I h ave just purchased a use 1degreepentax spot meter. There is a H and L scale in thye viewer. There is only an L button on the handle. When I take a light reading how do I differentiate between the Lev els. There doesnt seem to be a way to do this on the meter.
Nancy
The high scale is always on, that is don't push any button and you are on the high scale. Push the button to get the low scale.
What Jim said is correct. If you don't get a reading in normal daylight without pushing the button, then something is wrong. Probably the battery is dead. Depending on how old the meter is, it may be powered by an obsolete mercury cell no longer available. Find out precisely which meter you have and we may be able to recommend substitutes.
Thanks for both your replies. I bought a new battery and it does give you a reading when you push the button, but does not do anything at all when not pushing the button. Suggestions?
Sounds like you have a faulty meter. Is it possible to get your money back?
Stay away from the older Pentax meters that are on when the lens cap is removed. Get the grey analog meters with the "ON" button on the handle. They are readily available on the auction site for $75-$100 and will last you a lifetime.
Richard Ritter in Vermont repairs these meters and can provide you with guidance.
Cheers!
It is hard to be sure without knowing the specific model. Most of the earlier Pentax spotmeters used two batteries. There was a standard 9 V battery for the low light values and an approximately 1.3 V mercury cell for the high light values. The battery case flipped open to reveal the 9 V battery, but you had to open a screw top with a coin to get at the other battery. I've used a Wein MRB625 1.35 V cell to replace the mercury battery. It is not long enough to fill the space, but I improvised a metal coil filler from copper wire to get it to work. It is possible to find other batteries which look as if they will work, but if the voltage is wrong, it will give you incorrect readings. With the Wein cell, my readings are still slightly off, but the biggest problem is that there is no warning when the battery begins to fail. With the mercury cell, it was obvious, but with the Wein cell, it passed the check, but the high values are off. I finally gave up and got myself a Pentax Digital Spotmeter.
If you are sure you replaced the high value battery, you should get a reading even if the voltage and reading are wrong. In that case, the meter is faulty. However, you should be sure the battery is actually making contact on both sides. Aside from a bad fit, you could also have problems if there is some corrosion in the battery compartment. Try sanding or scraping the contacts.
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