# Sunpak Auto 120J with Nikon D300s



## jmtonkin (Oct 12, 2012)

Hey everyone, 

My grandmother was going through her basement tossing out a bunch of things, and she came across a box of my grandfather's old photography stuff.  Knowing that I am into photography, she gave it to me.  It was almost exclusively really old (1980) books, but of more interest, there was a Sunpak Auto 120J flash with cord and a Larson 42"x42" Soffbox.  I was thrilled to get my Nikon SB-900 out and compare!



<The Nikon SB-900 compared to the Sunpak Auto 120J, a snapshot from my phone.>

My question:

I own a Nikon D300s and I'm wondering if there is anyway to use my camera with this flash.  I've done a little internet searching, but didn't really find anything.  I figured that I knew a place where I could ask my question of professionals...

Thanks for your help!


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## pixmedic (Oct 12, 2012)

if your grandfather shot nikon..maybe? you would have to see if the contacts line up from the flash to the hot shoe mount on the camera.  also, there may be some voltage issues using an older flash on a newer camera, but im not familiar with that sort of thing. definitely research it good before sticking it on a camera.


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## tirediron (Oct 12, 2012)

You're not going to get any sort of TTL with it, but as a manual flash it will work just fine.


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## Derrel (Oct 12, 2012)

The Sunpak 120J was considered a VERY GOOD electronic flash. And it still is a good unit, as long as it fires well and the capacitor can hold a charge!!!


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## jmtonkin (Oct 13, 2012)

After doing some research, I decided to give it a go...The flash plugged into my camera nicely, I turned it on, snapped a picture and FLASH!  I was quite excited that after being kept in a box in my grandmother's basement for 10 years that it still worked flawlessly!  

This led me immediately to thinking about the possibilities of having two working flashes! However, after much messing around, I CANNOT for the life of me figure out if it is possible to set the Sunpak up on my camera and use it to trigger my SB-900...It appears that the only thing that will trigger is is my pop-up, but when I have the pop-up open, the Sunpak doesn't fire...Any ideas why the Sunpak will not trigger the SB-900?  I was always under the assumption that any sudden change of light would trigger the flash?  Or is there more to it?  My theory, and I haven't been able to research it yet, is that it is a different type of light, the bulb and the SB-900...


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## Derrel (Oct 13, 2012)

What you need is an optical slave. The SB-900 uses NIKON's proprietary wireless flash triggering system; the Sunpak does not have that feature. Soooo, you'd want an optical slave, which could trigger the 120J when *it* sees a flash pop coming from another flash. The 120J pre-dates the Nikon multi-flash system by multiple years.


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