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Like a flash in the pan


Welp, my Nikon SB600, which I’ve had for about a year and a half now has officially been declared dead. After dropping it yesterday it simply wouldn’t turn on anymore. I popped it open today hoping to discover what went wrong, after getting it pretty well apart, I noticed this.

Broken thingy Nother angle of broken thingy

Apparently the drop cracked the casing the F100 p3D (whatever that is) on the board. I did a bit of research and apparently permanent damage to the SB600 is fairly common after very minor drops, and in some cases they fail completely without any obvious trauma. I’m considering trying to identify and replace this part, but it’s a surface mount component, and I’ve never successfully soldered one of those. Anyone out there know what this thing is?

Even if I can repair it, I’m gonna go ahead and replace it. At the moment, I don’t want another SB600 after reading too many similar cases of failure, I don’t want to spend ~$300 for something that’s likely to get broken again quite easily. I’d like something that does TTL since that’s a big part of the reason I liked the SB600. I’m going to have to go with a TTL cord instead of using CLS for situations like yesterday where I was using it handheld, but it’s a small price to pay. The flash(es) I’m considering are around the $100 neighborhood and even if I were to break one of those, I can justify replacing one of those. More on that when I figure it out.

* UPDATE:

I’ve completed this repair, and the SB600 is now working fine, thanks much to David for identifying the inductor! You can read about my repair here.

This entry was posted on September 7, 2009, 10:19 pm and is filed under Photography. You can follow any responses to this entry through RSS 2.0. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

  • Rogy

    i have the same problem my wife accidentally dropped the flash SB600 and the same happened i opened the flash and that component was broken and the D303 was removed from the PCB can you please take a photo maybe showing top view where the D303 diode will be visible so i could solder that one first and worry about the other one later thanks

  • http://www.nslms.com RyanG

    I’ll see if I can snap a closer shot of that component for you. I’ve been informed that the F100 p3D is likely a ferrite transformer or inductor, which is pretty much what I figured.

    Still trying to figure out the specs for it. I actually almost bought another damaged SB600 off ebay in hopes to simply swap out the board, which is what nikon wants me to do if I were to buy replacement parts from them. *shrug*

  • Rogy

    Thanks in advance, should nikon the manufacturer who made the flash be helping us in supplying the components as it have failed during a waist high drop test considering that my wife is only 5 feet. I hope theres alot of SB600 flash owner to come forward who encountered this problem so we could actually ask the nikon for a replacement part or check the height of there drop test, hope they have one. thanks.

  • http://codefreak.de Hagen

    Mine broke two days ago, it felt of my tripod.

    You could hear some loose parts while shaking the flash. Today I took it apart and found this component labeled with “F100 r5D” broken apart. I removed it and as far as I can see, it is a “simple” inductifity and not a transformer. In the inside is a single painted (ans so isolated) wire with both ends connected to the outer contacts of the case of the “F100″. In my unit the wire on the right side is disconnected, I’ll try to remove the case of that part and solder the wires directly to the PCB and seal it with hotglue.

    I will also try to resolder the D303, which is disconnected either, what I noticed after reading Rogys comment.

  • http://www.nslms.com RyanG

    I’m kinda glad not to be the only one who’s experienced similar failure, though it’s also rather sad.

    Sorry Rogy, haven’t had the chance to break the unit open again to get a photo of the other component you were after. We moved to a new home in late October, and things have been WAY too busy for me.

    I’m still hoping to break it open again and grab that shot for you though. :-)

    Hagen, please do report back with your results. I’ve sorta “moved on” from trying to repair mine since replacing it with an SB800, but if you have success I might find renewed interested in repairing mine!

  • David

    The inductor, L301, appears to be a commonly breaking item on that particular board of the SB-600. It broke on mine…

    I bought a copy of the SB-600 service manual and parts list off eBay. Fortunately, it contains the schematics. L301 is a 10uH inductor, but no other specs are given. The fact that this particular device is specifically called out in a couple of the diagrams seems to indicate that this is a common and known failure point.

    I ordered the wrong value (100uH) from Digikey earlier today, but will be ordering the right value shortly. I’ll post the success or failure once I receive and swap the component, including the actual device specs.

  • David

    Well, it worked. The SB600 is now functional again. Woo hoo!

    The part I ended up using was a 10uH shielded inductor from Digikey, part number 513-1475-1-ND (Mfg part number SD6030-100-R) :
    http://search.digikey.com/scripts/DkSearch/dksus.dll?Detail&name=513-1475-1-ND

    The only problem with that particular inductor is that the footprint did not match exactly the pads on the PCB. I had to slide the inductor over towards the center of the board so the strip in the middle of the inductor on the PCB would not short the two contacts of the inductor, and then solder a bridge over on the outside pad to the inductor. The other thing about this particular part that concerns me is the physical size and current rating.

    A better fitting inductor, at least from the data sheet footprint is this one, Digikey part 513-1129-1-ND (Mfg part number DR73-100-R). This looks to be a closer match to the original inductor in both physical size and in the PCB footprint. Note that I have not tried this: measuring the pieces of original that I have and looking at the measurements of this latter one just seem to be a way better match.
    http://search.digikey.com/scripts/DkSearch/dksus.dll?Detail&name=513-1129-1-ND

  • David

    One more note on the repair: I used two long tip pencil irons under a microscope. The inductor is right next to a diode and the spacing is tight. The two irons allows you to heat both sides so the part can be lifted off without any stress on the board itself.

    The microscope goes without saying… The board is tight and the parts are all tiny. I don’t think this repair can be done well without a microscope.

  • ako

    My Nikon SB 600 was broken. Open it up and found out the F100 .y3d damage together with the diode next to it. I was wondering if it still fixable or does anyone know where to buy part/s (diode)

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  • v.

    Yay! I just repaired mine. It slipped from my hand and fell 1,5m. on it’s back on a tile floor and did not start anymore. The inductoe L301 was in pieces. Actually there is not enough space between it and the battery compartiment, so when it falls it touches the inductor easily and braks it.. I saw on a Russian website, the guys a filing a bit of it to have more space in between.

    Living in Europe, I ordered the inductor TDK SLF7032T-100M1R4-2PF from Conrad.de ( http://www.conrad.de/ce/de/product/443419/INDUKTIVITAeT-SMD-10H/SHOP_AREA_17429 ). The repair manual I found on internet on some Hungarian site. Soldering was easy and fast. When I reassembled it, it just started in a slave mode at the point where it was when it fell down.

    Just one point – never forget to dicharge the condenser! Use a resistance, or a voltmeter, or a light bulb, but do not forget to do this before you start playing with nude electrical contacts.

  • Carl Jung

    For reference, after dropping one of my sb600s a week ago, I found this thread and ordered: http://search.digikey.com/scripts/DkSearch/dksus.dll?Detail&name=513-1129-1-ND from Digikey. It’s part number 513-1129-1-ND if the link doesn’t work. It’s almost the original part exactly, with exact dimensions.

    As it just showed up, I haven’t soldered it on yet, but it looks like that may be tricky due to the surface mount. I’ll report back if it’s successful to turn it on, if it is, I still need to order a new flash tube as well.

  • david payant

    like ako, I too am looking to get a new diode that was located next to the inductor, but am unsure what part to order.

  • martin

    I have the same problem, I have to mount the inductor and 2 diodes, the diodes are inscripted with 5579 (togheter with the inductor) and I don’t know how it’s find or specifications, if someone give a clue I will be forever grateful.

    Martin

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