Frozen Motor

[Ernie Zahn]

So I was shooting with my Canon 514 XL the other day and it must have been 30 degrees F outside. I suppose I never really shot in the cold before, because I had found that my Camera began to run at 18fps for a few seconds and quickly slowed to a dead a stop. I was reading a post about faulty carts produced recently by Kodak, but these 64T rolls I'm using are left over from a large order I placed back in June and all the previous rolls shot perfectly fine. So I'm betting it's the cold getting to the camera. I tried holding up against a warm water bottle (those thermal bottles you use when your sick, not a Poland Spring bottle) in addition to wrapping it in a blanket. Together both items failed to keep it running. And yes I did bring it inside to warm up before I put on the bottle and blanket. It ran fine inside and I found that moments after bringing it outside it froze again and my remedy was as effective as throwing cotton balls at a stone wall to knock it down. I know there are shooters from Canada and Germanic courties here, you get colder winters than I do in CT, USA. What is your method of keeping your cam warm?

[Mark Dunn]

This is most likely a battery problem. Try some new or freshly recharged ones. For extended use you can make up a battery pack on a long lead and keep it in your pocket, although off a tripod your hand should keep the batteries warm enough- they're in the handgrip, aren't they? 30F is barely freezing and I've shot in snow loads of times. It's nothing like cold enough to affect the stock or the lubricant, I wouldn't have thought.

[Alessandro Machi]

As the cameras age the available current probably is reduced.

 

The camera still works but there is less and less efficiency. So using fresh batteries

is a good idea however the increased load on the camera could mean that the lubrication is

no longer doing a good job enough in cold weather.

[chuck colburn]

As the cameras age the available current probably is reduced.

 

The camera still works but there is less and less efficiency. So using fresh batteries

is a good idea however the increased load on the camera could mean that the lubrication is

no longer doing a good job enough in cold weather.

 

Yes Alessandro that could be quite true. Oil based lubricants do dry up as time goes by and can become stiff at lower temps.

 

Chuck

[Giles Perkins]

I shot in Iceland in Winter a few years ago and found the best policy was to keep the batteries close to my body (i.e. warm - not that I'm sweaty or anything) and then keep swapping warm batteries in an out of the camera as sometimes they dont like the cold either.

 

See http://chemistry.about.com/od/howthingswor...coldbattery.htm

 

Good luck!