Danger of using old strobes?

[Greg Blank]

Bob

Sorry to differ, WS is output as energy discharged not storage...storage is a rather simple term for capacitance, typically measured in Farads or portions of them.

You are completely correct that capacitors can have abundant energy to kill you after a single discharge. Most flash power packs don't completely discharge with a single flash and the pack itself is drawing back the voltage it needs for the next firing in milliseconds that is say a 1,000 volts for your typical 1,000 WS "capable" pack. (or somewhere above the rating of any given power pack) & faster than household breakers can trip.

WS is a measure of storage not how much energy it draws.

Even after the flash is discharged a capacitor can still have enough energy stored in it to make you very hurt, or dead.

[Don Dudenbostel]

As pointed out the big danger is old internal wiring and unplugging a head while the pack is on and creating an arc which can destroy the plug , pack and you. I've used Speedotron black line for decades and never had a problem but I never unplug heads while the unit is on. For years I had Norman packs and heads along with the Speedo and had many problems out of the Normans. Power / high voltage diodes blew from time to time creating a large ball of fire and a bang like a shotgun being fired. I updated my Speedotron lights a few years ago and sold about fifty thousand wat seconds of packs and heads. Some were newer 4800 and 2400 ws units and a few were the old 2401 packs. A local fellow bought one of the 2401 packs and somehow managed to totally destroy it. I spoke with Speedotron about how the incident could have happened and they had no idea other than creating an arc in an explosive atmosphere. Apparently the pack arced creating a powerfull explosion in the pack. The case was balooned and totally seperated the upper and lower half and ripping the screws that held it together out of the holes. the bottom of the pack was rounded where it would not sit flat and a hole was melted in the side of the pack. When the pack blew apart one of the conectors on the pack was blown to pieces and the upper part of the pack went up like a rocket and cracked a 2x4 in the ceiling above the pack. In forty three years I've never seen anything like this and neither had Speedotron.

I think many of the stories of dangerous strobes come from the days of the old Ascor Sun Lights. These were very high voltage units with piggy back capacitor banks that could be coupled with cables and could achieve extremely high output with very short durations. These units were very unsafe and photographers lost their lives not exercising good safety practices. I've not seen any of these units in the last thirty of forty years and would imagine they are totally out of service now.

Generally old strobes are safe but like any other electrical device caution and good sense need to be used.

[Daniel Unkefer]

I have older Broncolor strobes (two 606's, 404, 1400), older monolights, on down to an Impact system. I feel pretty safe using all of it, I am very careful with the big stuff.

[Bob Salomon]

I have older Broncolor strobes (two 606's, 404, 1400), older monolights, on down to an Impact system. I feel pretty safe using all of it, I am very careful with the big stuff.

Wish you had not said "older" I was the Sinar, Broncolor, Foba, Ademco rep for the USA when the 606 was introduced in 77 or so. Doesn't seem that long ago!

[emmett]

It's what Frank says about the arcing problem with old strobes. I believe that Dynalites were the first strobes that were protected from this. Back in the day I arced out an old Thomas Strobe unit and almost killed myself. All the connecting pins in the pack and the head melted. Old timers still turn off power packs when they plug in and unplug heads.

Just as an aside, I worked for a guy who used Norman strobes and the pack, for some reason, discharged the power through the sync cord and into the camera and into him. It stopped his heart and almost killed him.

I used to work with Dynalites in the 70s and they would frequently sizzle, pop, smoke and blow up. I always turned them off and bled them before pulling the head cables out. They would arc, at least the early ones did.