INTRODUCING THE FAUX POWER PACK FOR DEAD TURBOS and TURBO Z's
For twenty years I worked on the Quantum Turbos, re-building the batteries, testing them and fixing glitches.  For every Nikon, Canon and Metz flash I received, I got the additional note asking what to do with a Quantum TURBO that's got electrical and/or battery problems. The answer is nothing. Nothing that I can do. Let me explain why.

With all the electronics inside placed next to the battery thats heats to 130 degrees in the 2+2, the electronics toast. They will eventually go bad. This is common to all Quantum's.  The vinyl case may hold moisture adding to the problem.  The SLA's don't last forever when not on trickle, they will sulfate. NiMH are not much better, with a lot shorter shelf and use life than advertised. 

I  have opened them and the date codes go back to the 80's on some. That's how old some are that          were purchased on ebay. Especially from pawn shop operations. Costs for repairs are not cheap.

According to Quantum, the repair costs are as follows: $86 for a new battery, $81 for an upgraded board, some have more than one and a new panel is $59.  I will make a very profound statement. If the pack is bad and you really need the High Voltage side for the Quantum T series, send it back to Quantum for a rebuild for 200 dollars rather than buy a used one for the same 250.00 on eBay. You'll know what you got, on eBay sometimes all you get is a story. 

Electronics are different model to model and year to year and these Quantum's are very proprietary, complex and compact.  Quantum does fix them better than any of the gurus on eBay.  After all it's their product. I have fixed my share and they are not for bench players.

THE HOME FOR DISABLED TURBOS:
On the other hand if you have toasted it and have no other calling, you  can send it to me.  We have a Home for the Disabled Turbos.  We are proud to announce the Faux Pack... 

We designed it for those who care what they are wearing at a Wedding.  After all you might be seen by some amateur who has better gear than you do and that drives you nuts.  

No fear! If thats your mentality, you won't be doing weddings long enough to worry. 
As always we listen to a few of our upmanship starved troopers and we have created (like the Phoenix from the ashes)  the FAUX Power

Pack. We took a used Turbo with problems, bad battery, corrosion and bad switches.  Basically a case more than anything. Just didn't want to spend 200 dollars to get it repaired to run our Nikons and Canons.

Simply put, after you remove everything, it makes a great pencil case for your desk. True pencil collectors can use the discontinued Turbo Z because the tops of the pencils stand out higher. We gutted it with the finesse and surgical experience of our local butcher. We did a complete gut out, used Black shoe polish and Turtle Wax Black chrome to restore the Vinyl used in the Turbo Case.  

Then we are seven ounces lighter and down to two pounds with battery. We installed a new SLA 3.2 battery, a new charger, our own DIN plugs and our switches carefully laid out  to make it appear close to factory. 

We are currently sourcing fireflies for the internal lighting to give the appearance of LED lights but it is their mating season and they told us where to go. So no lights for now....hee hee hee.

Turned out like new and no one noticed the difference at a local camera show.

Unfortunately there was no applause for craftsmanship but we did pass the test. No one knew we were FAUX. Voila! Mon shootierre....  in a half hour I had it running our strobes just like brand new, even better with the faster charger and more reliability. We also dropped 7 ozs. of muscle draining weight, dumped winking, blinking, and nod (the lights of death), and eliminated some  problematic potentials.  Nice way of saying we threw the potentials out the door.  With our charger bringing it to a head in three hours a new pack is born...... with the new QUIZMO light stand adapter we achieved Perfection. Especially with our Perfection bracket.

VIVITAR 285 OWNERS AND FAUX PACKS
And it runs as great with the 285 HV as our other power products do.  Never again be embarrassed by upmanship.  And save 40 dollars when you send us the old pack and the battery clip from the Vivitar so we can make you a cable.  We will convert it to a 8 foot long module idea for light stand with Vivitars. We can do a lot of things with the Vivitars and the old Turbos and we try to save what we can. 

Photo equipment is expensive and who cares what's sitting on a light stand running the extra flash into a umbrella or the newer softboxes. Think for a second you are not concerned with the light going in the softbox it's the light that comes out the DIFFUSED end that you are concerned about.

The white diffusion material of a softbox or the silver or white of an umbrella will widen the spectral light of the You just need a couple of manual Vivitars, Sunpak's, and a couple old Turbos, Ghetto wireless and we'll convert the cable for you if you send them along with your old stuff.

That's a good starter setup to teach you LIGHT which is what this game is all about.  And we'll make you look like you spent the big bucks.  Remember first impressions are so important.  Just ask some of our Congressmen and Senators or even President George W. Bush, he fooled an entire nation.  

I joke a lot about the FAUX pack but it does work very well and recharges super fast. My favorite one now is the TURBO Z, because it takes the Tuxedo battery. The other good part is that there are thousands of those TURBO Z's out there because they got discontinued, they are Ni-Cads, had poor performance and died relatively quickly.  Some of the ones I converted were like brand new, hardly used but DEAD.

Heres the downside:  It depends on how beat up the case is from the original, If the screw holes are rounded, gone or split, or if the seams are splitting open, don't bother. If the case looks good shoe polish and a brush does a good job. Sorry we don't do shoes!

It stated as a joke but has become popular now.  In fact we are adapting one now with a built in R616 radio transmitter as a combo unit....cool. We'll announce how it works when we get one running on a full size Turbo. The "Z" might be a tad small.