S
Stu :)
Guest
I just discovered something really cool.
My Canonet QL17 uses these really annoying out-of-date and extremely hard to get 'mushroom' styled button batteries (PX 625).
Anyhow... today I discovered that the battery I put in at Christmas had gone flat. Which is a real pain in the butt, because only one camera shop I know stocks the PX 625 and they charge for it too! A rather hefty $25NZ per battery. Where as my new Bessa R uses the more current and easier to find LR44 (even the local gas station stocks them!), which costs around $5 to $8NZ for a strip pack of 10.
Cursing at the flat battery and dreading the trek across Auckland something occurred to me, that last battery they sold me was not a PX 625, but an LR44 with a collar attached to it. So out with the tool box, a quick tap with a 4lb. hammer and fine pointed hole punch, and the collar was off. I noticed that the inside of the collar was bevelled smooth, when the LR44 is placed into the collar the bevelled edge stops the LR44 at a certain point. When compared to a PX 625, the LR44 with collar has the same profile and fits into the Canonet perfectly.
So I did the normal 'short with a resistor and go make a coffee' trick. My Canonet QL17 now uses the same battery as my Bessa R. In my 15+ years of owning cameras, this is the first time I've owned two cameras at the same time that use the same battery.
So next time your PX 625 goes flat, have a closer look at your battery, it might just be a LR44 with that third party collar you can use again!
Stu
My Canonet QL17 uses these really annoying out-of-date and extremely hard to get 'mushroom' styled button batteries (PX 625).
Anyhow... today I discovered that the battery I put in at Christmas had gone flat. Which is a real pain in the butt, because only one camera shop I know stocks the PX 625 and they charge for it too! A rather hefty $25NZ per battery. Where as my new Bessa R uses the more current and easier to find LR44 (even the local gas station stocks them!), which costs around $5 to $8NZ for a strip pack of 10.
Cursing at the flat battery and dreading the trek across Auckland something occurred to me, that last battery they sold me was not a PX 625, but an LR44 with a collar attached to it. So out with the tool box, a quick tap with a 4lb. hammer and fine pointed hole punch, and the collar was off. I noticed that the inside of the collar was bevelled smooth, when the LR44 is placed into the collar the bevelled edge stops the LR44 at a certain point. When compared to a PX 625, the LR44 with collar has the same profile and fits into the Canonet perfectly.
So I did the normal 'short with a resistor and go make a coffee' trick. My Canonet QL17 now uses the same battery as my Bessa R. In my 15+ years of owning cameras, this is the first time I've owned two cameras at the same time that use the same battery.
So next time your PX 625 goes flat, have a closer look at your battery, it might just be a LR44 with that third party collar you can use again!
Stu
