2013Batteries/Power forum
Powering camera sled from monitor battery using P-Tap cables and battery plate adapters
13 years old. Gear and prices may have changed since.
DisputedParticipants disagreed and reached no conclusion. Read the findings as positions, not as an answer.
What the thread found
- A monitor battery can be connected to a camera sled's third battery position using a P-Tap to P-Tap cable, allowing the monitor and sled to share power from a single battery source.
- Connecting through the D-Tap port on a sled may cause power to backfeed into the monitor battery due to the sled's unified power distribution system, whereas connecting through the actual battery plate input pins avoids this issue.
- Using a diode in the battery plate on the monitor side can prevent unwanted power backflow when using cable adapters to redistribute battery positions for weight balance.
- On certain systems, the monitor power connector can backfeed power to the sled's front battery position, allowing operation with the center battery plate empty.
- When using multiple batteries in parallel through this configuration, batteries should be of similar age and charge state unless a diode is installed to prevent imbalanced charging.
- P-Tap to P-Tap connections between two battery plates, where only one has an actual battery installed, do not require a diode because there is no battery on the unpowered plate to backfeed.
Depends on
- Configuration details vary between different sled models and battery block systems.
- The backfeed issue behavior appears system-dependent and may not occur in all equipment configurations.
- One participant mentioned experiencing unwanted power routing but accepted it as acceptable despite using the setup for multiple years.
- Recommendations for diode installation were suggested but not confirmed as tested by all participants.
- The discussion focuses on older equipment from 2013 and specific proprietary systems that may no longer be in common use.