Minolta 600Si AF issue

[Paul Howell]

I have a 600SI that I bought at a yard sale for $5.00. Some of the cladding had come off, around the grip. I used epoxy to fill in the missing cladding and at some point plan on covering with leather or vinyl for a final finish. Other than the missing cladding it seemed to work just fine. But today I was shooting at the zoo, I wanted to use the onboard flash for fill in, when I popped the flash up the AF stopped working. Flash down AF works, flash up no AF. I have a couple of 800SI which I use the onboard flash without issue. From what I have read the the shutter metering and AF use the same chip set, although the 800 has a higher top shutter speed and a more powerful flash. Never run across this issue.

 

[xkaes]

I've seen a lot of pop-up flashes end-up a little "off-set". There might be a linkage that is not working correctly. Does you flash seem to be perfectly shut when it's closed? Do you hear it snap?

 

[Paul Howell]

It does, looking at the 600si and 800si, the infrared sensor is much larger on the 800, I think the 100 to 300 with lens hood might be blocking the sensor on the 600si, but not on the 800 or 9Xi or 9.

 

[Andreas Thaler]

I can only speculate.

The pop-up flash is probably integrated into the circuitry via a flexible printed circuit board.

Frequent opening and closing puts stress on the board, which could cause it to break. So, it's a contact problem.

You'd have to open the camera and take a look.

But as always, be careful of the flash capacitor, which carries dangerously high voltage.

 

[Paul Howell]

I doubt I will go to the trouble, next time I use I will try a 50mm with the smaller lens hood, I still think the lens hood on the 70 to 300 might block the infrared when in flash mode. I found an on line manual but it was not complete did not have the pages for flash operations.

 

[Andreas Thaler]

I found an on line manual but it was not complete did not have the pages for flash operations.

See

http://www.tashimareport.info/Minolta/si-Serie/600siClassic/UserManual/UM-600siClassic.pdf

 

[neilt3]

I have a 600SI that I bought at a yard sale for $5.00. Some of the cladding had come off, around the grip. I used epoxy to fill in the missing cladding and at some point plan on covering with leather or vinyl for a final finish. Other than the missing cladding it seemed to work just fine. But today I was shooting at the zoo, I wanted to use the onboard flash for fill in, when I popped the flash up the AF stopped working. Flash down AF works, flash up no AF. I have a couple of 800SI which I use the onboard flash without issue. From what I have read the the shutter metering and AF use the same chip set, although the 800 has a higher top shutter speed and a more powerful flash. Never run across this issue.

I've sometimes found with an AF camera that's not been used for a long time , both digital and film , when you pop up the flash for the first time there's a delay whilst the capacitor charges .
While this is happening there is no AF .

What happens after it's had chance to charge ?
Does the flash fire ?

Edit ; have you tried an off camera Minolta flash mounted on the hotshoe ?
Does everything work as normal then ?

 

[Paul Howell]

I will give that a try, thanks.