My Sekonic Twinmate L-208 meter is eating batteries, this can't be normal?!

[mr_phillip]

I suspect I know the answer to this before I ask but I thought I'd best double-check.

My recently purchased Sekonic Twinmate L-208 meter is eating lithium batteries at the rate of one every two weeks. The first time the cell went dead I put it down to keeping the meter in my camera bag - figuring the metering button must have been constantly pressed on overnight or some such thing.

So I replaced the battery and made a point of keeping the meter out in the open. I checked the battery again yesterday, and the damn thing's nearly flat after only two weeks, and it's been used exactly once since the battery went in this time.

So the question is: is this normal behaviour for the little meter? Or is it (as I expect) a dud?

Great meter when it works though!

 

[Tuolumne]

Deffinitely my favorite light meter. All analog settings and readings. Couldn't be easier. Sounds like you deffinitely have a deffective meter. I've used mine continuously for 6 months and it's still running strong on its factory supplied battery. In fact, one of the reasons that I switched to this light meter is because the Goosen compact meters have a reputation for eating batteries, and mine did, too. Shot after just two weeks of little use. Good luck with your Sekonic.

/T

 

[pau3]

I've been using one for more than 8 months, same battery.
Is yours under warranty?
Pau

 

[mr_phillip]

Yeah, it's under warranty. I just wanted to make sure there wasn't something obvious I was missing. Time to get a replacement methinks.

 

[ChrisPlatt]

So how is the replacement working out?

Looks like a nice little meter...

Chris

 

[mr_phillip]

The replacement's been faultless, and is still on its first set of batteries despite a lot of use. Must've just been a one-off manufacturing fault I guess.

If you're looking for a compact meter I can't recommend the TwinMate highly enough. It's tiny, accurate and weighs next to nothing.

 

[ChrisPlatt]

The replacement's been faultless, and is still on its first set of batteries despite a lot of use. Must've just been a one-off manufacturing fault I guess.

If you're looking for a compact meter I can't recommend the TwinMate highly enough. It's tiny, accurate and weighs next to nothing.

Doesn't this model have a shoe-mount option?

Chris

 

[mr_phillip]

Yeah it does, but I've never used it. I prefer to use it in incident mode – shoe mount would likely work best reflective.

 

[john_s]

I have one and find its accuracy ok in reflected mode, but very pessimistic in incident mode (which I don't use a lot but somtimes it's a worthwhile check in difficult light).

I've compared it with lots of good meters which agree with each other within a half stop.


Has anyone else found this?

 

[rogue_designer]

I have one and find its accuracy ok in reflected mode, but very pessimistic in incident mode (which I don't use a lot but somtimes it's a worthwhile check in difficult light).

Remember they're looking for different things. Difficult light could mean very low overall light, but a subject that is in good light. The meter just has the overall (unless you can get up to take the incident reading right by the subject).

Let experience be your guide. The meter is just the starting point.

 

[bean_counter]

I used (and still do) the L-208. I found it to be an excellent little meter to clip on to my IIIf while traveling. Incident feature was always iffy at best, reflective mode was usually good enough for chromes - with a few misses.

As I have moved to using finders on the IIIf, I started carrying an L-308S, nearly always using incident. A little bigger (usually carried on a strap on my neck), tougher to impute the oddball shutter/aperature settings on the IIIf, but I'm getting better exposures. Consistently.