Pentax Digital Spotmeter defect?

[hajime72]

Could anyone help advise (this is what it's showing me in the finder with two different and new 4SR44 batteries):

[vinny]

Call richard ritter. Google will find his #.

[Drew Wiley]

Looks like bad batteries to me, namely, when batteries are old and at the exhaustion point. Just because you bought them new doesn't mean that are usable. Lots
of crap out there nowadays; lots of counterfeit batteries too. But first, make sure there is no corrosion on the battery contacts. Otherwise, contact either Richard
or Quality Light Metric.

[Heroique]

If those two batteries were purchased at the same time & place, I'd buy a third one from a different source for a final test.

I'd also make it a 4LR44.

[Preston]

As more definitive test, you might want to aim the meter at a grey card under identical lighting conditions and/or compare the readings with a known good meter.

Oops. I see that the meter is reading about the same in two different light levels. My bad.

I use a 4LR44 in my Pentax digital meter, as well.

If you're still having issues after installing a new battery and cleaning the contacts, definitely contact Richard, or Quality Light Metric, as Drew suggests. They will tell you what's going on.

--P

[Luis-F-S]

Call richard ritter. Google will find his #.

+1

[hajime72]

Thanks all.
The silver-oxides are brand spanking new from factory, but ordered some alkalines and will see

[domaz]

Could a segment be out on that LED display? Seems possible.

[David Swinnard]

Looks like one of the LED segments is out. A careful check of a range of subject brightnesses to run the numbers up from zero while checking how they are displayed should confirm that.

I had a couple of dead legs on my meter's LED years ago and contacted Richard. I even found the original paperwork with the old photo cell still taped to it that I received back from Zone VI years previously with RR signed at the bottom. Richard had calibrated this meter originally and for a modest sum replaced the readout with some spares he had from defunct meters. This was in the early '80s and it's still running just fine. Pentax Canada at the time told me they could no longer get parts.

Call Richard.

[Drew Wiley]

I had a couple dead legs on one of my Pentax spotmeters just last month. It was just a weak battery. New battery fixed it.