K50 (K30) aperture control board clarification

Hello everybody,

Here is the case: Ironically after reading the thread regarding K30 pics coming out dark and all discussions related to aperture motor / control board failures... i decided to check my K50 and surprisingly ... I got the same "problem"... Here is the case:

I use K50 mostly with Helios 44 / 58 mm, F2 in live view mode, manual focusing and focus peaking . When i mounted DA18-55 i got dark frames right away after switching the lenses..  I went back and forth few times changing the lenses and the case was steady: no problem with Helios MF in live view, and everything went wrong with DA 18-55 in any mode P,A,S etc with any AF /C/ MF. After playing around for a while it went even worse....  My K50 started erratically doing exposures itself, and i said: yeah that's a real fun.. I had to remove the battery.  Just for reference, my K50 is 2.5 years old and it is not being loaded much with work - just Helios ( i actually bought K50 for that lens - it is that good). Now, the real story - i suspect it is not the failure in most cases, it is the power to the motor / board.

Here is what i did to "fix" my K50:  I tried to charge the original battery and no success.. I have AA batteries adapter and tried to use my older rechargeable NI-MH Energizer AA 2500 mah (4 batteries with adapter) - no success ... I still don't give up.. I take new Sony CycleEnergy 2000 mah AA freshly rechargeable and - bingo!!! My K50 started working again.  However, i think its not just the batteries, cause i did set the camera to do sequence "Hi" and did few series (BTW, sequence "Hi" didn't help with original battery). Anyways, my conclusion is: don't send the camera for repair right away, its obvious that K50 / K30 and maybe even newer KS series inherited this control board which is eventually very sensitive to supplied current (milliamps).  Its interesting that anything else works fine, and one can assume that camera motor / board failed..   Seems that the real problem is the ability of the battery to sustain certain current for certain time, and that original 1060 mah Pentax Lion became no match to Sonys CycleEnergy after only 2.5 years of very light use..

Final Conclusion: use the best available batteries you can afford, even better results might be with 2500 mah 4 batteries and adapter. Thanks for reading this report, hopefully it'll help someone

regards,

alex