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Richard Clarke
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, February 22, 2005 - 11:24 am: | 
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Hi- I am looking at replacing the plastic foot on my vivitar 283's and 285's. I want to use to "Sonia" brand metal shoe, with the PC outlet and the test button. Has anyone replaced their original with these? I have tried to find some info on the web, but not much seems available. From what I can find, not all the wires need to be connected, only 2. Is the center pin (and solder connection) +?
Any advise or tips would be greatly appreciated. |
Ron
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, February 22, 2005 - 06:40 pm: |
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Hi-
I installed one just last week on my old 70's 283. The Sonia foot unit is aluminum and looks well made. It has a test button, a PC connection and a hot shoe contact. It does not include the screws to secure it. You have to use the original screws, so be careful not to ruin them when you remove them. Mine were hard to remove. You should use a good quality jewelers Philips screwdriver. I had a cheap one from the dollar store and I almost ruined the screw heads.
Once you remove the screws and pop the original foot loose,it is connected with two soldered wires. I used the soldering iron to melt the original solder joints from the two contacts and I removed the old foot. My 283 had only two wires coming out of the bottom, a red and a blue. The red needs to be soldered to the center terminal on the Sonia unit and the blue to the side terminal. This was told to me by the store that sold me the foot.
I used a 25 watt soldering iron that I bought at Walmart (Lenk model L25K which comes with solder, three tips and a little stand). I used the fine tip as the contacts are very small.
It took a few tries as I have never soldered before, and the contacts are small, but I soldered the wires in place and reinstalled the new base with the test button facing the rear of the flash. It works fine now and is very sturdy.
Make sure you tighten the flash lock ring securely on the camera as it is made of a slippery plastic and loosens itself if it isn't tight.
All told it took about one half hour. I'm happy with the results.
HTH,
Ron |
Richard Clarke
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, February 22, 2005 - 07:18 pm: |
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Thanks- This is great info. I removed a plastic foot from my 285 (not 285HV) it has 4 wires. See the picture at http://users.ev1.net/~lclarke/vivitar_flash_foot.jpg |
rick oleson
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 23, 2005 - 06:26 am: |
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One note of caution regarding the metal feet: The flash is no lighter with a metal foot than it was with the plastic one. Now that it has an unbreakable foot, the next drop will rip the flash shoe out of the camera. This is not just hypothetical, I have a nice Canon FTb with the top of the flash shoe sheared off..... so just consider which is the more costly repair, a flash foot or a camera shoe.
rick : ) = |
John Shepherd
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, February 24, 2005 - 02:45 am: |
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I fitted one of these to my 283 a year or so back. I recall that the plating where the wires are soldered to the new foot was tarnished and so the solder would not take, I had to clean the solder tags by filing with a small fine file.
As with many Japanese screws, a regular Philips screwdriver does not fit well. Either search out the correct type, or grind away the tip of the Philips to create a small flat allowing the cross points to sit more deeply into the screw head. Incidentally, the correct size of screwdriver always looks improbably large!
John |
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