Olympus TG-5/PT-058/UFL-3 strange firing issues.

[Blackdog017]

Hello, I have a rather strange problem with the above setup.

It was all working fine until I added an AOI Air lense (same as the Blackscatter M52 Air Lense) to the PT-058 housing.

This lens requires that the flash diffuser of the housing be replaced by a black fiber optics adapter to which the fiber optics connector attaches directly, as there is not enough space between the housing and the lense for the normal setup. This adapter mounts the cable on its top edge and has an integrated little mirror at 45 degrees.

With this setup, on the surface, the strobe fires without any issue. Not a single problem.

But in the water, as soon as it's no longer shallow (below ~10m), I consistently get RC fire errors.

After my last trip I arrived to the conclusion that the culprit must be the absense of the diffuser somehow. As the mirror in the plastic adaptor is not really aligned with the camera flash inside the housing. I have now added a DIY diffuser inside the housing, covering the whole window, but have not been able to test it yet (in three weeks I will).

I was wondering if anyone else has had the problem or if anyone has any other ideas (that I might still have time to implement)...

Thanks for reading.

 

[arew+4]

What does backscatter offer as a solution, as I'm pretty sure their lens has the same issue.

 

[Blackdog017]

What does backscatter offer as a solution, as I'm pretty sure their lens has the same issue.

The Backscatter product includes the black fiber adaptor for the PT-05x. The AOI product does not, but you buy it separately.

I'm 99% sure it's the same lense, and same adaptor. Backscatter's lens has a "Optics by AOI" print on the frame. They look completely identical, so I think it's just a rebranding.

this is the thingy I'm talking about (incidentally the front pic is from Backscatter, the second is from AOI):

So it's this setup:

Instead of standard Olympus one:

(Pictures from different vendors in the web)

 

[arew+4]

Is it supposed to replace the diffuser or go on top of it?

 

[Blackdog017]

Is it supposed to replace the diffuser or go on top of it?

Completely replaces the diffuser.

 

[bvanant]

I would be tempted to drill a hole to mount the fiber so that the light doesn't need to use the mirror.
Bill

 

[Blackdog017]

I would be tempted to drill a hole to mount the fiber so that the light doesn't need to use the mirror.
Bill

Thanks for the input. I see your point. I will look into it but the wide angle lens restricts the space there a lot.

I am more convinced now that the problem is more in the optical path and possible attenuations/losses than the lack of the diffuser.

The cable I'm using is the Olympus one. I bought another cable to try, a Sea Frogs with S&S connectors at both ends. Right out of the bag it is obvious that the new cable has a smaller optical section than the Olympus (cheaper and inferior), and with this cable the strobe does not even bother to trigger with the non-diffuser/mirror setup. I will check it with the old diffuser/direct setup to see what it does, but it is clearly being returned to the vendor anyway.

I'm now awaiting delivery of a Sea&Sea brand cable to continue with the tests.

 

[Blackdog017]

It's been a while, but for the sake of closure in case anyonewith a similar issue finds this thread in the future.

I would like to report that with the Sea&Sea optical cable everything works perfectly, even with the blind diffuser/mirror arrangement.

The S&S cable has the widest optical section of them all. Wider than the Olympus cable's. So it was all a matter of having enough section on the cable.