Paul C. Buff, Inc. Technical Forum

I upgraded from a Dyna-Lite M-1000WI power pack and head system to Einsteins just a few weeks ago. The consistency in flash power, color, recycle time, are all vast improvements over the Dyna-Lite. But as has been mentioned in other posts, I NEVER had an overheat, modeling lamp turn off issue with the Dyna-Lite heads, even with the full 250 watt modeling lamp on literally for hours at full power.

With the Einsteins, running the Einstein modeling lamp at full power even when using just the Buff parabolic white shoot through umbrella shaft mount will overheat and turn off the model lamp for up to a minute or so, after being on at full power for 30 minutes or so. If I use the reflector designed to mount a grid and place a grid on the unit the Einstein will overheat in a matter of minutes and cycle the model lamp on and off repeatedly. Using a softbox will overheat somewhere between the open parabolic reflector and the grid timewise, but will still overheat.

I understand there is a lot of electronics in the Einstein, the Dyna-Lite heads are just a fan, the flash tube and model lamp, not much to overheat.

These are the latest v2 Einsteins, less than two weeks old, shipped the first week of September 2011.

But at this point if I am shooting in a dim location, and need a way to focus I need the model lamps often at or near full power, and especially with a grid I need all the light I can get to focus, especially manually with the Zeiss 100mm f2 macro.

Short of replacing the model lamps with 150 watt units (which may or may not help) is there any way to adjust the power of the model lamps to something other than full on, follow the flash setting, or full off? When I cycle the functions on the head all I see are model lamp off, full power, or track flash power, and using the CyberCommander I see nothing that is obvious.

Ideally if I could even set the model lamp so that it's default "full" on was actually say 3/4 power, I would still get a reasonable amount of light to focus by, but hopefully drop the heat enough so that the head does not cycle off the modeling lamp so frequently.

And YES I do have all heads set to cycle the model lamp off/on on every pop of the head, both to help identify when the head is fully recycled, but to help cool the unit as well.

Or is the only option to go to a lower wattage lamp and hope that is enough to keep the head from overheating? If so, what do I need to order as far as base type or part number?

This is nearly a show stopper for me to use these heads for my work, I love the other characteristics of the heads, but this is nearly an unusable solution with the model lamps overheating the unit on a consistent basis. If any testing has been done that shows that the 150 watt replacment actually will resolve this problem I would love to know before I order the replacement lamps.

Thanks

There are four options for the model lamp. FULL, OFF, TRACK, and ADJUST. The last one allows you to independently adjust the model lamp to where ever you want and it stays there. If you are selecting via the E640's screen, the icon would be the light bulb with a circular arrow. If selecting via the Cyber Commander, the appropriate selection would be "ADJ".

Once this mode is selected, you can adjust the power of the model lamp on the rear of the light by selecting the model lamp window (the second window down) with the Function button. Use the arrow keys up or down to make the adjustment.

If you use the Cyber Commander, scroll once to the right with the right joystick. This is your MODEL screen (as it appears in red at the bottom). Select lights and adjust model lamps just as you would flash power.

Remember, any settings made on the back of the light will be overridden by the Cyber Commander, unless you you follow the OPEN MEMORY sequence after you make changes to the light.

Thanks so much, that was my problem, I missed the fourth option of the lamp icon with the arrow on the unit, and for some reason I blowing past the model adjust option screen on the CC. Both work exactly as you indicate below!