Help!! 2xBowens + 580exII + 430ex not firing/syncing

Hiya all,

With the above set up I have the 580 on camera and set as master. the 430 goes off as expected with the infrared. The Bowens fire, but not in sync with the 580 and 430 although it looks like it is to the human eye. I've tried with a pc cable from camera, pc from 580, and with the slaves on the bowens units. still to no joy. Is there something I'm missing here that can't be fixed. like their syncing can't be brought into unision or something?

Thanks in advance!

I've the same problem and I suspect the E-TTL2 is screwing us over. I own a 420EX which is my master on camera, and two strobes photocell enabled that act as slaves. They look lke firing at the same time, but it's obvious that they are not in sync because pictures with the 420EX alone are a stop brighter than with the two photocells on. If I attach one unit to the camera through the pc cable, I can have a dark wall be white with no problems.

So the problem is that there is no sync between the master and the two non-Canon slaves.

Please help harroz and myself out, I'm sure it's the same problem.

-- V

PS. By saying that the E-TTL2 is screwing us over, I mean that its preflash triggers the slaves before the actual flash burst happens.

harroz set the 580 to manual, you can, I can't with my 420.
That will solve your problem.

Nope it doesnt help, everything is set in manual. Have tried with 580 on and off too. Think I've pretty much tried everything. thing is, I wouldn't know which part has the problem so don't know which one to take into the shop. I've tried it down to as far as 1/10 maybe even less like a second can't remember and from f2.8 up to f11 as well. It's got me stumped!

Do the Bowens have an optical trigger? If so, they are being set off by the pre-flash even when you are connecting them via PC cable back to the camera.

Unless you have the "Re-Wire Mod for the 580EX II" done, the PC jack on the 580EX II will not operate as an OUTPUT to anything. If you have the 580EX II in the hot shoe, and connect a cable to the PC jack to try and trigger the Bowens, and then you see the Bowens fire, it is definately because they are being fired from the internal optical slave trigger, and not the wired connection to the 580EXD II, so you must tape it over, or shut it off, and then plug the sync cord into the camera PC jack to sync.

This could be it! I'll try this later this evening and see how I go but i think you may have hit the nail on the head, Many thanks Michael

jmb4370 wrote in post #5787279
Do the Bowens have an optical trigger? If so, they are being set off by the pre-flash even when you are connecting them via PC cable back to the camera.

Unless you have the "Re-Wire Mod for the 580EX II" done, the PC jack on the 580EX II will not operate as an OUTPUT to anything. If you have the 580EX II in the hot shoe, and connect a cable to the PC jack to try and trigger the Bowens, and then you see the Bowens fire, it is definately because they are being fired from the internal optical slave trigger, and not the wired connection to the 580EXD II, so you must tape it over, or shut it off, and then plug the sync cord into the camera PC jack to sync.

Just went to try this as you were saying Michael but realized that I only have one pc to bowens cable so I'm unable to use the second bowens by slave. I wonder how I can work around this, I'm thinking that I could add an extra cable wire from the single so it goes to both lights, o.k in the studio but it could get in the way for bigger outside shoots. Can this actually be done? does it matter how long these cable are?

Get a little 3 way PC splitter, and then another PC sync cord, or just cut the wire, and splice another one in place (making your own Y cable), keeping the same polarity of the wires (tip to tip, ground to ground). The wire cable can be longer than you can imagine before you would ever see a difference.