Charger and batteries for the DCS 4xx Cameras

I have been intrigued by the 4xx cameras for a while, but have never seriously looked at buying one.

I'm in good shape I think to handle some of the quirks of them. Old computers aren't a problem for me. Not too long ago I bought a bunch of 2gb Delkin industrial cards, and from reading other places the industrial cards in PCMCIA adapters seem to make reliable storage.

The cameras themselves seem plentiful on Ebay, but I've yet to see a charger.

First of all, do I have the correct picture of them that the batteries are "permanent" and charged in the camera? I'm guessing that's what the mini-DIN plug is for but again haven't seen the full set up. Can the cells be easily replaced?(and are they a standard/easy to find size?)

Can a charger be improvised? I'm guessing the battery chemistry is Ni-Cd or NiMH and if so I'm wondering if the correct plug and a bench PSU would do...

Hi,

I did many a 460 pack rebuild years ago. 2/3 AF cells IIRC. Pretty standard cells, but you'd have to measure the cell diameter and length to be sure these days. My wetware may be flipping some bits here.They may have been AA. They come with tabs on the cells you get to spot weld together.

Or drop an old pack off at Batteries Plus Bulbs and they'll do it. For a fee of course.

The charger brick is a bog standard Elpac. I see them at hamfests still. They were really common for all sorts of notebook PCs when the 460 was new. So Kodak simply used one. Most have something coaxial on the end of their cable. So you do need the mini DIN and a soldering iron. I used to buy them from Newark Electronics. I bet DigiKey has them as well.

Stan

Thanks-sounds straight forward enough.

Seems like it might be worth paying extra for one that's confirmed at least to turn on, but otherwise sounds like it's within my capabilities.

In the distant past I've bought pre-tabbed cells and soldered them together, but I know I didn't always build the neatest packs. Back when I was in college(mid to late 2000s) I had a pretty big interest in Canon FD mount stuff and was making good money on Ebay buying up the rechargeable packs for the New F-1 and rebuilding them. Wasn't a bad deal as I'd regularly spend $30-50 for a pack+charger, spend $20 on 8x AA NiMHs with tabs, and more than once got close to $200 for the full set-up if I included one of the camera battery adapters. Even though I was decent at them, though, more than a few times I found myself having to tear one back apart after putting it together because soldering the cells wouldn't give as neat of a pack as if I'd spot welded my own tabs on. If I'd been smart I'd have turned the money around into a spot welder!

Hi,

Soldering works as long as you have a 25w or so iron and rosin core solder. I don't usually mention soldering cells due to the all-too-easy chance of heat damage which spot welding doesn't have as much of.

Sounds to me like you already know all that. ;)

The more I think on it, the 400 series used AA cells bundled into a simple pack in there.

Stan (who is missing his usual signature)

Amateur Photographer
Professional Electronics Development Engineer

Must remember to copy and paste that! :P

At the beginning of 2019, I had five battery packs redone for my Kodak DCS cameras, in a store specializing in the sale of batteries. And four years later they still work very well.
I am giving a little facelift to several of my Kodak DCS 410, DCS 460, and DCS 520, etc.

Kodak DCS ... by Marc Aubry, sur Flickr

Battery 9.6 V ( Kodak DCS ) by Marc Aubry, sur Flickr

Hi,

Well, those in Marc's pic surely look like 2/3 AF cells. Maybe I should not have sat and thought about it....

Stan

There is a Kodak NC2000e with charger for sale on eBay for $250.00 USD

While i was testing my NC2000 to check for life I made a crude battery from old cell phones LI-Ions, It worked fine, when the batteries ran out of juice i went and connected the original charger, since the Li-Ions have their own built in protection I felt safe to do that. To my surprise they charged just fine and provided me well over 200 shots.
Needless to say I found the room inside the camera and is running with the same Li-Ions since late 2017. I went the safe route and im undervolting the thing, Li-Ions never get fully charged with this method and that proved to really extend the battery life of the cells (I took the Kodak yesterday to the park and grabbed some shots)
Since the batteries have their own internal low voltage cutout they just go offline well before the camera thinks the battery is low and of course, much before the camera misbehaves due to low battery, and of course, this makes the battery meter to always show full or 2/3 full.
I don't like Ni-Cd or Ni-Mh batteries, they don't hold as much charge as Li-Ion and they can leak so this is a mod I really like.
As for the missing charger, making a new one should be hard but I guess a neat mod would be to make a 3D printed replacement bottom cover that allows for battery removal and external charging.
Having a permanent battery was such a awful decision, specially for a camera like the NC2000 that plainly needs to work as fast as possible, to make matters worse they chose a mini-DIN as power connector, mini-DIN belongs to a PS/2 mouse or an S-Video, not a power connector, specially not one that might need to be plugged in the field in a rushed manner... sorry about the rant.
But yeah, having a removable battery could be a very nice mod allowing the camera to work from a variety of options.

I don't know the whole history of Kodak for the DCS's
But how can we be so stupid? as to prohibit battery change!!

When you realize, that the Kodak DCS 200 (1992) has a removable battery compartment?
And no difficulty in finding AA batteries. A dream, for a collector like me 😎

Kodak DCS 200 by Marc Aubry, sur Flickr

Kodak DCS 200 by Marc Aubry, sur Flickr

That's perfect, and that's the ideal approach for a field camera, what's easiest to find than AAs? you can carry a sack full of those if you need to cover a story in the middle of nowhere. My finepix has that and i found that amazing.
On that subject... since the molds for the DCS200 and 400 series are basically the same, can't the bottom cover be replicated to use on a 400 and add that functionality? that would be awesome.

Some details about making a charger here: www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/4630856

I ended up winning that NC2000 linked above, so now I have not just that bit also a charger on the way.

I still want a 460c, though.

Definitely get some IR "hot mirror" filters for your lenses. The nc2000 and DCS4xx series have basically no hot mirror on the sensor. B&W makes some nice ones, but B&H also has some more affordable, and (from what I can see) just as effective ones under the Ice brand.

Don't know what you have for lenses, but you can use modern G lenses, including DX lenses, but only in P and S modes (since the earlier cameras don't allow you to set aperture from the body). FWIW, I've found that some DX lenses also cover APS-H. The 35/1.8 covers it just fine. The older 18-55 VR does (just barely), too, but the newer 18-55 VR II does not (and, IIRC, can't be used on the older bodies).

The only Hot Mirror I have is a Tiffen branded one in 52mm that funny enough came mounted on the Pronia 6i I bought a few years ago. I've been using it lately on my 14/n and SLR/n, although obviously 52mm is a bit limiting. I don't think Tiffen even makes these anymore.

My lens selection is...well...kind of all over the place but I do have an N90s and am familiar with lens compatibility on it. I have used-and actually still use-the F4 a lot and its compatibility is very similar(although obviously the N90(s) gives up matrix with manual focus and the ability to use non-AI). My most used lens these days is my 24-70 f/2.8E, which is wonderful but has no aperture control on anything older than the D3(although the F5 and F6 actually work fine and recognize that they can't change the aperture from f/2.8). I have not tried it on the F4, but I'd not be surprised if it sort of worked. Fortunately too I THINK that the N90s, like the F4, just ignores VR being there. Some slightly newer cameras like the N70 will "activate" VR but not actually allow it to function so it just sits there and drains your batteries. I do have bunches of AF and AF-D lenses, which are right at home on the 90s bodies. That includes some primes and a few good zooms like the 35-70 f/2.8.

IIRC, the 35mm f/1.8 nearly covers an FX frame. A not insignificant number of DX zooms will at least at some focal lengths. I've been known to use the cheap plastic 10-20mm AF-P on my DF as it will cover an FX frame at ~14mm(with some distortion and vignetting that can't be completely fixed) and I don't know of a lighter weight way to get a lens that wide on a full frame DSLR. It's basically dead on cameras before about 2010 or so, with no provision even for manual focus.

All of that said, I thought the 410/420 were small sensors with crops in the 2.3x range, and isn't the NC2000 even a tiny bit smaller? The 460 is APS-H, right?

My next project is going to be to dig my 760 charger out and hopefully get it going again too...

sensor size by Marc Aubry, sur Flickr

Kodak AP NC 2000 (e) Pro with a sensor (16.4x 20.5mm) = 1.5X factor
Kodak DCS 410, 420 with a sensor (9.2x13.8mm) = 2.6X factor
Kodak DCS 460 with a sensor (18.4x27.6 mm) = 1.3X factor

Thanks, so it is an APS-C sensor.

I'm guessing that with the relatively low resolution in a sensor that size, high ISO was a target?

Hi,

The 460? That's APS-H same as all the other Kodak DCS x60 models. It's just the first Gen of it.

Stan

I meant the NC2000, which I'm now an owner of(or will be when it makes its way here from Korea).

Hi,

Ah. I got a little lost there. It was a progression there. Smaller than APS-C, then APS-C a bit later, and finally APS-H. Took a few years.

And then there were generations within both APS-C and H. My 660 was quite a bit better than the 460. And the 760 better than the 660. What I wanted at the end was for Kodak to stick the fourth gen 10 MP APS-H sensor into the F5 based design. But they didn't. The only way to get that sensor was in the Leica DMR. Sigh.

Stan

Well, my NC2000e arrived today and it seems as though someone has beat me to pulling the battery pack out of it.

I've ordered some pigtail leads and 2/3AA batteries to build a pack(along with a cheap spot welder-we'll see how that goes). I've also found references elsewhere to using AAAs in holders to power it, so that might be worth experimenting with too.

I wish I had the original pack as a template to build one(and steal the pigtail off of it) although it looks like it follows the shape of the handle pretty well so I'm just hoping that will guide me correctly.

When I plug the camera in, it lights up the rear LCD but won't seem to do much. The manual seems to describe this behavior when you first plug it in with a completely dead battery, so hopefully that's all I'm seeing...

Great!

Yes, that behavior is normal for a dead battery, for a quick test you can solder a big capacitor in place so the camera thinks the battery is charged.

I had the pigtail but was corroded by a leaky battery and had to replace the entire connector on the mainboard, if you can't get something that goes you can replace it too, is quite easy.

AAAs can be used as well, actually anything that delivers the voltage can work, I have mine running with old cell phone Li-Ions.

I'm not sure exactly what's going on with this one, but at this point it seems a bit defeating.

I built an 8x AAA pack using my fancy new spot welder. I wanted to practice on something lower stakes even though I have some 2/3AAs, as regular Amazon brand AAAs are quite a bit less expensive. Of course too the pack was a lot easier to stack such that it would fit in the grip section.

I tried to plug the camera in and let it guide me as to the pinout on the pigtail. Just for reference, the pigtails I'm using are red, black, and yellow with red in the same position as the stock one, black in the center(white on stock), and yellow on the other side(black on stock). I was measureing ~6V across both yellow-red and yellow-black with the charger plugged in(no battery).

My AAAs are fully charged, and I measure 10.4V on the built pack(at the pigtail). I did red to positive and yellow to negative, plugged it in. The camera gives me no response with a battery plugged in. Plugging the power supply in gives me the same everything flashing, etc. as I described above.

I've tried a few other wiring possibilities. Finally too I just tried connecting a bench PSU to a spare pigtail. I can't get any sign of life out of the camera when I do that, and the PSU doesn't register as drawing any current.

What am I missing here?

One thing that did cross my mind is I'm wondering if it's supposed to draw ~6V(or 4.8V) on one of the taps to power the camera body. If that's the case, can I get around that temporarily by just dropping AAs in the body? I have...well probably a few...N90s and N8008s around here(I think both use the same AA holder) so that's no issue for me to do at least to test things out.

Mine didn't need no extra taps, only positive and gnd, i'm actually running it with li-ions and there are no taps where would be on the original ni-cd.

Original batteries have a third pin and it recall is used for something I cannot recall what it is but is there.

Also fully disassembling the back is not hard and a good idea to check for corrosion and any other thing out of the normal, also measure the fuses and regulators. to ensure you got power where you should.