Metz 58-AF 2 - A cautionary tail

I had a problem with the locking pin on the flash failing and effectively locking the flash to the camera hot shoe – the tab just above the front of the locking ring had broken off so the locking ring could not raise the pin.
To remove the flash I had to ease up the pin with a jewellers screwdriver – by pushing the screwdriver against the collar holding the pin through the gap left by the broken tab To stop this happening again I have now removed the locking pin (the pin isn’t really needed as the fit between flash and hot shoe is very stiff anyway so the flash is unlikely to slip off). Fortunately we had the tools to do this at work but if you don’t fancy opening up the flash it is probably easier to glue the pin up.

This is my second 58 AF, I had the mark 1 before which had a plastic foot and was known for problems with the locking pin. I had assumed with the improvements to the MkII they had also fixed the weakness in the design of the locking pin – but apparently not. … As I was in the process of checking out my newly arrived K-5IIs I was not a happy bunny. Fortunately no harm was done to the K-5 but the same could not be said for my blood pressure

To remove the locking pin you will need a small Torex screwdriver (No. 06 ?) and a pair of tweezers
1. Remove the base of the flash by removing the four Torex screws around the hot shoe foot.
2. Carefully remove the foot – there is a small PCB in the base connected to the rest of the gun via a ribbon cable
3. Remove the three Torex screws holding the PCB into the foot (one is just under the ribbon cable so be careful not the break the connector.
4. Remove the PCB, but be aware that there are springs beneath the PCB –the springs may fall out and are easy to loose
5. Take the springs out and pull the plastic cover in the bottom of the foot out .
6. You can now take the pin out
7. When reassembling remember to put the four long springs back which connect the four sprung pins in the base of flash to the PCB, the fifth long spring connects to the metal body of the foot (right-hand side when looking down from the back, you should be able to see the metal contact from above – the hole on the left hand side has no metal contact.

I sympathise. It reminds me of my first post on this forum when a Tamron 500mm jammed onto my 15 minute old *istDS

Strange I thought I was the only one to have this happen last week. After doing a Google search I found a solution but am not very happy that this now appears to be a design fault. However, apart from the locking pin issue I do like Metz Flashes.