I have an M5 I purchased in December of 2014 it came with the transport case and I've probably used it a total of 15 times. I just went on a shoot today and it's not turning on. No green LED's, nothing. I have checked everywhere and have not found any instances of this happening before aside from possibly an overheating issue. It was in the trunk of my car for approx 2 hours today but it was not in any kind of oppressive heat (it was 76 here in SC today and I was parked in the shade). I checked all my connection seatings and everything seems to be tight, including unscrewing the on/off switch panel and checking behind there. I have another shoot tomorrow and am in desperate need of your help. Has anyone else had this issue?
Taylor do you a lipo battery checker? Sounds like the batteries may have slowly discharged if they were not used for a long period of time. Put them on the charger and see if they will take a charge. Also make sure that you are plugging in the battery with correct polarity. Plus to plus (red to red wire). The connector does have a 'key' but I have seen on occasion someone who forced the connection and had the polarity reversed.
Thanks so much for getting back to me Gary. I will get a lipo battery checker, is there a specific one (possibly on amazon) that you'd recommend? Also, I have used both batteries in the last 2 days and both were working fine. I will try tomorrow morning to recharge the 2 batteries I have. Is there any indicators on the the movie battery charger that would tell me if anything is wrong. I'm sure I haven't reversed the polarities.
Only indication are these two, from the manual 8. The charge status LED and the cell status LED will light constant red. The cell 1-4 LED’s will glow continuously indicating a 4 cell battery pack. 9. When the battery is fully charged, the “charge status” LED will glow constant green. At Amazon do a search for Lipo Checker. Integy has some simple ones or you can get one of the 'more' expensive ones at $10 or so like the Neewer or TomTop.
If you may have accidentally left the power switch "on", your battery would probably have drained over a long period. I recommend unplugging the red lipo JST connector when not in use just to avoid an accidental movement of the switch... such as transporting or maybe putting in or getting out of the case.
Taylor: Check in your neighborhood -- if there is a hobbyshop they may well have a LiPo battery checker so you could check the batteries immediately. If you're going over to the hobbyshop, take both batteries as they might able to test them on the spot and they may even have some new batteries if it turns out that your batteries have indeed died -- you might need to change the M5 connector (EDIT: See posting below), but they may even be able to help you do that. At what voltage did you store your batteries? Fully charged? Half charged? Andy.
Let me clarify: When I say the "M5 connector" I mean to put a small two-pin (usually red) "JST" connector on the new LiPo batteries if you end up needing to buy them -- that's the connector on the LiPo that connects to the M5. Andy.
FWIW, late 2014 I had a temporary issue with the power switch on the M5. I had t take it out reset the wires on it, sacrifice a chicken and put it back in. The switch would not close the circuit and nothing was coming out from the in. I've been meaning to get another from FF.