Dead Battery Syndrom with D300??

[gdog]

Just wondering if anyone has experienced problems with their D300 showing that the batteries are dead (Dead Battery Syndrom-DBS), when they actually are not. It's being reported more frequent with the 70-200 and bigger lens. I know there are a few guys that shoot big lens here, so I am curious as to your experiences.

I was out last weekend shooting a SuperBike race and my D300 shut down. Using the 200-400 and grip. Only fix at that time was to turn camera off-on. It would go away for a while then come back. Took off grip, changed batteries, put the 70-200 on...same deal.

Found that some are finding that thoroughly cleaning the electrical contact points between the body and lens fixes the problem (short term in some cases). I cleaned mine and was surprised how dirty the contacts were. Hope to get out this weekend to see what happens...

TF..have you heard of this????

FWIW....panning a 200-400 by hand trying to keep up with a 180mph bike is a hoot!

 

[dslaughter]

Gdog,
First off, incredible shot!
I've been hearing about D300 gremlings for a while now but hadn't experienced any until last week. I had heard that some shots taken with bigger lenses would produce black images and the f-stop data would show zero. I've been shooting with the 70-200 for months with no problem. Last week I put on the 80-400 and had the black shot problem immediately and often. I cleaned the contacts on the camera and lens and the problem went away. I think the 300 has some issues (but when it works it works great). I was shooting alot last week with several folks using the 200-400 with the battery packs and they had no issues.

 

[TFinalshot]

LAST EDITED ON Jun-06-08 AT 03:01PM (MST)[p]Cool bike shot. When did you get a 200-400?

I think i've had every problem known with both the d200 and d300. I'm on my 3rd 200 and second 300. so far, with my current 300 I've got 26,000 shots and not ONE problem. I think using the grip with the enel4 battery make ALL the difference in the world. . . Bigger battery. . .



www.tonybynum.com

"Roadless areas, in general, represent some of the best fish and wildlife habitat on public lands. The bad news is that there is nothing positive about a road where fish and wildlife habitat are concerned -- absolutely nothing." (B&C Professor, Jack Ward Thomas, Fair Chase, Fall 2005, p.10).

 

[gdog]

LAST EDITED ON Jun-06-08 AT 04:09PM (MST)[p]

Thanks..on the pic.


>
>Cool bike shot. When did
>you get a 200-400?

This winter. I really like the zoom and extra reach. Starting to actually get a few keepers with it. I want to pick up a TC 1.4 for it next.

>I I think using
>the grip with the enel4
>battery make ALL the difference
>in the world. . .
>Bigger battery. . .
>

I'm running rechargeable AA's in the grip, since getting into the enel4 would run me +$250 (battery+charger). The AA's have plenty of power and so far last pretty damn long. At first I thought my problems were the grip, but it happened with it off as well.

I am going to wait till DBS happens again and then send it in to get fixed. The problem is, that it is hit or miss when it acts up.