I need a little help and I hope someone here can provide it. I am currently studying in Costa Rica and I cannot get my flash to fire anymore (it fire okay the first time I used it when I first got here). I have a Canon Digital Rebel XT and a Phoenix DPZBIS-125CII shoe mount flash. The screen on the flash acknowledges the f-stop and focal length of the lense I am using, but I cannot seem to get it to fire anymore. I press the test button on the flash and it works fine. Here is the link to the flash:
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/429991-REG/Phoenix_04372_DPZBIS_125CII_Digital_Flash_for.html
I'm not familiar with that flash Jason, but I have shot quite a bit in the tropics. Depending on how long you have been there, a small bit of corrosion may have built up on the contacts between the camera and flash, especially if any bare brass is showing. Easy to fix by cleaning the contacts. Avoid using a heavy abrasive like sandpaper, however, as more exposed brass adds up to more corrosion, etc. I have the best luck cleaning contacts using a pencil eraser. Using it daily along with your other cleaning chores should help prevent buildup, too.
I hope that works for you, because it's an easy fix. If it turns out not to be the solution, you'll have to dig deeper.
Best of luck!
Posted by Kent Staubus on June 19, 2007 at 9:13 PM
Try taking out the batteries and like Hank says, look for corrosion. If it looks OK, try drying it out inside with a blow dryer, carefully.
Jason, This (above ) was exactly my problem when i was in Costa Rica twice over the last 4 yrs.
After about a week of shooting, then a 3-day rest while doing other stuff, enough corrosion built up to make the flash non-functional.
Hope this is the easy solution for you, also!
Enjoy a wonderful place with incredible wildlife opportunities! I needed a Better Beamer to get good shots in the deep rainforest, too - just in case this helps as well.
Sandy R
Hi Jason,
I had the exact same problem with a Canon 580EX flash this march in Costa Rica. Starting on the first day there it wouldn't work/communicate with the camera anymore. I was there for eight weeks and it didn't work the whole time.
As soon as I got back to Switzerland it started working again and still does so flawlessly...no idea what happened. Sorry I can't be of more help.
Posted by Tom Nevesely on June 20, 2007 at 12:58 PM
I have nothing to add other than that one of my lenses died in Costa Rica. It was the beginning of the rainy season and the lens died after about 3-4 days. Too much humidity I guess? For the rest of the trip, I had to rely on my p&s for wide angle stuff. Fortunately my 70-300mm lens worked fine.
You're not going to want to hear this but it's possible that you've fried your X-sync trigger. Canon's are notoriously weak when it comes to enduring high trigger voltages and I've seen more than one develop this problem. I don't know your particular flash but if you don't know what the trigger voltage is you should always use a protecter between the flash and the hot shoe. Unfortunately, if you have indeed fried your X-sync, it's too late and you'll need a repair.
Does your built-in flash work OK? I don't know if the same sync contacts are used for both. I don't use Canon and on my camera the hot shoe does not use the same contacts to fire a flash as the PC jack uses, so if you know whether your built-in uses the same contacts as the hot shoe you can figure out if it's a fried contact problem.
Discussion
6 repliesI need a little help and I hope someone here can provide it. I am currently studying in Costa Rica and I cannot get my flash to fire anymore (it fire okay the first time I used it when I first got here). I have a Canon Digital Rebel XT and a Phoenix DPZBIS-125CII shoe mount flash. The screen on the flash acknowledges the f-stop and focal length of the lense I am using, but I cannot seem to get it to fire anymore. I press the test button on the flash and it works fine. Here is the link to the flash:
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/429991-REG/Phoenix_04372_DPZBIS_125CII_Digital_Flash_for.html
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Jason Babcock-Stiner
I hope that works for you, because it's an easy fix. If it turns out not to be the solution, you'll have to dig deeper.
Best of luck!
Kent in SD
After about a week of shooting, then a 3-day rest while doing other stuff, enough corrosion built up to make the flash non-functional.
Hope this is the easy solution for you, also!
Enjoy a wonderful place with incredible wildlife opportunities! I needed a Better Beamer to get good shots in the deep rainforest, too - just in case this helps as well.
Sandy R
I had the exact same problem with a Canon 580EX flash this march in Costa Rica. Starting on the first day there it wouldn't work/communicate with the camera anymore. I was there for eight weeks and it didn't work the whole time.
As soon as I got back to Switzerland it started working again and still does so flawlessly...no idea what happened. Sorry I can't be of more help.
Does your built-in flash work OK? I don't know if the same sync contacts are used for both. I don't use Canon and on my camera the hot shoe does not use the same contacts to fire a flash as the PC jack uses, so if you know whether your built-in uses the same contacts as the hot shoe you can figure out if it's a fried contact problem.