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Sharp VL-Z3 Dew Repair
Posted by Bill under How-Tos, News
Back in 2004 I posted about how hard it was to find the manual for my Sharp VL-Z3 MiniDV camera on the Sharp website, and how much better the Canadian branch of the Sharp corporate machine was at providing that kind of information. It’s now time to add a little bit more to the Sharp info pile: here’s a confirmed fix for the deadly “Sharp VL-Z DEW Message” problem.
On just about any video camera out there, you will occasionally see a “DEW” warning in the viewfinder when the sensors think there’s too much humidity present for normal operations. The Sharp VL-Z series cameras can take this to an illogical extreme: the dew sensor goes nuts and it always thinks there’s too much humidity for normal operations. Thankfully, there’s a solution to this issue and it does not involve boxing up your camera and sending it in for repair… If you’ve got a soldering iron and the realization that you’ve nothing to lose, you can repair your camera in about two minutes. It worked for me!
UPDATE - An unseen side-effect of my “fix”… my standby function no longer works! I left my camera in the on position after playing a video, and when I came back 5 hours later my camera was hot to the touch and wouldn’t even load a tape. Buyer beware!
UPDATE - Bollocks! My dew warning has come back, and I’m shopping for a new camera. (January 14 2008)
2 Responses to “Sharp VL-Z3 Dew Repair”
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December 12, 2007 -
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April 26th, 2008 at 8:57 pm
Thanks a lot Bill. My VL-Z3 cam was left forgotten and useless somewhere because of the damn DEW message which powers the cam off even under the hair dryer blow… Well I said to my self lets try the web. I found your page and as u said : got nothing to loose lets do it ! I noticed that the two solder joints in my cam where perfectly soldered with no excess flux. So, before following the suggested soldering instructions I decided to just insert a small screw driver tip between the two solder points and carefully turn the tip like separating both solder points. That´s all. Put the batteries back and the DEW message WAS GONE!
The camera revived like miracle.
Thanks Bill
Carlos
May 24th, 2008 at 9:29 pm
Bill:
I repaired my DEW problem with your help. Thanks! It still comes back but leaving the tape cover open with the tape ejected for a few minutes usually fixes it. Now I have another HUGE problem I am hoping you have an answer to. I was filming on a very sunny day yesterday and the camera went black. There seemed to be no power anymore. I plugged in the AC adaptor and still there was no power. The battery charge light does not litght red. I can not eject the tape. It is without any power. Have any ideas for me? Thanks - Wendy