Need a Metz Flash with battery pack

and i dont know wether to go for an old skool jobbie, or save up and get a new style metz flashy thing... Some advice would be great if anyone knows about this sort of thing... i been looking on ebay coz they have some of the old style ones really cheap occasionally, they are so good i did a shoot with them in Amsterdam in February and i managed to make it look all summery and nice! Now i have decided i must have a metz to continue with my people and places happy snappy ness any advice or people that use the big metz flashes would be great xx

Mattmatic has a Metz hammer head flash gun with batterys etc, I'v just posted it back to him (had it on loan for a while) nice bit of kit, give him a PM.

yeah i like the external batteries, Colin at the College who is the techie guy who Really knows what hes talking about, has told me to avoid ones unless i have the external battery pack... its all very confusing

It is worth taking a look at Quantum battery packs

this seems just the right thread for me to come in with my query, sorry Feeb to get a piggy ride .

I am tired of buying batteries for my igma ef 530 st dg super. And specially when I lock myself in my shed Ooops I have been advised to call it my studio now , and go through my fussy experiments my flash gobbles batteries like a hungry lion, well with the usage I put it through its not surprising anyway. Is there a way I could get a battery pack or something to get around this? Or what do you usually do to find the best balance? Apart from the obvious lowering the output to 1/2 or 1/4 or even lower, which really doesn't suit me for my purposes.

I bought a second hand Nikon flash gun from SRS at a cheap cheap price to use as a second flashgun as Matt very kindly had advised me, and I notice this one has a side input socket which it seems its to connect to the mains. Oh it definitely it is because the on/off switch has a MAINS setting as well as well as Battery setting. So hopefully will get the mains transformer for this, but I am left with my main Sigma which I am hoping to get some ideas please.

Thanks

Unless your flash gun is designed to take an external power source (like your Nikon) then you're stuck with an endless stream of AA's I'm afraid Amin.

The Metz flashes being discussed here come with an attachment for a large external battery pack that can keep them firing all day long - this is why they're the choice of folks like (for example) wedding photographers who don't have time to be messing around with battery changes but need to be able to use their flashes constantly. Unfortunately, neither the flashes nor the external power packs come cheap!

Thanks Hefty

Seems I am really stuck then. Well, as I spend battery loads doing work in the shed I think the best option then would be to buy another cheap flashgun like the Nikon I got which takes external power source. I got it quite cheap, but at the time I didnt give much attention to the socket, only when I starting blowing so many betteries it got me thinking and noticed that slot. I will be looking for something like that again then, cheap for my smoke photos and stuff that I would like to experiment. Are they cheaply available? and will I be able to get a second hand flashgun along with its mains power source adapter together?
I am left now to look for the powersource cable for the Nikon I have, it does a great job as it is with batteries but would love the power source for it now that I found it can get connected to mains

I'd say your best bet would be to have a look at eBay. There are bound to be other examples of the same Nikon flash on there and you'll probably find you can get a mains adapter there too. Good luck!

Thanks for this hefty,

Amin why not a studio flash set most of the time they're cheaper then the flashguns and they don't run on batteries

Stefan I was really thinking along the lines of that. I didn't know those studio flash sets were different from normal flashguns. I have even managed to borrow some stands from my japanese neighbour and some reflectors also that he gave me to use . When he saw me with the pentax in the back garden he approached me and started chatting about photography and told me he had loads and loads of pentax equipment from his college times and then a few days later dug them out and is letting me use them.

Those studio flash sets must be ideal to transform my shed into a proper studio lighting environment. How much do they go for? I guess e-bay is the best place to go loo for it isn't it? Does anyone have a link or a site i could have a peek just to familiarise with how they look like?

Thanks

SRS have some basic studio all-in-one kits: link

But yes, eBay is also a good place to look along with any of the big photo retailers - even Jessops!

Just saw the SRS website hefty with the link you gave me ooooh they are dear , not exactly cheap.
I think I will just stick to a second hand cheap flash like the Nikon I have mains powered for the time being. Those are pretty expensive toys to invest at this stage for me for just play around with bubbles and incense smoke, at least for now

Will keep an eye on a cheap flash then,

Hi Amin, won't your flashguns take rechargeable batteries, AA, C Cell, D Cell etc. I use an old Sunpak Autozoom 5000 that will probably do about 50 flashes on 4 No. C Cells, recycles in about 8 secs. It also has a mains adapter, but I've never used that and I rarely use it at full power which is f/11 to f/16 at 10 ft and 100ASA. The power switch goes down to 1/128th. I doubt if you'd find one on ebay the ones that still work are keepers.

The only problem is the trigger votage 200v (I think), so I use a small flashgun and a slave to trigger it. You will have to watch the trigger voltage on anything you plug into the camera, inc mains flash heads.

shim

Shim, yes I suppose I could use rechargeable ones. And 8 seconds is fine as recycling time. But the thing is when I am doing the smoke and bubble pics I would just be doing over 150 shots or sometimes even more. Ideally slightly quicker recycling time also would be great. So I was thinking rather than rechargeable battery mains would be great.

But now you are telling me about the voltage, you got me concerned here. I thought I would have to be careful with voltage differences only if I connected the flashgun directly on the camera, is it not? Oh my I guess I got it wrong. I connect the Nikon flashgun through a pc cable, on the side of the K20D body, where that little round knob is that I need to take it off. Which by the way is such a nuisance, a small knob there that is so tricky to hold and unscrew and store it even. On several occasion I lost it on the floor in the shed and I was lucky to find it back. And actually I forgot to put it back since my last experiments in the shed so have been walking around with the K20 without that cap in there. Hope its not such a big deal, I dont usually go out on the rain with the camera.

So help me out then, do I have to be very careful with voltages on flashguns if they are to be connected through this little access point too?
Helpppp please ))

thanks