Am I the only one who thinks Nikonos Bulkheads are terrible?

[mo2vation 5]

Maybe I'm just spoiled by years of shooting with Ikelite cables. But after a month with my L&H Titan housing and its Nikonos bulkheads and cords, I gotta say, these bulkleads suck.

 

The list of why these cables blow is long, but some of the more irritating issues include they're combative to assemble on a moving, pitching, poorly lit boat. They're not installed facing the same way oh the housing (one notch forward, one notch back), unless the unit is bone dry there will always be water filling the bulkhead when you take out the cord (I have resorted to bringing along canned air to blow them out when breaking down the cam in the field.) The cord ends do not seal 100%, so unlike my Ikes I can't just screw the cords onto the delrin caps and toss the cords into the rinse bucket. Oh, the Ike end remains dry - not the Nikonos end. Even with installed correctly they don't offer a visual reference - there is always this little gap, you can't tell if they're on-on or just on. Unreal.

 

Its staggering to me what a poor design this is.

 

I'm calling BackScatter today to see if I can have these limp bulkheads sawed off and Ikelite or ANY other type installed on my L&M housing.

 

I can't be the only one who feels this way. I'm here and on other boards often, and I don't ever remember reading about how lame these things are.

 

Oh well. I'll call BS and see if they can assist.

 

---

Ken

Edited January 14, 2008 by mo2vation

[Warren_L 0]

You know I'm with you on this one, buddy..... I tried that tip you gave me. I still have difficulties feeling when the notch has been aligned, though.

 

The Aquatica housings have the option of getting the Ike connectors - which I may go back to, but unfortunately with only one bulkhead, so a y-cable is required.

[Lionfish43 0]

I've never had anything except Nikonos connectors so guess I don't know any better. They're not the best, but they're the only generic design so until the manufactures can agree on a universally accepted alternative I guess we're stuck.

 

One tip: I always remove the connector from the housing with the housing up-side-down. That way any trapped water will fall out and not into the bulkhead.

[scorpio_fish 5]

I've discussed it several times and it has been discussed on the forums. Yes, they blow.

 

Sadly, they became the defacto standard during the days of Nikonos. Let's all agree on a new standard and change it. Call Subal, Seacam, Nexus, Sea & Sea, Aquatica, Ikelite and Nexus and let them know our decision.

[james 0]

There are many thread here at wetpixel about this. I think there was even one thread where someone called for a vote for a "standardized" bulkhead.

 

I have used Nikonos, Ike, and S6 bulkheads. It would be easy to standardize on either Ikelite or S6 as both ends are even the same (although, I doubt it would be possible to convince Ikelite to switch :-)

 

Cheers

James

[Viz'art 24]

Call Subal, Seacam, Nexus, Sea & Sea, Aquatica, Ikelite and Nexus and let them know our decision.

 

Wrong tree George , many housing manufacturers do not manufacture strobe, the one's to call are the strobe manufacturers, I couldn't agree more with you guy's, The Nikonos has had its days, and a new open structure design is needed, something simple, robust and made to contain any moisture entering it (sealed from the housing interior) and please, please pretty please no spring loaded (should say loathed here ) pins. If the flash people make it happenand we are open armed to help them, we will be amongst the first to implemented it but again its not really up to the camera housing folks as much as it is the strobe manufacturer the must supply the proper cord to connect their strobes to the whatever new standard would be, as for us, well we plug the hole with what's available and popular

 

Cheers.

[herbko 0]

I'm siding with George on this one. The strobe manufacturers control one end of the connection and the housing makers the other. The two are different. You can't plug the strobe end of the cable into the housing. Although I've been careful and lucky enough to not have any failures to date, I find the housing end much more trouble to use and keep clean than the strobe end.

 

There's no reason a housing maker can't come up with a reliable, easy to maintain connector on their housings and sell cables to connect it and Nikonos strobes. To me, it looks perfectly feasible for a housing maker to offer this as an option. I'd take a more reliable connector at the cost of replacing a couple of cables. In fact Ikelite offers this option.

[Phil Rudin 423]

Fiber optics seem to be working quite well with the strobes designed for them (Inon comes to mind). Nexus seems to be the most recent to embrace this idea, perhaps it will catch on for the DSLR market.

 

Phil Rudin

[Viz'art 24]

I understand the frustation, but believe me I don't see were the housing manufacturer would be qualified as a supplier of cord but not of strobes. molding and manufacturing strobe cables make sense if you make the strobe that go along with them. Us or I guess another of our competitor coming out with a new design would just be another isolated standard that will fade away if its not endorsed by the strobe manufacturer.

 

A few years ago Aquatica came out with a wet connector system, it cost quite a chunk in R&D and was a smart design allowing swapping cord underwater, alas it died because the Nikonos was still too implemented.

 

The industry will need to address this one day, but that will mean sitting at the same table, putting aside our difference and ... agree on something. Dialog is prime here.

 

As a housing manufacturer we see a sure benefit in standarizing, and honestly I hope it will happen. We, you deserve a connector that is up to today's task and is widely accepted.

 

Meanwhile our housing are available with Ikelite Bulkhead's, its a simple and efficient connector and it is widely accepted worlwide, as a plus they have cords to connect their bulkhead to Inon/ Sea & Sea and Nikonos.

 

P.S. We are looking into Optical fiber, but not a lot of strobes are Optical ready as of now... again the bloody different standard .

 

Cheers

[davephdv 0]

My Subal housing has Ike sockets. I highly recommend them.

[okuma 64]

With 25 years of Nikonos, I too agree in droping them.

I like the Sea & Sea connectors; good sized 'O' ring in the correct location, and a good threaded connection.

[StephenFrink 9]

With 25 years of Nikonos, I too agree in droping them.

 

I use S6 and am thrilled with their reliability and ease of cord installation; in the dark, on a pitching boat, whatever:

 

http://wetpixel.com/forums/index.php?showt...19246&hl=S6

 

Very robust and elegant. Of course, this thread above went nowhere last time in terms of suggesting a better universal standard than the Nikonos, other than letting me vent my angst. We are recommending S6 to new Seacam customers for the superiority of S6, and forward compatibility with E-TTL (Canon) and I-TTL (Nikon). Even so, at least 50% of our customers still opt for Nikonos V connectors due to legacy of strobe cords.

 

Interestingly, most ordering new Canon MKIII Seacam housings are ordering with at least one S6, and several have decided to go with dual S6. Mine will have dual S6.

 

BTW ... Seacam does provide S6 to either Ikelite or Inon/Sea and Sea strobes (I travel with both kinds of cords), and S6 is the standard for their own Seaflash 150. Because of the Euro exchange rate the cords are expensive, but very good.

[dhaas 26]

My take, after being one of those who has regularly added to the discussions of the Nik V connector being well past its prime is to make your choice when you get a new housing!

 

While the S6 is nice, the Ike style connector (which is the same on their strobe bulkhead and housing end, hence ZERO hook up dilemmas) is currently the best choice for housing mfrs. to adopt.

 

Ikelite as mentioned currently makes cords from their housing connection style even to competitors strobes. Of course they HOPE you will consider their fine UW flash units!

 

Personally, for so many who will spend extra bucks for some gizmo on a new housing system to think getting new style, but more reliable and robust connecting cords is expensive? I am thinking that's penny wise and pound foolish.......

 

Just my 2 cents

 

dhaas

[Alex_Mustard 0]

The other solution is to go fibre optic. 100% water proof, super light weight, cheap. Downsides - no TTL, not compatible with all strobes.

 

On last summer's Wetpixel/JASA shark trip, Tony Wu had both of his zillion housings fitted out this way. Very impressive indeed. I'm going this way with my Inon Z240s.

 

Alex

[zook 0]

My Subal housing has Ike sockets. I highly recommend them.

 

Same thing here, but if I were to order it today, I'd ask it with Ike on one side and Nikonos on the other. This way I could use different strobes (with Y cables, not different strobes at the same time )

[scorpio_fish 5]

I was being somewhat facetious when I said let us decide and let them know.

 

Jean, you sell yourself and Aquatica short. Aquatica, and appparently Subal, have addressed the issue by offering optional Ikelite connectors on the housing. This is really all we need, a choice. I don't think it is a coincidence that neither Aquatica or Subal sell strobes.

 

All we need are a couple more to offer Ikelite connectors and then eventually the first guy will quit offering Nikonos.

 

Not to knock the S6, but cost counts and the Ike connector already has a bigger market share.

 

Then people like me will quit ordering housings with Nik connectors because we already have a drawer full of them from the past umpteen years.

 

Someone just needs to convince someone that an Ikelite connector to a Sea & Sea strobe connector on the other end is in their best interests.

[davephdv 0]

Slightly off topic, but I added the Ike TTL adaptor to my D2X housing with the Ike synch sockets. Very nice and gives you TTL or manual. I believe they actually make it so you can use with Nikonos bulkheads as well, though I'm not sure.

 

http://web.mac.com/daveburroughs/Site/iTTL...ter_photos.html

[Gudge 58]

The other solution is to go fibre optic. 100% water proof, super light weight, cheap. Downsides - no TTL, not compatible with all strobes.

I agree with everything you said apart from the TTL issue. My wife uses a 400D in Seatool housing with Inon Z240's and fibre optic sync cords. The Inon sTTL system works very well with this system. Apart from Seatool, there are a few housings coming onto the market now that have fibre optic connections on them to allow TTL via fibre optics such as Inon's sTTL system. For example, the latest version of the Nexus D200 housing can do TTL via fibre optics with Inon strobes.

 

 

I just wish I could use fibre optic cords with my Subal housing.

Edited January 16, 2008 by Gudge

[pakman 0]

Agree with Gudge... I am reluctantly ordering a S&S 40D housing (due largely to all the ports/ domes/ gears I have collected) but wish S&S had gone the route of Nexus and Seatool by offering optical. But again, S&S is a major strobe maker and might have a vested interested in keeping to the Nikonos cables... S&S "You want TTL? Sure just buy our $400-500 TTL conveter"...

Edited January 16, 2008 by pakman

[olegam 0]

I have for years used wet connectors from Marshall. These are equal to the Electro Oceanics connectors that used to be popular some years ago. The connectors are cheap and reliable. The downside is that you only can use the strobe in manual mode. There are other alternatives that will make it possible to use TTL. One of these is Subconn. Subconn is even better than EO/Marshall and available in many configurations. The company that sells these connectors is MacArtney. They have branches all over the world. The use of such connectors will of course require some work attaching the strobe connector to the cable.

[tdpriest 115]

Yeah, the design of Nikonos bulkheads is pretty crummy, but in ten years diving I haven't had a failure. Since there are so many out there, the observed failures COULD be simple statistics (confusing absolute failure rates and relative failure rates).

 

I'm suspicious enough that I've replaced mine with optical connectors, but I'm now wrestling with the temptation of using TTL strobe control, that I haven't used since I retired my Nik V...

 

... and I'm still carrying my 5-pin cords (as backup!?!).

 

Inon Z-240 strobes mimic TTL through their optical cable, by tracking the cameras internal flash. The only problem I've had is a little light leakage into a big dome, solved by a plastic disc that pushes onto the lens and occludes the gap between the dome and the housing.

 

Although the Ikelite connection is good, just remember where the bulkhead was sited on the D70 housing, just where it pokes your nose!

 

Tim

 

B)

[Balrog 5]

Cables are the weak point in the system, potential leak and snag points. I would like to see us ditching them altogether, be it copper or fibre. Surely in this time of cheap electronics and wireless communication, someone can come up a compact encapsulated plug in Tx/Rx unit with as many channels as necessary for full TTL.

 

It works on my dive computer, now its just got to be fast enough.

 

Anyone want a project

[bruceterrill 0]

Hi Guys,

 

Gudge,

I contacted the Oz rep for Inon and he sent me out two of the new 'Optical Windows' and I then had the housing drilled and tapped for the 'windows'. I use a Nexus housed D70S and it is an older housing BUT, still has plenty of room to deploy the camera's flash unit. Try fitting your camera into the housing with the flash up and you might be surprised by how much room is actually in there... 'Windows' were about aud$90 each??

 

Tim,

I was also concerned about any strobe/flash light coming out of the housing and into the port. Once again I contacted my Inon rep and got hold of some of the clear flash tape that they use for blanking out the flash units on the compact/P&S cameras. The strobes read the infra red light signals which passes through the tape unrestricted...

 

The result of the experiment has been a complete success and I will now have to get a couple of the nice new Inons, unless someone has a couple that they want to donate to research??

 

Bruce...

[Gudge 58]

I contacted the Oz rep for Inon and he sent me out two of the new 'Optical Windows' and I then had the housing drilled and tapped for the 'windows'. I use a Nexus housed D70S and it is an older housing BUT, still has plenty of room to deploy the camera's flash unit. Try fitting your camera into the housing with the flash up and you might be surprised by how much room is actually in there... 'Windows' were about aud$90 each??

Thanks for info, but I'm not ready to start drilling and tapping holes in my 20D housing right now as I won't be using it much longer. My new Subal housing for my 40D will hopefully be delivered to today and I'm reluctant to start tinkering with it for a while.

 

I did check my 20D in the Subal housing last night and there is sufficient room for the strobe to be raised inside the housing and fire. So fitting optical windows to the housing is certainly feasible.

 

I also got an email from Ryan last night saying that he was looking at putting some optical bulkheads into the Subal 40D sync cord sockets along with some internal fibre optics so that Inon strobes could be used in TTL mode with the 40D. There probably won't know anything for sure until next month but I'm definitely interested if it works.

Edited January 17, 2008 by Gudge

[BCarmichael 0]

I have been shooting the Titan D100 with the wetlink strobe cords for a few years.

This was an option with the housing when new, and I’m surprised that they still don’t offer them.

This is also the same cords from the tetra housings.

I haven’t had any problems with them at all. Just push them in, and your ready to go. After diving just pull them out give a rinse, and a rub of grease done.