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Looking forward to following this thread, OP. Goonspeed. 
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Sep 16, 2018 21:00
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Wonder if powdered graphite would be okay in an application like that. I suppose it wouldn’t gum things up/attract dust, but it might get into the guts and onto the elements(?).
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Sep 21, 2018 02:39
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Been cruising ebay for a cheap project lens (~$25). I wish KEH’s outlet provided some info on the AS-IS stuff. It’d be nice to know if something is salvageable or just plain junk.
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Sep 23, 2018 18:23
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I’ve recently picked up a used Sigma 70-300 DG for $10 with a busted autofocus. When mounted on my 7D the AF points through the viewfinder flicker, as does the focus drive indicator text on the LCD on top of the body. The lens is very clean and the mount and contacts area look brand spanking new—no corrosion or even wear marks that I can see whatsoever. Is there a way to home diagnose something like this? If it’s not something I can sort out on my own then I’ll just resell. It’s not exactly a high end lens...
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Oct 10, 2018 22:56
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Sauer posted:Flicker constantly with a regular frequency or only when you move it a certain way? A regular repeating flicker might be a defective IC or timing circuit which could be home repairable if you're handy with miniature electronics repair and parts are available. If it only flickers if you handle it a certain way there might be a corroded or lose connector inside the lens somewhere; or a tin whisker. Same deal though, are you handy with a multi-meter and can go hunting for intermittent continuity? Does the lens work normally aside from flickering? Just for the hell of it you can give the contacts a quick buffing with a pencil eraser but if they look like they're in good condition the problem probably isn't there. Consistent flickering, no change after zooming, jiggling, tapping, etc. Aside from the AF issue the lens works fine. Aperture adjusts as it should. Thanks for chiming in. You’ve given me some directions to look in.
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Oct 11, 2018 00:16
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Blackhawk, I notice that you wisely put the controls back in place after taking the top cover off your SRT. I was elbows deep into my SRT 202 the other day, and I didn't do that. I was just about to put the prism back in place when I tilted the camera juuuust so. The little pulley that usually resides under the rewind know slipped off its spindle, taking a tangle of string with it. Of course I didn't note how it all was supposed to go together, as I didn't plan on monkeying around with that stuff--I don't think I've ever uttered such a pathetic and defeated sound. After some desperate googling, I found a few images and illustrations that gave me a very basic understanding of how to re-route the string. It was such a pain in the rear end, but I eventually got everything back into place... On a lighter note, I purchased an SRT 100 of my own for ten bucks on eBay the other day. It's in nice shape, but it did come with two issues: 1) The little blank insert that's installed where the shutter speed scale usually goes on the higher-end models had come loos, and was partially obscuring the viewfinder. After pulling the prism out, I was able to reaffix it using a few small dabs of super glue. Easy as pie! Before:  The offending item:   After:  2) The mirror also wasn't returning to the down position after firing the shutter. After consulting Mike Willegal's very useful SRT repair page, I learned that there's a little lug on a gear on the bottom of the body that's supposed to strike the mirror return lever. Apparently the associated gear train is prone to sticking, and this common issue can be fixed with a bit of lubrication. I removed the two screws that hold the bottom cover off and added a drop of oil where Mike's webpage indicated (my photo):  I tried a shutter actuation, and the camera now works like new! I've been inside of a handful of SRTs over the past few weeks, and I've found that the cameras aren't too bad to work on. Anytime I've found myself in trouble, I've been able to find resources online where someone's outlined the process I'm trying to figure out. It's very cool to be able to bring of of these things back into fighting shape. President Beep fucked around with this message at 22:41 on Nov 13, 2018 |
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Nov 12, 2018 16:52
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Blackhawk posted:Does your mirror return at all shutter speeds? Mine always works at 1/60 or above but works less frequently as the shutter speed goes down. I lubed the gears that you mentioned but it didn't make a huge difference. Nice work on the repair though! I also had the pulley and string come off and I almost gave up hope when it happened but figured it out eventually too. The camera works beautifully now, shutter speeds were way too fast initially but they're fairly close to correct now. Yep, returns at all speeds. When yours still sticks, are you able to manually trip the return via the little lever that the lug hits? If not, then the page I referenced says to look elsewhere for problems. I look back and laugh now about the pulley and string coming off, but the feeling at the time was dreadful. In hindsight, once I did get it back in place it seemed pretty straightforward... pseudorandom posted:Just a comment, in an effort to set a precedent for the thread: in order to help avoid the Wisdom of the Ancients problem, I'd like to suggest re-hosting and including resources like the "few images and illustrations" that helped you re-route the string. That's a very good suggestion. I'm going to make some edits to my original post.
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Nov 13, 2018 16:21
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Hoo, boy. Not sure what the deal could be there. Could something dragging the shutter mechanism be affecting the gear speed/force? I assume the former somehow regulates the latter.
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Nov 13, 2018 20:09
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Trying to take apart a Vivitar 28mm f/2.5 lens to get some fungus off of the inside of the front element, but the group won’t come apart. Looks like the drat thin’s been soldered together. Before I throw caution to the wind and take a hot iron to it, does anyone have any additional input? There’s a similar plug on the other side, and the metal is very soft.
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Nov 23, 2018 16:49
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Ah, cool. Thanks a bunch. I’ll try that first. There’s only the one ring on the outside, but there is another on the inside of the assembly, beneath the front element. That’s what leads me to think that it can further come apart. I’ll post results (good or bad!)
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Nov 23, 2018 18:14
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You were right! Put some acetone around the top joint and it eventually popped loose. Held the ring with my spanner, gripped the rest of the assembly in my left hand, and twisted like hell. Pretty sure those two bits I pointed out before are solder, as some scraping reveals soft metal, bit they hold something in further down, where I don’t need to access.  
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Nov 23, 2018 19:43
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Hi, fellow DIY goons. I’ll soon be taking delivery of a Bessa I folder, and some of the leatherette is deteriorated, so I’d like to replace it all. So far though I’ve not been able to find pre-cut replacement pieces anywhere. Anyone have experience in cases like this? Can one buy bulk sheets and cut them to fit? Self-adhering is preferred, I suppose, as I have no experience working with material like this. President Beep fucked around with this message at 17:38 on Dec 30, 2018 |
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Dec 30, 2018 17:32
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The old handbag route is a great idea. Thanks as well for the heads up on the shellac. I was initially thinking of using 3M contact adhesive. What’s the practical advantage of shellac?
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Jan 1, 2019 09:55
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Wonder if a warmed up putty knife or similar implement would help to peel off the old stuff. Not hot enough to mess up the camera itself, but maybe just enough heat to get the shellac a bit gummy. I’d assume that any chemicals like acetone would ruin the leatherette.
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Jan 3, 2019 20:20
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Landed a yashica mat in nice condition, and everything seems to be working, except for the shutter cocking mechanism. The shutter cocks manually just fine upon removal, but it’s almost like the throw on the automatic cocking lever that’s connected to the crank set is juuuust a bit too short to fully cycle the shutter and cock it. I’ve tried tweaking both the lever and the little receiving cocking tab on the lens, but no luck so far. It either causes interference with the body, or stuff gets too skewed to engage. The camera was only 55 bucks, and I really don’t want to spring for a CLA, especially since everything else seems to be working just fine. I might try to shim it. God drat thing...
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Jan 26, 2019 04:39
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Follow up: Some cleaning, slight tweaking of linkages, and careful application of some light oil to the cocking lever pivot in the shutter has brought this thing into seemingly good working condition. I couldn’t get the old leatherette off in one piece, so I’ve got a replacement front cover on the way. Now to run some film through it!
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Jan 27, 2019 16:51
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Oh, cool. Same variant, right down to the adjustment dials. f/3.2 viewing lens?
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Jan 27, 2019 18:01
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Ah, I think that’d put it just a bit newer than mine then. According to some hand notation I found on the back of the shutter I think mine was made in ‘68.
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Jan 27, 2019 18:19
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Dang, that homemade front cover doesn’t look too bad! It’s too bad you’ll have to take it back off to fix the aperture adjustment wheel.
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Apr 3, 2019 01:26
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Hoo boy. I’m constantly having to gently caress with my yashica mat shutter, so it’s not just you. It’ll randomly decide to stick once in a while but work like a charm most of the time. I had a similar cocking issue. Ended up tweaking the tiny receiving lever on the shutter a bit so that the cocking arm linkage could push it down far enough. If the crank is able to fully cycle its arm then I don’t know what else you could do to improve that mechanism. Fair warning: if you try and “adjust” the arm that acts on the intermediate linkage between it and the shutter, you’ll have to be careful, because it’s really easy to gently caress it up so that it’ll jump out of alignment and not interface correctly. The way it has to sweep down on the receiving linkage without any sort of guidance at the area of interface means that there’s lots of opportunity for problems. I’m kind of a cheapskate, so I don’t want to spring for a CLA, but I also get why people online often suggest that right off the bat—these goddamn things are really temperamental.
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Apr 3, 2019 09:44
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pseudorandom posted:This sounds like pretty much the same issue I'm having. I made a video to try to show what's going on, since explaining it via text seems kind of difficult: Just got around to watching this. You should be able to rotate the crank further, which will actually allow the cocking arm to complete its downward travel and then come back up again as you continue to turn the handle clockwise. If/when you get that resolved, a bit of light oil in the cocking mechanism in the shutter might help too—it improved mine.
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Apr 5, 2019 01:09
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Ah, okay. Sounds like you are able to cycle it then. I tried doing some half asses shimming too, but I didn’t have any luck. Tweaking the arm on the shutter itself and oiling its little gear train are what fixed it for me. It’s so goddamn finicky. As I’ve already mentioned ITT, I wish I’d gotten a model with a manually cocked shutter instead. Regarding bending the cocking arm that’s connected to the crank, I didn’t have any trouble there. It didn’t help, but it handled bending okay. Just regular steel, not cast or anything.
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Apr 5, 2019 01:36
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Oh, man. A good, sharp pair of angled tweezers are super handy in a case like that.
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May 3, 2019 00:56
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I goofed up the helical orientation on an old manual focus prime once. Got it back together in the end but there was a huge “oh, poo poo” moment where I kind of just froze for a few seconds, looking at the suddenly disassembled lens pieces in my hands.
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May 3, 2019 02:21
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God dammit. My X-700 crapped out. Advance lever jammed and the meter lights would go as soon as I’d depress the shutter release button. Did some reading online and pretty much every resource I found made it sound like my experience was a classic failed capacitor scenario. Great, I thought, I’ll pick some up and swap them out. No biggie. Went for the easier bottom capacitor first. No improvement. Delved into the top one, thinking that would be the solution. Nope! Still no luck. I then carefully cocked the shutter by sliding it to the left with my fingers. After that I was able to move the advance lever. As soon as I’d try and fire it it the lever jams all over again. poo poo! I really don’t want to tear this thing down to the bare bones, but I can only imagine that for some reason when the shutter is cocked via the advance lever that it’s setting the camera up for a fail state. The shutter moves easily when I reset it with my fingers, but it definitely drags when cycling the advance lever. Thinking back, I was having some weird shutter drag show up once every roll or so... Am I gonna have to strip this thing down? Other than this problem it’s in really nice shape, and I like the camera, but holy poo poo does tearing it down far enough to inspect the rollers and whatnot look like a pain in the rear end. 
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May 11, 2019 03:48
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I probably will tear into it, sharing my misadventures here. In the meantime, I’ve got an SRT-201 on the way. I’ve got some nice SR glass and a macro bellows that I haven’t even used yet, so I don’t want to abandon this ecosystem, but I I want something bulletproof and mechanical. The X-700 looks brand new, and I’m mega bummed that it crapped out. The program and aperture priority modes were great.
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May 11, 2019 16:47
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What’s the second shutter curtain up to? There’s a little spring loaded striker under the bottom plate that thwacks a pawl attached to a gear in order to complete the exposure cycle. If that mechanism is dried out/sticky then it can’t produce enough striking force so things lock up. Maybe try a bit of light oil there? That part’s been discussed ITT, I think by me, so you may find some useful links upthread.
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Jun 2, 2019 22:17
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Cool. Sounds like you’ve definitely narrowed it down. A battery unfortunately won’t help though, as the SRTs are all fully mechanical—battery powers the meter only.
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Jun 3, 2019 17:34
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I’ve got a 50mm f/1.4 Rokkor X with some fungus inside the front element. The thing that sucks about these lenses is that the front group is sealed, making it impossible to open up without also destroying it. I know of various ways to treat the lens to at least mitigate the infestation (heat, desiccants, etc.), but what I’m more interested in is if anyone knows a way to remove the physical traces of the fungus. The poo poo’s totally safe from being physically removed. While the group is sealed in my experience with similar lenses it isn’t watertight—is there anything effective I can soak it in that will easily evaporate without leaving residue behind? Goddamn cheap manufacturing processes...
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Nov 17, 2019 18:33
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Yeah, getting the front group out is easy. It’s at that point that progress stops though. What appears to be the two front elements are forever crimped together in a housing so you can’t access the inner surfaces. You can’t further tear it down like with the older Rokkors.
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Nov 17, 2019 19:01
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Just imagining the “ploop” sound it made as it went in. Must’ve been a great look on your face too.
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Nov 23, 2019 12:42
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Past fuckup aside, that ring should come off if you’re careful with the spanner, and as long as the front group isn’t some sealed abomination like what I was dealing with upthread you’ll be able to remove the fungus with some gentle cleaning. Whether or not the coatings are hosed up is another matter though. It’s something I’d personally take a chance on, given what you say about rarity and price, but it’s definitely a crap shoot to some degree. You could end up with a totally rehabilitated lens, one that’s clean but with compromised coatings, or it could even turn out that the group isn’t physically serviceable. I also suggest doing some reading online/searching youtube to see if you can find any teardowns.
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Dec 21, 2019 20:44
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CodfishCartographer posted:So I stumbled onto this youtube channel recently, Daito Camera: youtube.com/user/daitocamera/videos Nice. Gonna check him out. Just today I watched a video from Japan about an old Konica P&S and with autotranslated subtitles on it was actually pretty easy to follow. e: Holy poo poo. This guy's prolific. President Beep fucked around with this message at 20:46 on Jan 7, 2020 |
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Jan 7, 2020 20:43
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I had a 40mm Hexanon pancake apart earlier today. Had to reset the focus ring to correctly reference infinity and it was a snap compared to the Rokkors I usually delve into. On those if you’re off a bit reassembling the helical you’ve got to start over. On the Hexanon you just loosen three little screws and turn the focus ring until the marks are correctly set.
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Jan 12, 2020 03:27
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I’d also like to take this opportunity to say that I have quite a few successes under my belt tearing into and then reassembling prime lenses, but my record with zooms is still something like 0-3.
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Jan 12, 2020 03:31
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In the end that’s where I’m at too. The old ones are pretty crappy in general, and I’m disinclined to start taking apart AF lenses.
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Jan 12, 2020 05:10
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I’ve always wondered if you really need a specific cocktail to clear up a fungus infestation. You’d think all sorts of different chemicals would do the trick—you’re just trying to wipe out a little organism. Hell, I bet window cleaner would work fine. I can’t imagine fungus tolerating that. Now that I’ve shared my brilliant and infallible wisdom I do have a problem I’m trying to sort out: The light meter in my SR-T 202 isn’t working. When I turn the switch to BC the needle snaps right down where it’s supposed to, but it doesn’t budge from it’s up position when switched on. Do the photosensitive cells themselves ever die, or might I have a circuit problem? I’ve read anecdotes online claiming that the cells last forever, so I’m hoping it’s a corroded connection or something...
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Apr 30, 2020 03:10
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CodfishCartographer posted:I'd guess it's a faulty connection between the needle and the light meter itself, yeah. Does the other needle move when adjusting shutter speed or aperture? The SRT series has a very fragile cord that connects the controls to the light meter needle, and I've heard if you adjust the shutter speed too quickly the cord can come off its railings and lose tension. Not sure if that's connected to the light meter needle itself, but could be possible. Yep. The needle connected to shutter speed moves well. I’ll start looking for a bad connection somewhere.
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Apr 30, 2020 13:44
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Quick follow-up: Sure enough, a soldered connection had come loose on top of the prism. Reattached it and the meter works great now. Unfortunately, when I had the top plate off all of the pulleys and strings and poo poo immediately exploded, so I spent a few hours suffering through that secondary repair. loving hell, messing with that stuff is not fun.
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Apr 30, 2020 20:57
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| # ¿ May 17, 2024 01:53 |
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Alright, I’m stumped on something here. My dad gave me his old Hi-Matic GF that he’s had ever since I was a kid, and it’s in very nice shape, except the screw that fastens the rewind crank to the spindle has been missing for decades. Any of the other Minolta bodies I have kicking around use a slightly different mechanism, so I can’t cannibalize the parts. I haven’t seen any other copies of this model for sale, and I’d rather just replace the screw. Problem is, I have no idea what size it is. Any of you ever had to figure something like this out? It’s a cheap camera, but it has sentimental value so I’d really like to get it working.
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Sep 5, 2020 20:21
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