Can a car drive train erase a memory card?

Paul Howell · Sep 21, 2017

In the summer I usually carry a Pentax K2000 in my Isuzu 4 wheel drive, normally in the rear cargo area. Too hot to leave film in the car, this summer has been hotter than normal, many days well over 110 F. Past couple of weeks I kept the Pentax in the front on the passenger side floor. I had a 4GB card in it, when I installed the card it was working. A few weeks later I attempted to take a shot the card was blank, the saved images were gone and it would not save an image. Sounds far fetched, but next to the drive train, the drive shaft is enclosed so a rotating shaft, creating a low magnetic field that after a few weeks erased the card? Other option, the card just failed. BTW, I installed a new card and all is fine.

Prof_Pixel · Sep 21, 2017

Paul Howell said:
Other option, the card just failed.

That's my bet.

railwayman3 · Sep 21, 2017

My guess is also a card failure. I'm no expert, but cards, USB drives, etc., seem very resilient to any outside influence......carried in pockets, put against sources of magnetism/radio waves, etc., such as TV's, phones, computers, etc., and we don't seem to hear of many issues ?

faberryman · Sep 21, 2017

I vote SD card failure, but am curious how you think your drive shaft created a magnetic field?

Paul Howell · Sep 21, 2017

Thanks, just to make sure, never had a card fail, the Pentax is my only camera that used SD cards, my Sony, Konica Minolta, and Sigma all use CD, some are only KB cards, after 15 to 16 years all seem to be good as new.

RalphLambrecht · Sep 21, 2017

Prof_Pixel said:
That's my bet.

I agree, the magnetic field would be too weak to erase the data.

twelvetone12 · Sep 21, 2017

No, but flash memory can fail from overheating.

MattKing · Sep 21, 2017

If this thread was on APUG, rather than PHOTRIO, I would have said it is the result of the analogue photography gods exacting revenge.

nmp · Sep 21, 2017

faberryman said:
I vote SD card failure, but am curious how you think your drive shaft created a magnetic field?

+1

nmp · Sep 21, 2017

MattKing said:
If this thread was on APUG, rather than PHOTRIO, I would have said it is the result of the analogue photography gods exacting revenge.

Catch 22!

Eric Rose · Sep 21, 2017

You must have inadvertently photographed a super secret government operations site and the NSA hacked into your camera and erased your card. You are now on a watch list and spooks will be tailing you for years. Just don't try and get on an airplane!

Paul Howell · Sep 21, 2017

Eric Rose said:
You must have inadvertently photographed a super secret government operations site and the NSA hacked into your camera and erased your card. You are now on a watch list and spooks will be tailing you for years. Just don't try and get on an airplane!

Damn smart phone with GPS, knew it would come to no good.

Paul Howell · Sep 21, 2017

nmp said:
+1

I had additional off road features added by an off road specialty shop, metal plate guadd covers the gas tank, another guard for the drive shaft damaged when off road, I thought had maybe like a dynamo, far fetched, the spinning of the crank shaft as I keep the truck in read drive most of the time, the metal shell, more likely NSA tracked me down.

nmp · Sep 21, 2017

Paul Howell said:
I had additional off road features added by an off road specialty shop, metal plate guadd covers the gas tank, another guard for the drive shaft damaged when off road, I thought had maybe like a dynamo, far fetched, the spinning of the crank shaft as I keep the truck in read drive most of the time, the metal shell, more likely NSA tracked me down.

I will go with NSA theory too....

Sirius Glass · Sep 22, 2017

Chalk up another vote for a memory card failure.

bdial · Sep 22, 2017

A magnetic field wouldn't affect it, and your drive train on it's own wouldn't create one.
OTH, a few years ago, the SD card popped out of my Palm Pilot into the snow in my driveway, and I didn't notice it. Wife found it about a year and a half later while working on her flower beds. It was fine.

Sirius Glass · Sep 22, 2017

Static electricity can wipe out the memory circuits.

Ces1um · Oct 11, 2017

Paul Howell said:
In the summer I usually carry a Pentax K2000 in my Isuzu 4 wheel drive, normally in the rear cargo area. Too hot to leave film in the car, this summer has been hotter than normal, many days well over 110 F. Past couple of weeks I kept the Pentax in the front on the passenger side floor. I had a 4GB card in it, when I installed the card it was working. A few weeks later I attempted to take a shot the card was blank, the saved images were gone and it would not save an image. Sounds far fetched, but next to the drive train, the drive shaft is enclosed so a rotating shaft, creating a low magnetic field that after a few weeks erased the card? Other option, the card just failed. BTW, I installed a new card and all is fine.

unless your drive shaft enclosure is wound copper I don't think there's any chance of creating a magnetic field there.

removed account4 · Oct 11, 2017

Paul Howell said:
In the summer I usually carry a Pentax K2000 in my Isuzu 4 wheel drive, normally in the rear cargo area. Too hot to leave film in the car, this summer has been hotter than normal, many days well over 110 F. Past couple of weeks I kept the Pentax in the front on the passenger side floor. I had a 4GB card in it, when I installed the card it was working. A few weeks later I attempted to take a shot the card was blank, the saved images were gone and it would not save an image. Sounds far fetched, but next to the drive train, the drive shaft is enclosed so a rotating shaft, creating a low magnetic field that after a few weeks erased the card? Other option, the card just failed. BTW, I installed a new card and all is fine.

its not far fetched ...
if your car endedup someplace where there
was government testing of an EMP ?
or when it was parked someone snuck in and reformatted your disk.

i've had similar problems - film based and similar ...
film in cameras, and film holders i never bought
with photographs i never took ... ( and no one else here had taken )
also light meters missing for a year that just "appear"

maybe the fae that were at my house found your car >

Ces1um · Oct 11, 2017

jnanian said:
its not far fetched ...
if your car endedup someplace where there
was government testing of an EMP ?
or when it was parked someone snuck in and reformatted your disk.

i've had similar problems - film based and similar ...
film in cameras, and film holders i never bought
with photographs i never took ... ( and no one else here had taken )
also light meters missing for a year that just "appear"

maybe the fae that were at my house found your car >

It's funny you say that! I have issues where I'm sure I'm correct and yet my wife tells me in no uncertain terms that I'm wrong! Imagine my surprise! Now it's even worse because my fifteen year old son is telling me he's right and I'm wrong. I'm pretty sure it's some kind of conspiracy. Probably the fluoride in the water or something to do with amazon's targeted advertising. Sometimes I get up to do something and forget what it was I was going to do. Gotta be some kind of mind control beam.

removed account4 · Oct 11, 2017

Ces1um said:
It's funny you say that! I have issues where I'm sure I'm correct and yet my wife tells me in no uncertain terms that I'm wrong! Imagine my surprise! Now it's even worse because my fifteen year old son is telling me he's right and I'm wrong. I'm pretty sure it's some kind of conspiracy. Probably the fluoride in the water or something to do with amazon's targeted advertising. Sometimes I get up to do something and forget what it was I was going to do. Gotta be some kind of mind control beam.

exactly !

Can a car drive train erase a memory card?

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