The ever-resourceful team over at Lens Rentals recently released their Teardown of the Canon EOS R5 Mirrorless Camera and decided to dive deeper into it and investigate the overheating reports. Roger and the team used a Thermal camera to see exactly how hot the R5 can get after it’s been on and in use for various durations of time, and if you look into their full blog post, you’ll see it can get much hotter than you’d expect.
The big thing they theorized about after the teardown was with all the weather sealing and hardware crammed into the body, that heat dispersion would be a real problem, and they weren’t wrong. While the system could hold up nicely when heated up to 180°F, it took 10minutes or more for it to come back down to the ambient room temperature of about 73°F.
Under general use, they found that the system warmed up a little which is normal when recording video on dslr and mirrorless systems, but things got much more “heated” nearing the end of the 15 minute cut off marks of the system where the exterior of the camera would heat up to nearly 104°F! Things got noticeably hotter for the memory card slot after the firmware update that extended the recording time. Roger and the team recorded temperatures as high as 134.8°F which is hot enough to potentially cause 3rd degree burns with a few seconds of skin contact!
After the teardown and this test, it doesn’t seem that there’s much Canon can do to fix the potential overheating issues, especially if you’re shooting 8k with this device on the regular. If you’re looking to shoot video at that level as the main use of the camera, it might be in your best interest to invest in a proper dedicated video camera, as applying workarounds and external cooling units may end up voiding the warranty and even breaking the system entirely. Be sure to check out the full blog post from Lens Rentals with all the details here.
As of putting this post together, it appears that Canon has made an official statement/comment on the overheating as reported by Canon Watch. Read the full interview here, or check out some of the exchange below;
Johnnie – CineD: The Canon EOS R5 is already shipping and there is no doubt that the camera is a technical marvel. What led Canon to introduce this product and don’t you think that introducing such an 8K mirrorless camera is a bit too early?
Katsuyuki Nagai-san – Canon: Someone has to be first, right?
[…]
Johnnie – CineD: Both cameras suffered from overheating issues in video recording and more than that, long recovery times. By introducing the latest firmware update, it seems as if Canon is trying to overcome some of those issues by allowing longer recording and shorter recovery waiting times (until the camera can film again). What exactly is causing those cameras to overheat and what’s the new FW doing in order to help here?Katsuyuki Nagai-san – Canon: I think we should look at the fundamentals of the whole topic to give a better perspective. The cameras feature cutting edge features squeezed into compact bodies designed to offer weather resistance.
This is where we come to the first of the two governing factors that affect the cameras when it comes to overheating. Holding a very warm object for an extended period has the potential to result in what is known as low temperature burns. Secondary is to protect the internal components of the camera from the overheating. We limit how hot the external body of the camera can get to protect users, which is one of the causes of overheat shutdown. Some heat management must also be applied to ensure the camera continues to operate.
Have you used this camera yet? Are or Were you planning on getting one? Do the comments from Canon or the Teardown/Heating investigation from Lens Rentals impact that decision at all? Let us know in the comments below.
Check Pricing & Availability of the Canon EOS R5 Mirrorless Camera Here;
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