Help!!! My virtually "indestructable" wein slave doesn't always fire.

Question

I can't seem to get it to go all the time. Could it be defective? Sometimes it will not even work right in front of my flash!

Answer 1

May be dying. Things do that - even Wein slaves.

Have you cleaned the contacts lately?

Use the eraser on a regular pencil.

Answer 2

I've had that problem with slaves as well.  It's most likely not broken.

It's more than likely a flash duration issue.  By this I mean that the length of time the flash is on, is too long.  Slaves are triggered by a very short duration of light.  Sometimes when the flash is used at too high of a setting, the duration is too long.  Try powering down your flash (the one that's triggering the slave) & see if it fires.  It should... if the slave is functioning.  Next, try it with the flash (non-slaved) at full power.  Let me know if this does or doesn't work...