We just purchased a Polaroid Instant Camera for our daughters birthday but we don't know if it is going to be of use once the battiers in the flash run out. We paid for this camera and really don't want to keep it if we can't insert more batteries for the flash to work once they run out. Could you please let us know if we can change the batteries and where they go cause in the direction booklet they say nothing about the batteries being replaced.

-- Steven Briggs (sfkckbri@kda.attmil.ne.jp), July 14, 1999

Answers

Well it's not really a digital camera question, but as far as I know Polaroid cameras get new "batteries" every time you put in a new film cartridge. For years now they've been building a flat 6Vdc battery called a Polapulse into their film packs. Unless this has changed for some moronic reason or another, you don't have a problem. On the film packs I've seen over the years there are at least two contacts on the bottom of the film cartridge visible through cutouts in the cartridge.

I hope that helps. By the way, if you have any use for them, those polapulse batteries usually still have a lot of "juice" in them after the film is all gone and are easily removed from the cartridge. They're a very high energy density power source in a very small package. Fun to play with if you like electronics.b

-- Gerald Payne (gmp@francorp.francomm.com), July 14, 1999.