EOS R5 II Weather Sealing is Garbage

[mikerigney]

I've had the R5ii for about a month now. I got up at 2am in Alaska to pre-order on the day it was released to make sure I got it as soon as I could. I've been shooting with the R5 for about 2 years, almost exclusively for wildlife photography. I've shot in all conditions - rain, snow, on small boats with ocean spray. The only issue I ever had was the eyepiece fogs (which is quite annoying). I finally used the R5ii in some decent rain yesterday and treated it as I do my R5. I have a rain cover and only expose the camera when shooting. I'm not meticulous about keeping it dry but I try. The camera performed well throughout the day with no issues until I got home later. I wiped it down and an hour later went to review photos on the back of the camera. It wouldn't turn on. I opened the battery compartment and noticed the battery had water on it and there was water in the battery compartment after I took the battery out. Not a lot, but definitely moisture inside. I left the door open and let it dry next to my dehumidifier and after a few hours tried a different battery. Luckily the camera turned on, but it flashed the dead battery icon even though it was a full battery. I decided to just let it dry out overnight and popped open the card door. Also moisture. The following day after de-humidifying I loaded a fresh battery, card, and the camera booted up no problem. I then went to take photos and when I half pressed the shutter for pre-capture, it started taking photos. I turned it off and back on again and at that point it went into pre-capture mode (filling buffer with pre-capture icon visible) when I wasn't even toughing the shutter. Half press starts taking photos.

It is insane to me that I paid $4300 for a pro-level camera that can't take a little rain and was able to get 3 separate weather sealing areas of the camera (that I know about so far). I will now have to replace or repair the camera through CarePak. Will the repair or replacement be at all weather proof? Will I have to worry about my camera working any time I encounter weather? I've just lost a lot of faith in this system. Other than that it's a phenomenal camera. What a shame. 

[sanyuan]

I, too, had my misadventure with my R5m2. It was the first snow at Yosemite and I was excited shooting away. Soon afterwards, my mode button no longer works. It was not really that wet with the snow. I had been in much more serious conditions with my R5 and R cameras before and had no issues with moisture. Sent the camera in to Canon Service thinking it was a warranty issue. The technician called me with bad news that moisture was detected around the dial on top of the camera the dial that use to adjust F/stop. And it caused the a circuit short. NOT COVERED under warranty. I did not buy Carepack, even though I bought it less than 90 days ago. $400 damage. 
this underscores the problem with weather seal capabilities of this camera model. So be careful with rain out there with is model. Don’t make the same expensive mistake that I did. 

[mikerigney]

Update: After my original misadventure I never had a good window to send the camera in, and it appeared to be working normally. I had trips to Africa, Mexico, South America, Antarctica back to back to back to back and yeah, I definitely should have sent it in for evaluation somehow but didn't. So I get down to South Orkney Islands in the Southern Ocean, and am leading a little 3ish mile hike. It's raining very lightly. To the point where I didn't even THINK about my camera hanging on a strap as I hiked. There wasn't a ton of wildlife to photograph and I barely used it. When getting back to the landing there were some cute Adelie penguins so decided to take a few shots. Battery icon was flashing red - weird. Swapped in a new battery, also flashing red, then it died completely. Crap. Got back to the ship, tried one more fresh battery and nothing. The camera would never turn on again. Put it in a dehumidifying cabinet for a week, and nothing. Luckily I had my old R5 as a second body and that got me through the next couple weeks in Antarctica. When I got back to the US I had one night before heading back to Mexico and shipped it in to Canon. I have CPS Gold and Carepak, so shipping and repair was free. After evaluation the diagnosis was a corroded main board. They replaced the board, back and top covers and had it shipped within a week. Unfortunately I was out of the country so could not get the camera for another month. Just got it back yesterday. In total I was without that body for about 2 months due to its failure from another light rain. I'm hoping that the back and top cover replacement fixed an issue with my specific camera's weather sealing, and this is not an issue with all R5ii bodies. The worst part was being surrounded by OM Systems shooters bragging that this never would have happened with their cameras. OM freaking Systems. Humiliating.