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Ok, as a follow-up, things have gone a little haywire.... I wasn't getting a response from AOI to my enquiry to clarify service conditions posted above, so I emailed them again and got the following message yesterday: Thank you for your follow-up email. While we were exploring potential solutions internally, our team also reached out to Fantasea. We have just received a reply from their representative, who confirmed that Fantasea will contact you directly to proceed with the next steps. We have therefore handed over your case to them, and we kindly ask that you watch for upcoming emails from Fantasea regarding further handling. Thank you for your understanding and patience. So unfortunately, it looks like AOI retracted the service offer they had made me and which I'd posted above, which is a little unexpected and, well,... I asked AOI for confirmation that this was the case and have not yet received an answer. **** Later on, a Fantasea rep did get in touch (so they're still operating even if the website is down) and offered for me to ship it to the USA under the following conditions: You can send it to our office to be checked. If internal cleaning is needed, we can do so for $120, including shipping the lens back to you. If replacing optical elements is required, then servicing and shipping will cost more than that. When I replied that this wasn't economically viable for this lens, given my location (Japan) and the price of a new AOI UCL-05N (which is the slightly upgraded version of my lens), and asked about changing o-rings, I was told by Fantasea: Please note that we do not offer parts for sale to replace within the lens (self service). In addition, if it helps, we can extend this price of 180 Euros (USD 212) for a new lens if you wish to order one. This offer is valid until the end of the month. So basically, I can buy a new lens, or pay roughly the price of a new lens to have it serviced. The lens is letting moisture in, so cleaning and servicing plus replacement of elements would be required.

Thanks Davide, I'm really happy with this one. That treasure-chest of music you introduced me to is quite inspiring! Thanks a bunch Maria - he's an absolute cartoon cutie Thanks Craig - Yes, I think it works well - [boomer mode ] just too bad 80% of content is watched without sound these days 😅 [/boomer mode]

Hi JapanDiver, Welcome to the forum and rainy greetings from Okinawa main island. I just did my last two dives of the year this morning and the weather is breaking down, I hope you have better conditions in Shimoda! Cheers! Ben

I mostly a budget shooter. Buy a lot of used gear. Recently bought a sea&sea ys-d1. It turns on. Red light. Can be switched to blue( slave mode). Focusing light turns on and off. The only problem is it won’t flash. I got it connected to a TG-5 with housing and sea&sea Fiber optic cable. Is there a quick test I can do to know if the flash bulb is done?

Aloha and welcome @btroxell !

I tend to pull the o rings after every day of diving on my camera housing and Inons. I tend not to do that with focusing and video lights. I do mostly shore diving, and it’s hella sandy around here. I also tend to feel grit, debris and imperfections on the rings more easily than I can see them.

Aloha and welcome @JapanDiver ! @bghazzal

Hi JapanDiver Welcome aboard! We hope you enjoy the forum! Ciao

Hello everyone. I was looking for some answers to my problems and find this place here. It looked very nice so I signed up. I hope we can help each other. And share our photos( mine are very bad ). BTW I live in Shimoda, Japan a surfing and marine sports town. We probably got the most beautiful beaches and best diving/snorkeling in the greater Tokyo area( we might not be exactly in the greater Tokyo area, but close enough ). I would have attached a few photos. But I don’t know how.

I did not clean, lube or pull the O-ring off on this particular occasion as I describe how I normally would have. What I think happened is that the FIX S90 housing is a clam shell type. When I opened the housing the door with O-ring rubbed across the room table I was working from. The room cleaning lady did have curly black hair (like a perm) so I think it likely hers from cleaning the room and wiping the table down as part of her duties. I am not blaming her, I was the one who deviated from my normal routine and did not inspect the O-ring for FOD. FOD can come from all sorts of places. I think that is how the hair got on the O-ring. Many times I have found sand and debris on the door O-rings and down in the groove after a dive and upon opening the housing. The OP asked what other people do. I explained my routine. "So, it got me to wondering what other folks do:" I did not say it was necessary or required. I remove, clean and lube with each opening and I answered the original question.

Yes these are the people without mechanical sympathy, they'll probably find some other way to flood their strobes even if they stop servicing them, it's a skill UW photographers need to learn and avoiding ultimately won't solve the issue. It's very dependent on the situation whether you need to pull them, but if you see water droplets that needs to be dealt with.

I think the lights have lower current, a 100 W-hr battery if it lasts 1 hour at full power it's running at 100W and I believe they are 14.4V, so running 7 amps. Some newer ones have higher power of course, but typically aren't run at full power for long periods. The backscatter flashes talk about 20Amp current drain. The contact area on the RG Blue battery is also a lot bigger. As the video light is constant draw, it probably needs the bigger contact area to minimise resistance and heat build up.

A black hair wrapped around an oring could only happen if the oring was removed. That is not likely from wiping and lubing in place.

I have seen many divers yanking on their orings luke they were pulling taffee while applying lube. Stretching them out horribly. It's not necessary to remove orings most of the time, so just don't unless it looks like a day at the beach!

I remove the Nauticam door O-ring (both housings are clamshell type) with each opening. I clean the groove, look for debris, sand, hairs, Q-tip fuzz etc. Same with my strobes, I remove the Inon strobe O-rings with each opening, clean and lube. The only flood I have had was a FIX housing for my S90. I changed the battery in a rush, went diving, flooded. Afterwards I found a tiny, black hair on the O-ring wrapped around it. Neither me nor my wife have black hair.

It depends on the exact situation, whether or not you get grit and also the type of enclosure. Clam shell housings are different than housings with a separate back for example. You can get away with lube on flat housing backs, ikelite specifically say not to on theirs, but clamshell housings need to be lubed. It also depends on the o-ring itself, the tiny 1mm dia o-rings on dive computers are much more fragile than the 4mm dia port o-rings on N120 Nauticam ports. My Z240 o-rings get serviced every battery change as they have drops of water clinging to them and usually some grit, My nauticam OM-1 main o-ring is also pulled every time it is opened after a dive - it's a clamshell housing and usually has water drops clinging to it which you risk pushing into the housings when you close it again. My INON torch never gets these droplets, it has a sand seal ring which is basically an external o-ring that the cap edge contacts as you screw it down, so the o-rings on that torch never get droplets or grit. The o-rings are pulled every couple of years for a clean and service. My Retra strobes, I've been using a blower bulb to blow away any water drops, they mostly seem quite small and only on the outer o-ring and I have been following the advice to lube/service them less frequently. They are not too hard to deal with though and they seem to resist getting grit with the tight fit of the cap. I think the risk of damage to an o-ring is quite small for most people - some people naturally have what I call mechanical sympathy , they know how to handle things and not break them, others not so much. But apart from very fine o-rings like you might find on dive computers they are reasonably robust and don't damage that easily if handled well.

Hi Ben! Always great to get a Wetpixel refugee with us. You’re very welcome. I’m sure you’ll see lots of familiar names.

I migrated here from WetPixels a while ago and am finally posting here for the first time. I am a long time underwater shooter and recently housed my R6 MkII in an Isotta housing (with old Sea&Sea ports). I have my macro lens set (EF 100mm f/2.8L) but still working out the wide angle setup. I have test shots in a tank using my RF 24mm f/1.8, RF 14-35 f/4L, and even the RF 24-105 f/4-7.1 to test extensions behind a 210mm dome port but not many real shots. The pool is cold (northern California) so that may have to wait until spring. Ben

The Kraken must be used with a 60mm lens. The Nikon af-s 60mm in my case on a Z8. The corners and overall quality is inferior to the WWL-C that I use. However, it is a great tool some conditions. The shark pictures above were taken in crappy summer visibility conditions. The dive plan was 90 feet for 30 minutes looking for Sixgills. Then up to the shallows in to shoot small macro creatures with the 60mm and a diopter. You are able to combine true wide angle with true macro. This is a lot more range and flexibility than what some people are trying to do with the MFO-3 these days. Nikon Z8 w/Nikon 60mm lens, Kraken KRL09 WA, f14@1/200s iso200

Here are a couple of more at f8: Nikon Z8 w/Nikon 60mm lens, Kraken KRL09 WA, f8@1/50s iso800 Eight-foot long Sixgill shark on a very dark and murky summer night, range of inches.

What lens does that work with that Kraken optics Dave? How do you find general IQ compared to the Nauticam WWL?

Yeah, don't remove those small orings. Very lightly lube them with each battery change.

Did you build a sand castle around your housing?! 😀

I don't typically remove the housing O ring either during dive trips, I was thinking more of dive and focus lights and such, where the o rings are smaller and have to be slid over threads or pinched hard or stretched.

I don't really care a lot about corners. I crop many/most photos anyway. Here are a couple of images shot at f10 with the Kraken krl-09s. These are CFWA, taken from inches away from the subject.