A few weeks ago I was shooting a wedding in extremely high temperatures. I noticed that my flash smelled pretty hot at times, even when we got in to the air conditioning.

Now, I notice this every time I use the SB-600. Today it started to smell hot after only 50 or so shots.

I didn't have this problem at all last year, even in hot temps, and I'm not using the flash any differently. Does anyone know if this is a sign of the speedlight going bad or if there's something I can do to stop it? I'm just sure one of these days I'm going to have a flaming flash on top of my D300.

Just be warned that if the capacitor blows up during use, it will be in close proximity to your face/forehead.

And I'm not shitting you or trying to flame (no pun intended) Nikon gear.

Maybe time to invest in a new flash.... play it safe and replace this one before something dangerous happens.

I definately wouldn't take the chance or liability over this flash doing something crazy. SB600's are only $150 bucks now. I would either replace it, or send this one back to Nikon. In fact, Nikon probably would like to take a look at it anyway.

Thanks for the feedback! I have 2 other Nikon speedlights so retiring this one isn't a big deal. I was just trying to figure out what happened that's causing the "melting plastic" smell.

(disclaimer, I've noticed no actual melting plastic although the plastic in front of the actual "flash" gets amazingly hot)

I had a mono light that was emitting a "burnt plastic" smell and then it started making a crackling noise. Before I could unplug it the capacitor blew up shooting pieces of the case all over. Thank god my clients weren't in the room.

This doesn't sound like it ends well. Def. replace it.

I have a metz 58 flash sometimes it really smells like burning plastic. what happens to me is, it will occasionally get stuck in the widest zoom position (closest to the front of the flash) so when I'm banging away I will notice the smell if I'm back lit like I was a couple weeks ago people I was shooting saw smoke as it was firing. my solution has been to keep track if where the head is and if gets stuck I have figures out little tricks to make it go down again.

Do you flash much when you use it?
Using flashes at high-output rapidly causes them to overheat and Ive seen in some instance the plastic freshnal lens on the front of the flash tube melt or yellow.