Friday 29 May 2009

My First Nikon D80 Problem

Two years, three months and over 25,000 exposures after buying my Nikon D80, a fault. A small, intermittent, easy-to-work-round fault, but a fault nonetheless.

After taking a photo, sometimes, the 'battery low' icon flashes in the viewfinder, and there's a black screen on the back of the camera. The LCD readout on the top of the camera confirms a dead battery. But it's just been charged! I switch the camera off, then back on - and everything's fine, battery meter confirms a 98% charge.

This can happen after one shot, after three, or ten, or four - a seemingly random fault.

It started happenening after a series of night time bulb exposures (catching lightning strikes) last week. Never happened before, now it's occurring at least once in every shooting session.

Annoying, because there's no rule to it, not a fault bad enough to have to take it in for immediate service, but still a fault and irritating.

Has anyone else had this problem with the D80? Is there a fix? (I've not attempted to do anything to isolate the cause of the fault such as swabbing the electrodes of the battery pack etc in case it does more damage).

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

With all of the electronics it is very hard to determine what the problem is without taking it to a repair facility. Could be battery 'memory' after 2 years of charging.

I take my nikons to the repair facility by Galeria Mokotow

Bob

student SGH said...

that might be indeed a Memory effect, I'm not a technician, but as fat as I know it's an aftermath of recharging the battery before it totally runs down - in that way the battery "learns" that it's time for charging even if it is not low. According to some advice I've heard it may be fixed by discharging (most advisably by natural use of the camera) totally and then recharging and repeating the procedure for a few times - this method won't do more harm, but its effectivness might be disputed. Consult a specialist...

Thank you for the link on your blogroll ;-)

Anonymous said...

Michael - one thing I neglected: I have 2 batteries for my Nikon. That way I can fully exhaust one and have a spare. Allows me to run the 'in use' battery down to it's end and 'hopefully' eliminate that memory effect issue.

Bob

Michael Dembinski said...

Thanks Bob, thanks Bartek, I think next Sunday I shall visit the Giełda Fotograficzna at Stodoła.

Anyone want to come along for rummaging around the stands and a lunchtime beer?

Anonymous said...

Michael - that would be quite interesting, I have never been there. Let's talk this week.

I have your number.

Ewa is out so I'll have a free day.

Bob

student SGH said...

I thought there's only a Giełda komputerowa there... Maybe GK is opened only on Saturdays...

Next Sunday you musn't forget to cast a ballot...

Michael Dembinski said...

GK is open Sats and Suns. GF open Suns only (10:00 to 14:00).

And don't you worry - I shall most certainly vote! (the Warsaw district of Ursynów usually has Poland's highest voter turnout).

student SGH said...

maybe this year the suburban municipality of Lesznowola will try to challenge it and we'll outrun you :-)
it doesn't matter where the highest turnout will be (although we have in mind the famed lacking ballot cards from October 2007), it should be as high as possible in the whole country.

Today I've read about fifty per cent of our current Eurodeputies do not speak any of the foreign languages (it referred mostly to English and French which are the official languages of European Institutions, at least command of English is essential) - that's the saddest figure, those people are called "silent deputies"