Hello,

Until this morning both of my strobes (YS-D3 lightning mkii) were firing fine. Today one of the strobes has stopped firing, it powers on, charges up etc - everything seems ok but my shutter/trigger isn't triggering the flash.

My attempts:

• I've swapped cables with the working strobe and both fibre optics fire the working strobe.

• I've swapped batteries and same as above.

• So the working strobe can be fired with both fibre optic ports on the housing, both fibre optic cables and both sets of batteries.

• I can trigger the dodgy strobe with my phone's flash into the port and I can trigger it by running a fibre optic between the 2 strobes.

Any ideas what could be causing the strobe not to fire normally? It doesn't seem to be an issue with the trigger (S-turtle 2 manual trigger) the cables, the ports or the batteries. I did find that when I'd turn it off for a few minutes and turn it back on it'd instantly turn red as if it was ready to fire, but with no red flashing light/recycle sound. I don't shoot bursts on high power or anything too intensive for the strobes so it's unlikely that it's fried

I'm in Raja Ampat for the next few weeks so hopefully can find a solution to get both working again!

Sony + nauticam housing + turtle manual trigger

The fact that the bad strobe can be triggered with a different source tends to indicate it has having problems detecting the pulse from your trigger.

You can try running a fibre cable from your good strobe to the the dodgy one. Plug the cable into the side socket on the good strobe and run it to the dodgy one in the normal fibre port. See page e-22 of the manual for how to. The dodgy strobe should be the one on the LHS of the diagram. Here's an e-link to the manual if you need it: https://www.seaandsea.jp/support/download/manual/manual_en_03123_ys-d3_lightning.pdf

Now check if it triggers. If it does check the exposure from each strobe and make sure the dodgy strobe changes brightness as you change the power on it. If it does, this is your solution, possibly not ideal but should sort you out at least till you come back and can try to get to the bottom of it. It might be that you fibre cables are marginal for this strobe. You could try borrowing another cable to test if things improve with it or not. Fibre optic problems are relatively common and not all cables are created equal and a bad cable can be the difference between triggering or not (yes even though the other strobe is happily firing). What brand cables are you using?

If it doesn't trigger using the method above, nothing will trigger the strobe as you are using the main flash to trigger the other strobe.

Regarding whether the dodgy strobe is fried, never assume when troubleshooting, test your assumptions with tests that can determine what is going on.