Paul C. Buff, Inc. Technical Forum

Hi,
I will be using my B800 and B1600 in India and I suddenly realized that I do not have the original power cords that came with them. I will be running them off a Vagabond II with a three pin "plug adapter". Due to the difference in the plug types the live and neutral polarity will be reversed once I attach a local power cable, and this will be reflected at the IEC connector. So once everything is plugged in, the IEC connector will have the live and neutral reversed. Will this cause a problem and fry the bees? Or cause a hazard by having a live body? Or trip the GFCI etc..? I will probably not be able to ground the vagabond externally.

Alternatively, I can use a two pin plug converter and get the correct polarity at the IEC, but obviously without a ground connection between the flash and the vagabond. Is this preferable to the above?

To explain the issue with the passive plug adapter, both US and Indian plugs have live on the right and neutral on the left, but the ground pin is at the bottom in US and at the top in India. This mirror image is carried through by the plug adapter and I end up with live on the left and neutral on the right in an Indian socket. Since the IEC power cable will be correctly wired for India, I will end up with a reversed IEC polarity.

Many thanks in advance for speedy replies.

Because you are using the Vagabond II (and there is no need to ground it), you should not have any problems with normal usage. However, you will run into issues with the RJ11, if you were to use that.