Spare Strobe?

What does everyone else do in regards to bringing spare strobes? I have 2 Ikelite DS 125's, and I always worry that a bulb is going to pop and I am going to be screwed the rest of my dive vacation. I have 4 total battery packs, so I have spares in that regards, just not on the strobes themselves. What does everyone else do? Do I have anything to worry about?

not sure exactly what you mean? can you be more specific?

If you can carry a spare, go for it. For a vacation i'll carry 2 strobes. If i ever got a gig that paid me to travel and shoot UW, i'd for sure bring extra spares.

i guess its a personal decision between redundancy and baggage bulk/weight.

chris

Edit: haha, hit reply before the 2nd post came up. i don't think you'd be screwed with only 1 DS125, but if you already got 4 battery packs, an extra head won't be too much to carry. redundancy is good!

I am worried that the strobes are fragile and might break. Or the flash bulb/strobe will pop and no longer be useable. I know these can be repaired. But it would just be a bummer to lose one of the strobes on a trip, especially when you only go on 1 or 2 a year.

I take at least 1 full spare. Sometimes even 2. Ive got 2 older YS90DX's that i use as spares in case my 110s fail.

I think photographers use two strobes too much. A lot of interesting photography can be done with a single strobe. Which is another way of looking at the problem.

Alex

p.s. I wouldn't expect the bulbs of DS125s to go wrong. Synch cords and battery floods are worth watching.

It is not a bad idea to carry a spare anything electronic on a dive trip since there are usually no underwater photo shops nearby.

I carry a new extra sync cord, extra o-rings for the nikonos connections, strobe and batteries.

Elmer

woops hit enter too quick...

 

What does everyone else do in regards to bringing spare strobes? I have 2 Ikelite DS 125's, and I always worry that a bulb is going to pop and I am going to be screwed the rest of my dive vacation. I have 4 total battery packs, so I have spares in that regards, just not on the strobes themselves. What does everyone else do? Do I have anything to worry about?

I usually carry a spare strobe or two. Have some YS-90DXs that are fairly light and run on regular batteries. Figure that if my DS-125s have an issue (I did have one go bad right out of the box on its first trip, bad tube and would not fire before it even got into the water) or the batteries go bad etc., good to have a back-up.

I always carry spare strobe, plus cables. Very difficult to replace whilst in remote areas. Things do break. I've had 2 strobes and 1 cable fail over the years.

As Alex says, you can do a lot with one, but I prefer to carry the spares instead, including spare camera and extra lens. Once had massive housing failure in Fiji, but saved by having complete duplicate system w/housing with me.

Up to you to decide what suits you best I know where my comfort level is.

FWIW I have used my 'spare' DS51 strobe on four out of the last five dive trips that I have taken.

On the last trip I swapped right out of Ikelite DS125/DS160's to Innon.

YMMV....

Paul C

Honestly if your doing a once in a lifetime trip carrying an extra strobe head makes sense. The heads without the battery parks arnt that heavy. I have blown one bulb on my DS125 but this was on a local dive.

I would recommend spare sync cords, orings, batteries, and even battery chargers. I always carry two ikelite battery chargers on a trip as its easy to have two batteries charging at the same time while the other two are in use.

I am also looking at the Inon's Z240's as a travel compact setup.

Regards Mark

It depends how redundant everything else is in my view. Single strobe shooting is far more viable than no camera shooting or whatever.

As in if you have a spare strobe to take already no biggie, but it wouldnt be my first redundancy point to spend money on, and more one of my last.

Edit: A single sync strobe cord would be a biggie!

Otara

I carry a spare camera, housing, strobe, etc....I can't say I've ever needed a spare, but more than once I was able to help someone else in need on a trip.

I have two strobes but no spare strobe. I have both double and single spare strobe cables though. That seems to be the strobe part most likely to go wrong.

Since I had thumb reconstruction surgery I have lightened my load.

I carry two DS 160 strobes in my checked camera case. I shoot with only one. I also carry a DS 51, my housing, 100 mm dome, and one synch cord in my carryon. My personal item is a small camera bag with my camera, 10-17 lens, maybe 60 mm, iPad, and camera connection kit.

I do most of my shooting with one strobe. Started out because of problems with my thumb. But when people started asking me how I got better shots by going back to one strobe, well...

If you can use optical connectors, the Inon S2000 strobes are very small and light, about one stop less powerful than the Inon Z-240, I think.

I'm certainly one of Alex's "photographers use two strobes too much", although, in my defence, I often turn one right down or off...

Tim