Paul C. Buff, Inc. Technical Forum

I have 4 AB 800's, controlled with your wired remote. In the past, one of them had problems twice. The power slider did not control the actual flash power, although it did dim the modeling light. The light always flashed at full power, however the slider on the light or your wired remote was set. This was fixed twice within warranty (THANKS :) ), and while talking to a tech about the problem, he suggested that I use a surge protector for each light to help keep this from happening. That solution has worked fine the last year or so, with no problems with the lights.

But I saw in a recent post on here that a tech recommended NOT using surge protectors with an Einstein. So Paul, what is your opinion? Are surge protectors OK with your old wired controller and AB lights, but not with the new radio controlled ones? Or should I not use them at all? I hope to move up to some Einsteins as they become more readily available.

Thanks, Jeff Jessee

Looking forward to the PLM's being available.

Tech help can give better answer to this than I can. My gut says the surge protecter should make no difference. Try switching telephone cables . . . it's possible you have a bad cable connection on the flashpower control pin. What was fixed twice . . . the light or the remote? If it's the light it's possible tech repair mis-diagonsed it and we ought to replace the whole light to be sure. Tell them I said so!

First, we must differentiate surge protector and power strip. Use of a basic power strip is OK, as all it does is split the number of outlets. Using a surge protector, on the other hand, may or may not cause issues, depending on the design of the surge protector. We often do see issues with lights and surge protectors that go away after the surge protector is removed from the formula.

If you are using a surge protector, remove it from the set up and see if the issue goes away. There should not be an inherent issue with plugging multiple lights in to one power strip, though i cannot rule out the possibility of multiple lights causing issues with a surge protector that would not exist with one light.

Also, these suggestions would apply to any light, not just Einstein.

To clarify, there is no problem now with the AB's. The "always flashing at full power" problem, which happened when using the wired remote, or if the power was controlled from the slider on the light without the remote, has not reoccured since you repaired the light the second time, over a year ago. I was told that something had burned out in the dimming circuit inside the light, and since it happened twice, the tech I talked to suggested that maybe I had some problems on the 120V line, and suggested that I use a surge protector to protect the AB from spikes on the line. So far, for a year, that has worked, and the lights dim and fire fine, and I haven't seen any problems. But when I saw a tech on here recommend not to use a surge protector, however, I was a little worried what problems they might cause. Can you tell me what problems you have seen because of them?

Unless you have a good reason NOT to use them, they seem to work for me, so...

Thanks,
Jeff Jessee

If they work fine, then you are OK. This issue that frquently comes up is random firing, or perhaps non-functionality with CSR+, CSRB+, or LG4X. Nothing damaging to the light would come from using a surge protector, even if it was an uncooperative surge protector.