How did you flood?

Does anyone have any flood stories while a vacuum system was being used?

I used the Hugyfot vacuum system and twice flooded my housings - with air!

I know of one Hugy and one other housing that flooded with sea water despite passing checks. But I know lots of photographers - and so have seen most things! A vacuum system is well worth having if you worry about flooding.

I have never lost an SLR (film or digital), nor since using a vacuum system found that I hadn't put my housing together correctly upon checking it. But I still like having it.

Alex

I know of one Hugy and one other housing that flooded with sea water despite passing checks.

Alex

The corollary of that is that a vacuum leak test is a waste of time!

Except that I've seen 100s and 100s of photo dives when they have not flooded.

Dove from 2005 to 2013 with no floods except strobe. (Sea & Sea caps don't like the sudden pressure of jumping in the water, even when you can't use the strobe because it's a Whale shark snorkel). 2013, two floods. First flood was a bad o-ring on the button that unlocks the lh function knob. No damage to camera or lens, but the electrics in the housing were toast. $750 rebuild and about 20 dives later, the rebuilt housing flooded destroying the camera. Sync cord port nut had come loose and the port had 3mm of vertical play. Working with good vendors pays off. The shop that repaired it the first time redid the fix, this time with loctite on the nut, and bought me a good used replacement camera. Thank you Backscatter.

1. video light:

leaking o ring

2. inon z240: o ring slipped out

3. Nex 5n...housing springs got caught inbetween

Earlier in this thread, I noted that I have installed a vacuum system in my AD7000 Aquatica housing and was going on a trip to evaluate. Now I have completed the trip with about 20 dives on the system. I am completely sold on the system. Generally I set the kit up in the evening and let it set overnight with the vacuum established and the green OK light blinking. Every morning it was there to welcome me before the first dive. Added assurance that everything is watertight before my giant stride or back roll (without my kit!).

A couple times I had to make an unexpected, rapid lens and port change. The vacuum system gave me added assurance that everything was tight.

Definitely worth the minor cost compared to all that I have invested in my kit. I have a Leak Sentinel from Vivid Housings which has an electronic sensor and signal lights. This gives me a continual indication of a solid kit during the dive. I like this better than just using a purely mechanical system, i.e., vacuum gauge, since the gauge doesn't go in the water.

Soon I'd expect that all quality housing will come with a vacuum system installed.

If you're going to buy the Leak Sentinel, PM me as I have a couple comments that are not yet covered in the manual.

Sync cord port nut had come loose and the port had 3mm of vertical play. Working with good vendors pays off. The shop that repaired it the first time redid the fix, this time with loctite on the nut, and bought me a good used replacement camera. Thank you Backscatter.

Well it is good that they got you a replacement camera, but as John Bantin suggests earlier the corollary to this is that they should have done it correctly the first time. Do they do the repairs in-house or do they have Devon do them?

Bill

They do the repairs in house, AFAIK. I think that Scott, their technician did all the work. As someone who has been employed in a service industry for many years in the past, I'm aware that errors can happen and I'm always appreciative when I'm told, "we'll take care of it" and it's done.

Two Major floods Ikelite Housings D70 first when I was ignorant and starting with DSLR Port oring poorly seated.

Second D300 Ikelite Longest port with Sigma105 in a current holding line on surface think it banged on something and was nearly full at 5M.

Also a self serviced G1 Ikelite housing (checked without camera) failed to seat most button orings water poured in so fast I had to do it again to see which ones were leaking (no electronics in that housing).

Now I have Bill's (Underwater Camera Stuff) vacuum checker no leaks but two false alarms from the electronics probably due to temperature change (I now vac the housing to about 1 psi over where it goes green, that seems to be enough). AND one genuine warning of a poorly seated oring that would have drowned camera. So I'm definitely ahead on that. Although this showed up when failing to pressurise at all so electronics not needed on that occasion. But I like the green flashing lights!

OK, here's mine:

The main one was with a very early model Ikelite 10D housing, probably on about it's sixth dive. I was at 45 feet and lying on the sandy floor to try to shoot some subursts - and then noticed water trickling over the viewfinder from the inside. Made a pretty (very) quick ascent and swam back to the boat with the housing above my head. Camera was definitely wet but - somewhat suprisingly - survived to shoot another day.

Back then I was very fond of my shiny new 10D so I always made sure there was no sand etc on the rear o-ring (was pretty obsessive about this). But we'd had humpback whlaes swim under the boat on the way out so I'd grabbed my camera out of the housing to try and get some shots. I think the most likely scenario is that my hastier-than-usual reassembly once we reached the dive site left some dirt/sand/etc on the o-ring.

I spoke to Ike about it and - as always - he was great with the customer support. I had a new housing shipped to me immediately whilst he pressure-tested the flooded one and was back shooting in no time.

Back in the day - before upgarding to the Ikelite housing - I was doing my underwater photography (with my precious, new DSLR and 'L' lens) using a EWA-Marine bag, It survived lots of free-diving and some SCUBA to pretty decent depths with no problems whatsoever.

I'd grabbed my camera out of the housing to try and get some shots. I think the most likely scenario is that my hastier-than-usual reassembly once we reached the dive site left some dirt/sand/etc on the o-ring.

 

I have heard so many similar stories about trying to get hasty topside shots leading to problems, I now try to make it a practice to have a splash resistant point and shoot available for things like this, so I can leave my dSLR safely nested in its housing

Canon point and shoot in Canon housing - defective housing total loss Canon replaced everything

Ikelite housing - housing latch magically opened somewhere between handoff and rinse tank everything worked after 3 days dry out, flakey LCD, electronics replaced at service time.

Ikelite housing - macro port for 100mm flooded somewhere between 25ft and surface at end of dive - not sure why. Lost camera & lense.

Talked with Bill (uwcamerastuff) ordered Housing Sentry -

Interesting to note that one housing manufacturer seems to be over represented here, especially where there was no blatant user error involved. This agrees with my observations, as well. It always baffles me that people who happily pay $6000+ for a trip will try to save $1500 on a housing which malfunctions or floods, spoiling their trip, and costing them a great deal to replace the ruined camera and lens.

I have also seen a few floods from gross user error when the housing was worked on in the evening, after consuming alcohol. I will never work on my camera after drinking.

I have flooded 2 cameras due to the main housing o-ring popping out of it's groove, one in a test dunk, both due to user error. Now, I remove this o-ring as infrequently as possible during a trip, and have gone 7 years without any more camera floods.

I had a vacuum system installed on my Nauticam housing. It is simple to use, and gave me much confidence during a recent trip to Mexico, where the camera facilities on the liveaboard were decidedly suboptimal. Time will tell if this confidence is misplaced, but I am certain it will detect any large breaches of housing integrity.

I have had continual and ongoing problems with the battery compartment o-ring binding in my Inon 240-Zs while screwing the cap on, resulting in a danger of flooding. Usually this is obvious, but not always. More grease, and new o-rings have not improved this situation.

I flooded the battery compartment of an Ikelite S51 I once had. Charged the batteries the night before and they were still hot when I took them out of the charger. So I put them in the strobe but only loosely tightened the compartment cover meaning to tighten it fully the next morning before diving. Guess what?

In respect to Inon battery cover O rings, I found with my S2000s using less grease was an improvement together with using the palm of my hand rather than my fingers helped in screwing on the cap evenly and not catching the O ring.

Sadly, one was a piece of hair.

One was a faulty housing (got a new housing, but not a new $3k camera).

I fully disassemble everything now. Check all o-rings. Clean all grooves. Inspect with lighted magnifier. Regrease.

Always go through rinse/soak process after every dive. NO ONE touches my camera but me. Seen too many bozos with P&S drop camera in a communal barrel. I only dip mine, then wait until I am back to lodging, where I soak it. After an hour, I syringe out (rubber bulb syringe) the buttons, then actuate them. Carefully remove and dry.

As for the comment on housing brand....might be the sheer number they sell (would need a percentage failure rate). No housing is idiot proof. Our dive shop owner has a 6k housing which leaked BRAND NEW.

Maelstrom: Which Liveaboard in Mexico had the substandard camera facilities. I was on Rocio del Mar some years ago and their facilities were the pits. I did all my camera work in my room. But they said that they intended to upgrade their camera table shortly thereafter. Not sure if it ever happened.