A700 Flash shoe problem

[UrsaMajor]

I have recently encountered a problem with the flash shoe on my A700 that I do not remember hearing mentioned by others. I'm not sure of the best approach to solving it, and would appreciate any input that might be relevant.

The issue is that when I insert my external flash into the shoe of the A700, it will click into place and remain here, but can rock forward and aft while in place. By itself this is not of great concern, but the real problem is that if the flash is not rocked to the back of its movement range, the flash will not fire. I can compensate by reaching up with my left hand and pushing backward on the top half of the flash while pressing the shutter, but this is a very inconvenient "solution".

There has always been an occasional problem of this nature, but it occurred so seldom that I had been ignoring it as just a random event until it became so frequent. I assume that this is an issue with too much clearance between the shoe on the A700 and the mating part of the flash.

Since this could be a problem with either the camera or with the flash, I experimented by installing two different flash units on the A700, and then installing the same units on my KM 7D. The A700 had a problem with both flashes, and both flashes worked without a problem on my KM 7D.

Any inputs, comments, and suggestions for a solution would be appreciated.

With best wishes,
- Tom -

[Greg Beetham]

Tom have a close look at the contacts on the A700, if you see blackish/greyish rub-marks from the flash contacts on them then it’s likely your A700 has the same contact problem that mine had. As far as I could tell the plastic in the hot shoe area on the A700 is softer than that on my KM5D and A100 and rubs off and is transferred onto the contacts themselves, if you give them a clean with an abrasive cleaner you’ll be able to get rid on the insulation transferred onto the contacts, I used a small piece of 1000G w/d and that worked ok.
Greg

[Dr. Harout]

I encounter that problem much often, and every time I have to either rock the flash or clean it. Sometimes it is very annoying specially when I shoot skin problems.

[twm47099]

It sounds like the dies used to make the shoe are worn (original Minolta??) or else there was too much tolerance in their manufacture.

It's unfortunate, because the main selling point for the Minolta flash shoe was its one-click positive mounting. I was very happy when Minolta had it on their cameras, because I had always had problems with the flash mounting and inconsistent firing on my Minolta AF5000 which used the older ISO shoe. Part of the issue was the small flash contacts of the Minolta flash mount and slight twisting of the flash in the shoe would result in misalignment of the contacts and failure to fire. The new shoe solved that. But I also notice that my flashes (which fit very well on my Maxxum 7 and KM7D) are somewhat sloppy on my A700. I haven't had problems yet with failure to fire, but I am uncomfortable with the flash flopping as I tilt the camera up or down.

tom