Pentax 645N Not Firing

<p>I recently purchased on eBay a Pentax 645N. It looked pretty new in the box. The only thing it is does not work.</p>

<p>It has a fast 2.8 lens. The batteries are Lithium and new. The battery indicator light blinks no matter how much I clean the battery connections. The battery holder tested as 9v yet flashes.<br>

The camera makes a whine when I press the shutter and then stops, with indicator flashing.<br>

I'd like to see if there is a quick fix.</p>

<p>Thanks! Jim M.</p>

<p>I know the Pentax MZ series have a separate motor just for the mirror, and the gear on it is plastic, shrinks, and then cracks and spins on the shaft. Causes the same sort of symptoms.</p>

<p>Two choices. Return it for refund. Or pay <a href="http://www.pentaxs.com">Eric Hendrickson</a> to repair it. Risk of the latter course is that it's not repairable.</p>

<p>I'd send it back unless it was a "as-is" item. </p>

IIRC, with an insert installed, you've got to have film loaded in the P645N. You can't dry fire it without an flashing error code otherwise.

Fixed it:

Sorry for the delay of a year or so! I took the film rewind hole at the bottom and put a pen tip inside to force it to "rewind". After this I put film in, the ERR error went away and I was shooting fine. I've since fixed a friend's camera the same way.