Paul C. Buff, Inc. Technical Forum

I was wondering if anyone else has had this problem...

I have an Alienbees B800 that I was setting up yesterday. I bought it used, but I have operated it quite a bit since I bought it. I have used it on slave mode, and I have also used it with a transmitter/receiver system through the sync port. Everything has worked great.

I recently purchased a cybersync+ system with the cyber commander. I read through the manual several times on how to operate it and hook it up. I had the system hooked up and the Alienbees on, and I was messing with the settings to sync it and all when I hear a fizzle and there was smoke coming out of the unit. I quickly shut it off and unplugged it. There was brown fluid running out and it was really hot for 20 minutes or so. I am assuming it is a failed capacitor.

My question is, what can cause this? Is it something you do or don't do, or does this just randomly happen? Does anyone know if this is a common problem with Alienbees?

Yes, it sounds like a failed capacitor. This happens with any flash unit (or anything with a capacitor, really). There is nothing you did that would have caused this. Age and usage could factor in to it, and since it was bought used, we are unsure of either.

I hope the tech guy doesn't mind me stepping in on this one, but I feel like I'm uniquely qualified to answer.

I've owned a Bee for some time, and when the cap failed it was like a gunshot.
Since I've been into photography for some time (going on 25 years now) I knew that all strobes eventually fail, and that the Caps are (usually) loud when they fail. After all, there is a LOT of power going through there.

I'm also an electronics guy, so I've repaired a lot of things by myself. The pinball machine that is sitting behind me kept on resetting itself. The problem was a bad power supply, with the 4 caps that feed into it. I replaced them, and its worked great ever since.
In my living room is an older HD television set. When the image turned into a single white line, I wondered what the problem was. After research, I found out that this model has a capacitor that fails, and causes a few other minor problems. After changing out that cap and a $5 part, its worked for 4 more years and is still going.
My surround sound system started clicking in one channel. Bad cap.
My audio receiver started getting a lot of static after 15 years. Bad cap.

All of the items that you read about, above, were traced to capacitor problems. Once replaced, the items worked fine.

Capacitors are electro-chemical storage units. They're similar to a rechargeable battery in some ways... and like rechargeable batteries, they have a limited lifespan. The more stress on them, the more likely they are to fail.
Putting hundreds of volts through a cap and dumping it suddenly is a lot of stress. Given how much we stress our strobes, its amazing what they'll do.

Just thought I'd put it all into perspective.

One last thought: I wanted to replace my own cap. But after doing a lot of research, I found out that the caps were expensive, replacement caps in this size are dicey, and Buff has a really good repair facility. It was a reasonable price for repair. As a photographer, I appreciate whenever I don't have to sell a kidney to get my gear fixed.

I would also stress replacing caps can be dangerous if you do not know what you are doing.

Also, our capacitors are custom made to our specs, and replacing one with a different capacitor could cause further damage.

With that said, the percentage of them failing under proper care and use (mainly, regular use), is quite low, but it is impossible to have a 0% failure rate.