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Equipment DIY

Yongnuo RF-603N Camera Hotshoe Modification

I received a set of Yongnuo RF-603N radio frequency triggers today. They are low cost, yet decent quality flash and camera triggers available online. While I like them for their small size and general reliability, not all is perfect. There was an odd design omission related to the shoe connection that is generally used when connecting one of the transceivers to a camera.

I haven’t found the exact cable ties online, but you can check out my links to Amazon and Walmart for similar ones.

You can see my related video about this here.

Here is a quick modification to help Yongnuo RF-603N triggers stay stationary on the camera. These units don’t offer a locking mechanism for the shoe connection, which could be an issue in the field if the unit gets misaligned or pushed off the camera. Using a ziptie (cable ties) of the proper thickness seem to add more vertical force to keep things in place. The specific ones I used were GE 51213 8″ Cable Ties made by Jasco (K223 on the tie itself) and the camera was a Nikon D7000.

As you can see, the trigger in its default configuration has a large gap and no way of using clamping force to secure the trigger. With the trigger just by itself, it might not be as much of an issue, but put a flash on there and expect things to be a problem.

The cable tie was luckily the right thickness so that pulling the trigger off of the camera is more difficult, but not impossible. It provides some force upward and downward to help keep everything where it should be in general use.

I have yet to test them out in practice, but I have a feeling that this will do the trick. Most bumps the triggers might experience as I use the camera(s) shouldn’t be enough force to cause issues with the cable tie in place.

I haven’t found the exact cable ties online, but you can check out my links to Amazon and Walmart for similar ones.