A710IS acting up .....

Please register or login

Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.

Benefits of registering include

  • Ability to post and comment on topics and discussions.
  • A Free photo gallery to share your dive photos with the world.
  • You can make this box go away

Joining is quick and easy. Log in or Register now!

sarita75

Guest
Messages
3,460
Reaction score
0
Location
San Francisco, CA
# of dives
100 - 199
Just returned from my vacation to Florida. During the only dive we were able to do (that's another story), I noticed a drop of water in the u/w housing. The camera, however, was acting fine. It went on the 2nd dive - again, acting fine. However, later that afternoon, it started acting up - wouldn't turn on. Changed the batteries, and it was fine. Then, after about 30 minutes of checking out the photos, it wouldn't turn off.

Its gone forwards and backwards on this and, quite frankly, I am a bit :heart: broken since it won't even turn on anymore.

I really do love the camera and finally am feeling comfortable with its functions, etc. When I began u/w photography, I told myself that I wouldn't beat myself up about it if this happened, but now that I am "here" - it is a bit harder not to beat myself up. So here I am ... Curious if, in the infinite SB wisdom, anyone has any ideas, tricks, suggestions before I make the ultimate decision re: sending it back to Canon v. new camera/housing, etc.

Thanks in advance ......
 
If you've gotten water inside, the camera is likely toast as those guts don't like water at all!

But open everything up, take your card and batteries out and put it in front of a gentle air conditioner over night to try to dry things out as much as possible. The cool dry air seems to work the best. Cross fingers, try camera again.

Hopefully others will have more tricks to try...

...oh, and be warned, anything that "fixes" it now, may not really fix it and it may fail again unexpectedly...
 
Oh Alcina - thanks! I have tried all of that, including moisture munchers, etc. :( I have a feeling that the several times it worked afterwards were just "hiccups" in the road to the inevitable. :( So sad! I will see if anyone has any other suggestions (I remain eternally optimistic). Thanks (as always!)!!
 
My sympathies. I am also recovering from a recent camera demise resulting from excess humidity in the case. As in about an ounce in excess. Fortunately, it occurred on the second to last dive on our trip. Noticed early in the dive that there was fogging on the LCD viewing window. Got worse during the dive. Knew it was a leak, but could not abort short of an emergency declaration. Camera functioned through the whole dive until I turned it off at the end. On the boat between dives, the camera would not go on; opened the caseand saw the water; took the batteries out.

Back on shore, a closer look revealed corrosion already on the battery terminals and on the contacts in the camera. Rinsed batteries and battery compartment in fresh water back in my room. Re-charged the batteries were OK. Camera dried and it still didn't work.

Back home, I examined everything carefully again and found another battery I did not know existed. It's a watch battery that supports retention of information in the camera memory. I don't know if cameras can function without this battery, as I have not been able to test things in an intact camera yet. I have an A570is and this battery sits on its edge in a slot near the AA batteries and memory card under a little plastic tab that has the battery ID number on it. Pull this tab up and the battery will come out, sitting in its holder.

I replaced that battery ($5 from Radio Shack), put in charged AAs and the camera still didn't work.

I then rinsed the whole camera in isopropyl (rubbing) alcohol, undiluted (which is already about 70%). A friend subsequently said it should have been about 10-15%. Who knows? The camera dried overnight and still didn't work. Moreover, now I saw blue corrosion which was clearly copper based, rather than iron, down around some of the AA battery contacts. That did it. I ordered a new camera.

Yours is probably dead, too. But, you might try the diluted isopropyl alcohol rinse, if all else fails. One thing I regret not doing was rinsing my camera with absolute (100%) ethanol. I have access to this, and should have done it (and probably preceded by a thorough freshwater rinse), as any water moisture would be washed away by the ethanol which would itself evaporate very quickly. Still probably would not have been adequate. I strongly suspect that fine wires inside were already interrupted by the corrosion that occurred during the 3+ hr exposure to salt before I got a chance to make a freshwater rinse.

LESSON LEARNED--I have learned the hard way to check the o-ring after each opening of the case.

My attitude had been that if it isn't broken, don't fix it. Yes, I did a thorough check and silicon lubrication before the first use. And, I did a thorough rinse after every dive. I should have been particularly careful when we dove in a circumstance of 1 ft visibility surrounded by milky water filled with very fine particulates. Belated inspection of the case o-ring revealed a lot!! of fine particulates embedded in the silicone grease on the o-ring and case. None of this stuff would wash off. It had to be rubbed off with a clean cloth or my fingers. It could be felt with the fingers as mild resistance against the o-ring (such as would occur with superfine sandpaper), but was more or less invisible, until accumulated in one spot.

So, I will be much more careful in the future. This was in Bonaire, incidently. The wind had shifted, allowing substantial swells from the northwest, between Klein Bonaire and Bonaire, to break as waves on the western shore. Shore diving was the pits for a day, and it took an additional day for everything to settle back to near normal. The only place of relatively decent vis. was the southeast corner of Klein Bonaire.
 
Thank you everyone. I appreciate it.

LMorin - We did try to change the little CR1220 battery in ours, and - like you - to no avail. We've been pretty meticulous about o-ring cleaning, etc. Funny enough, I had just bought a new o-ring, but decided to put it in after that dive, .... who knows if it was the o-ring or what that caused the moisture inside the housing. Its really hard to say. I am not even sure what to do in order to determine the realiability of the housing or not. I was not, however, putting any desicant (sp) in the case with the camera, which I will start doing as soon as I have sorted out this issue.

My husband and I are now debating the merits of fixing the camera at this point. I am of the impression that the $100+ we would spend fixing would be better put to use on a new A710. To be decided still.
 
Just a question but how do you know it is the door O-ring that leaked?

If, assuming no lint or debris and the correct lubrication, an O-ring does not require magic to seal. If you can see CONTINUOUS and uninterupted equal compression by looking through the clear housing on both the outer and inner surface then it should be sealed.

We always had big furry collie dogs, I flooded a strobe once and afterwards whilst sitting on the resort room bed pondering my poor state of affairs I discoverd a long thin collie hair had somehow been installed along with the O-ring! In this case an alchohol wash did save the strobe for many more uses. However, those little digi cams--if you even think about water near them they are DEAD--DEAD--DEAD. That is why I bought TWO 570IS and one DC12 houising. That is why I like the idea of a waterproof camera in a waterproof housing like the Olympus SW series. I am absolutely confident if the 570IS even sees a single drop of water it will be DEAD--DEAD--DEAD. An otherwise nifty little indoor camera that simply cannot live in the real world--that includes all Canon digis.

Someday if people complain enough they will make these digi-snaps with gaskets etc, not water proof like the Oly SWs but splash proof and humidity proof and rain proof etc then if a "drop" of water condenses in the case it will not be a problemor if you take a picof the kids playing in the rain you will not need a new camera.
N
 
Just curious, which housing are(were) you using? I've got the 710 with an Ike housing and even though I once had some condensation, it cleared quickly with no long term affects.
Also. any idea as to how often that CR 1220 should be replaced? Thans, DD
 
I was using the Canon housing for the A710. I didn't actually see any condensation on the housing, but there was a drop of water at the base while we were diving. Not sure what caused it, but we didn't have any desciliant (sp?) in the housing.

As for the CR1220 - I am not sure how often. We weren't having any problems with it at the time, but replaced it because it was a $5 potential solution. Ultimately it didn't do anything though. :) oh well.
 

Back
Top Bottom