What I dont like about the Minolta 9

[Paul Howell]

While shooting a baseball game the batteries died on my Minolta 9, the camera rewound the film midroll, only got 5 exposures. Normally I shoot sports with a A9000, but decided on the 9, never had that happen. Guess I'll make sure to check the batteries and change them out sooner than later. Would have really been annoyed if I was shooting a roll of E6 or Porta.

 

[BMbikerider]

Was there not a warning on the battery level indicator - they are not for decoration

 

[Paul Howell]

Hot spring day, lots of glare, my fault for not watching, saying that, forced rewind?

 

[neilt3]

I have ( and use) all the 6,7,8,& 9 series of Minolta A/F cameras , and apart from when I'm using the grip with recharable AA's in I squeeze every last little drop out of the dammed expensive lithium batteries .
I haven't replaced any untill there fully dead , and never once has it caused the camera to rewind mid-roll .
When you put some fresh batteries in it , I would suggest putting a test ( scrap) roll of film in to see if you can shoot till the end of the roll .
There might have been a fault or glitch with the camera .
Just a thought .

 

[mgb74]

Interesting design choice:

Do you protect the film by rewinding with the battery's dying breath or leave it out so it can't be retrieved until New batteries obtained.

 

[Paul Howell]

Not sure if intentional, might camera error, I have the battery grip for the 800xi which I run with AAs, the 600 takes lithium, and the A9000 is all AA, 2 for the body and 12 for motor drive or 4 for the winder. I guess I'll look for the vertical grip for the 9 as well.

I process the film, it was short roll of Ultra Fine 400, got up to 10 before it ran out of power and rewound.

Might be that once the batteries are dead the camera does not know how many frames are left, or what ISO I was using so takes no chances and rewinds.

 

[neilt3]

Might be that once the batteries are dead the camera does not know how many frames are left, or what ISO I was using so takes no chances and rewinds.

That's not the case .
I've swapped batteries between cameras while I've been out when one set has died .
One camera with colour film in , the other with black and white in .
When fresh batteries are put in the camera it comes back on still on the correct frame number .
The ISO when read of the DX markings remain the same , and if I'm using bulk film , whatever I set it to also remains the same .

If I'm not planning on using a camera for a while , I take the batteries out .
At no time have any of the Minolta cameras done an auto rewind due to batteries dying , being swapped , taken out etc .
Same goes for the Nikon , Canon and Pentax Autofocus SLR's I own .

Only once has a film rewound on me before it should have , and that camera has never done it since .
I reckon the film was either too tight or the central part of the cassette bound and wasn't moving freely .
The camera would have thought I reached the end of the roll and rewound .
Can't remember if it was bought film or a reusable bulk one I fill myself .

 

[neilt3]

Current AF bodies I have loaded with film are a Minolta Dynax 9 with Ilford FP4 in an , a Dynax 7 with Rollei Infrared in ( interested if the I.R film counter will fog the film ) a Dynax 800si with some old Fuji colour film in , a Maxxum 70 with some old Jessops ISO 400 ( Agfa APX400) in .
A Nikon F4 and F501 , and Canon Elan 7NE , an EOS 50E and an EOS 500n.

Plus a load of manual focus bodies , medium format SLRs and TLRs and large format , but these keep the little battery left in them where required .
The LR44 battery last's for years anyway and I've never had one leak on me anyway .


So needless to say , with all these bodies , there not all being used at once .
I take whatever bodies I want to use depending on what lenses I'm planning on using .
For all the bodies that have VC or battery grips I have a few set's of Sanyoo Eneloops .
These are used in whatever body I'm using and a spare set in my pocket .
They are not left in a camera while it is not being used , otherwise I would need a ton of batteries !

Because a lot of the cameras use the same type of lithium batteries , I share these between whatever body I'm using .
Otherwise I would have about 10 batteries on the go , non would be full .
This way I have 1 set in use , and a pair of spares .
A much better way of doing thing's .

Unless I'm shooting something where I can't risk missing a shot ( in which case fresh/fully charged batteries are in) then I will use a set untill the power dies before replaceing with fresh .
This has never caused a camera to rewind of forget the ISO .

Something is is going on for that to have happened .

I guess there might be an internal battery or capacitor in the camera to remember the settings.

 

[hoffy]

The forced film rewind is a curious one. Is the leader out? You can always reload, and shoot from where you left off.

 

[Theo Sulphate]

It seems unlikely that if the camera detected low battery voltage that it would then initiate a rewind operation.

More likely that there was resistance upon advancing the film and the camera thought it had reached the end of the roll.

 

[Paul Howell]

It seems unlikely that if the camera detected low battery voltage that it would then initiate a rewind operation.

More likely that there was resistance upon advancing the film and the camera thought it had reached the end of the roll.

The more I think about it the more I think your right.

 

[MattKing]

It is always scary when it appears that a camera has been "thinking".