New a6xxx housing from Meikon

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So a long term use issue...

I sprung a leak last dive. Not much and the camera is fine but it was probably 20ml of water.

Obviously it was time to do some maintenance so I started with the body. I went in thinking it was going to be the trigger since that gets the most use. It wasn’t. All the buttons and dial seals were clean. Relubricated the seals and reassembled. I did notice some crud around the plug for the surf grip at the bottom. Took that out and it was horrid. Really had to clean the crap off the plug and from the threads, lubed and reassembled.

Vacuum test went green but failed failed after a few minutes. I remembered the eyepiece had been shown some condensation at some point. I took that apart, cleaned and lubricated, reassembled.

I’m past fifteen minutes into another vacuum test and green light is still blinking. Got it!

Lesson learned... that bottom plug needs to come out every so often for a clean and lube.
 
So a long term use issue...

I sprung a leak last dive. Not much and the camera is fine but it was probably 20ml of water.

Obviously it was time to do some maintenance so I started with the body. I went in thinking it was going to be the trigger since that gets the most use. It wasn’t. All the buttons and dial seals were clean. Relubricated the seals and reassembled. I did notice some crud around the plug for the surf grip at the bottom. Took that out and it was horrid. Really had to clean the crap off the plug and from the threads, lubed and reassembled.

Vacuum test went green but failed failed after a few minutes. I remembered the eyepiece had been shown some condensation at some point. I took that apart, cleaned and lubricated, reassembled.

I’m past fifteen minutes into another vacuum test and green light is still blinking. Got it!

Lesson learned... that bottom plug needs to come out every so often for a clean and lube.

Great suggestion. I think as SCUBA divers, we probably don't pay too much attention to the Pistol Grip plug at the bottom of the housing. I was surprised how thin and small the O-ring is as well. Wish they had a beefier O-ring to seal that area off.
 
So a long term use issue...

I sprung a leak last dive. Not much and the camera is fine but it was probably 20ml of water.

Obviously it was time to do some maintenance so I started with the body. I went in thinking it was going to be the trigger since that gets the most use. It wasn’t. All the buttons and dial seals were clean. Relubricated the seals and reassembled. I did notice some crud around the plug for the surf grip at the bottom. Took that out and it was horrid. Really had to clean the crap off the plug and from the threads, lubed and reassembled.

Vacuum test went green but failed failed after a few minutes. I remembered the eyepiece had been shown some condensation at some point. I took that apart, cleaned and lubricated, reassembled.

I’m past fifteen minutes into another vacuum test and green light is still blinking. Got it!

Lesson learned... that bottom plug needs to come out every so often for a clean and lube.

I had the horrifying bottom plug mess as well. Definitely needs inspection regularly. I go from surf-->dive fairly often so I luckily discovered this quickly.

Separately: On my last dive to 100' I sprung a tiny leak that tripped the sensor. No idea what caused it, haven't had time to investigate, but working on it now. Camera was not damaged. Feeling a bit unsure about going deep with the housing now.
 
I got the same problem yesterday morning, in the middle of a liveaboard trip. Small leak, a few drops of water here and there, camera and lens were fine. Another diver on the boat had lost an A6300 with a 90mm macro to this some time ago - the pistol grip port plug on the first generation of housings is vulnerable to corrosion and when he took his out, it was just a mess - in the currently sold gen3 housings this is fixed. I didn't want to risk making my housing completely unserviceable for the remainder of the trip so I didn't touch the plug, instead putting superglue around its circumference, which held for a couple dives, but then it started leaking again. I decided to just keep diving it but limit my risk by using the kit lens, which turned out to be a great decision, as I got a bunch of shots that neither 10-18mm nor 90mm would have managed, and the camera survived to the end of the trip, but now I'm waiting for a response from Meikon support as to what should be done about it.
 
I got the same problem yesterday morning, in the middle of a liveaboard trip. Small leak, a few drops of water here and there, camera and lens were fine. Another diver on the boat had lost an A6300 with a 90mm macro to this some time ago - the pistol grip port plug on the first generation of housings is vulnerable to corrosion and when he took his out, it was just a mess - in the currently sold gen3 housings this is fixed. I didn't want to risk making my housing completely unserviceable for the remainder of the trip so I didn't touch the plug, instead putting superglue around its circumference, which held for a couple dives, but then it started leaking again. I decided to just keep diving it but limit my risk by using the kit lens, which turned out to be a great decision, as I got a bunch of shots that neither 10-18mm nor 90mm would have managed, and the camera survived to the end of the trip, but now I'm waiting for a response from Meikon support as to what should be done about it.

Keep us posted... if there's a fix for us early adopters we should look at it.
 
Keep us posted... if there's a fix for us early adopters we should look at it.

Just got a response. They say they don't have spare parts for the gen1 housings anymore, but since I've been a good and loyal customer (indeed and I have; over the years, I have purchased two housings, a wet dome, two vacuum systems, one flat port, three domes, two strobes and some spare parts) they're offering me a gen3 housing for $160 + shipping. Not a bad deal.
 
Neat, but they only list A7SIII and A6600 housings as compatible. It's got a built-in rather than flexible lamp, and it looks more like a small xenon tube rather than LEDs, so it won't line up with fiber optic ports on Salted Line housings and I doubt it will afford burst capability - it's more like a clip-on flash that Fuji and Olympus bundle with some of their cameras. It's still quite useful to A6600 owners who now don't need to shell out $500 to UW-Technics or TRT.
 
Neat, but they only list A7SIII and A6600 housings as compatible. It's got a built-in rather than flexible lamp, and it looks more like a small xenon tube rather than LEDs, so it won't line up with fiber optic ports on Salted Line housings and I doubt it will afford burst capability - it's more like a clip-on flash that Fuji and Olympus bundle with some of their cameras. It's still quite useful to A6600 owners who now don't need to shell out $500 to UW-Technics or TRT.

I did see what looked like flash tube but totally missed the A6600 wishfully thinking it was the A6xxx housing. Interesting nevertheless and perhaps they will have a trigger similar to the TRT or UW-Tecnics at some point.
 

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