canon and pentax accesory flashes fine, but they will absolutely not trigger the 283's for anything! I have double checked the cables used and also used a hot shoe adaptor. There is no way I can attach them to the 283 and have it work.
Please tell me someone else has heard of this and can point me to some useful info that will help! I'm getting very frustrated and more than a little disappointed that my $30.00 eBay trigger will work when almost $500.00 worth of Pocket wizards won't......:huh
I planned on using this setup pretty soon too. I guess I will have to stick with the cheapy triggers until I figure it out.:ymca
P.S. I did call PW directly and the only thing he thought it could be is the cables which I made my self, but I have tested them nine ways from sunday and they are fine. I am a sound engineer during the day, so I can solder fine. I make cables all the time.
I am pulling my hair out here!
I have 3 Vivitar 283's. I have been triggering them for a while with the cheap eBay radio remotes and other than some odd flashes from interference they work just fine. I would say the eBay remotes have a succesful trigger rate of about 95%, but they do have some random triggers sometimes when you don't want them.
I recently upgraded to some PW plus II's. I got 3 of them. The problem is that they will not trigger my 283's! They work on a 430EX fine, they will trigger my lone 285HV fine, they work fine on old canon and pentax accesory flashes fine, but they will absolutely not trigger the 283's for anything! I have double checked the cables used and also used a hot shoe adaptor. There is no way I can attach them to the 283 and have it work.
Please tell me someone else has heard of this and can point me to some useful info that will help! I'm getting very frustrated and more than a little disappointed that my $30.00 eBay trigger will work when almost $500.00 worth of Pocket wizards won't......:huh
I planned on using this setup pretty soon too. I guess I will have to stick with the cheapy triggers until I figure it out.:ymca
P.S. I did call PW directly and the only thing he thought it could be is the cables which I made my self, but I have tested them nine ways from sunday and they are fine. I am a sound engineer during the day, so I can solder fine. I make cables all the time.
I am pulling my hair out here!
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http://strobist.blogspot.com/
― Edward Weston
Check the trigger voltage of the flashes. Some of the older Vivitar 283s are a very high trigger voltage, and that may complicate things. A Wein SafeSync might help in that case, by reducing the trigger voltage to 6V.
Moderator of the Cameras and Accessories forums
I had thought about reversing the polarity, and I will try it out. But isn't the "trigger" just a short. I mean you can trigger the flash just by shorting it with a paperclip anyway, I wouldn't think the polarity would matter in that case. I'll give it a shot though....
My 283's are high voltage, they can run anywhere from 125 to 300 volts depending on the state of charge the batteries are in. The PW plus II's state they are high voltage safe though....
I believe one of the strobist threads was talking about how the new version of the eBay triggers fixes a problem with the polarity issues with the New Vivatars. So maybe PWs have the same issue. Some one also had a fix for the old version of eBay triggers that corrected the problem as well, which might work for you on the ebay triggers, and point toward a PW solution.