Battery Wiggle with ET gold mount back plate

[Josiah Duncan]

Finally got to try out my Element Technica gold mount plate after having the Epic-W arrive in the mail yesterday. I'm having an issue where one of my batteries (Anton bauer digital 190s) wiggles slightly and causes the camera to lose power. One battery works perfectly, the other one works as expected until you nudge it, causing it to lose contact with the plate somehow and cutting power to the camera. Upon expecting the contacts on both the batteries and plate, everything looks fine.

Anyone else ever encounter an issue like this? I've used these batteries on all sorts of other plates and configurations all this year. I cant recreate the issue with other plates.

 

[Bob Gundu]

That sucks as one of the benifits of AB is that they don't get loose.

 

[Jake Wilganowski]

Mine doesn't have this issue

 

[Sergei Franklin]

Put a piece of soft velcro on mount or Battery

 

[Daniel Stilling]

I've had that issue. So much so that I tried to nudge one of the battery contacts a little to one side to create tension. Then it broke. I have still to send it in...

 

[Satsuki Murashige]

Put a piece of soft velcro on mount or Battery

This. The velcro acts as a wedge and eliminates any play between the plate and the battery. It's simple and works every time.

 

[Josiah Duncan]

What causes this? I though the design of the gold mount made it virtually impossible to lose contact because of the banana plugs. I would rather fix the root issue than patch it and have the possibility of it happening again on set. Is this just an element technica issue?

 

[Scot Yount]

What causes this? I though the design of the gold mount made it virtually impossible to lose contact because of the banana plugs. I would rather fix the root issue than patch it and have the possibility of it happening again on set. Is this just an element technica issue?

I have two Element Techinca Gold Mount plates and both work great. I am using Anton Bauer batteries and they are pretty old, but still are snug. This makes me wonder not about your plate, but rather the batteries you are using on them?? Just a thought.

Edit: Forgot to say that 190s are kind of big. I am using 90s.

 

[Josiah Duncan]

At this point I'm almost certain it's the individual battery. When it's jiggled on the charger it also has trouble making contact, so something must be wrong with the female terminals. They're less than a year old so it should still be under warranty.

 

[Josiah Duncan]

Update. After a few months of waiting on Anton Bauer to service this battery they claimed they couldn't recreate the problem and sent it back unchanged. Still is the only battery that breaks connection for me, I couldn't tell you what the cause is but my other gold mounts work fine. Besides buying another one on amazon then swapping/returning it for a refund (morally questionable), what other options do I have to fix this that don't cost ~$600 for a new battery?

 

[Satsuki Murashige]

Have you tried the Velcro trick yet? Nothing to lose by trying.

If it were me, I'd make a public YouTube or Facebook video explaining and demonstrating the problem in a calm, organized, rational way, showing step-by-step your process of elimination - show how all of your other batteries work on the AB plate and your charger except with this one battery that their service department claims is fine. Then email your Vitec/Anton Bauer customer service rep, politely explain the problem in detail, send them the video link, and ask if they can help you figure out the problem. I'd bet they'll be quite willing to help you out.

 

[Josiah Duncan]

Hate to necro a thread but I just wanted to provide closure and a solution just in case someone runs into this in the future. Turns out it was worn out banana pins on the mount, really easy fix AB sent me some replacement pins and it couldn't be easier to resolve. Support and I are still stumped on why it would affect certain batteries and not others even though the female ports were perfectly circular. Since then I've ordered two more 90's, so I would count this as a success.