| Author | Message | ||
     Peter Rating: N/A |
Hi learned people, This is a call for help... I love old cameras and until now external cosmetic cleaning was as far as my repairs have gone... I have read the warnings about DIY, but just couldn't help myself! Now I think I have gone and done it!!! I picked up a nice Nikkormat FT + 35mm 1:2 & 105mm 1:2.5 this weekend and was a little bummed when I got home to find that the meter didn't work (who carries around 625's in their pocket?) Anyway, I swallowed the meter problem and started a test roll using a hand-held meter... I recently read in an e-bay listing that camera meters were for wimps anyway!!! I don't agree to any extent, but I really want to learn about proper exposure through manual settings, so I thought 'here is a good opportunity'... Sorry, I'm rambling. I was on frame 18... I had hoped that the film was winding on correctly (not sure about that yet) and the shutter just didn't fire. Now, I'm not sure why this happened, but the lens mount had started to get noticeably wobblier (is that even a word?) especially since I had been switching lenses every 2-3 shots (now I see why zooms were invented!). Anyway, to my DIY: I was suspicious that the aperture arm had something to do with the problem because with some wiggling of the depth-of-field preview button I could get the shutter to fire. After finding this, I also found that the shutter would fire, but only if the lens was set to f2. I guessed that the wobbly mount was catching the aperture arm and causing some hang-up somehow? I took off the first ring of the lens mount... no problems there until the little spring thing for the ASA setting shot across the room. After recovering the spring I noticed that the black screws holding the inner lens mount ring to the camera body were loose. Eureaka, I had found the source for the wobbly mount! Camera repair lesson #1 here learned... fix what looks to be the problem, then put it all straight back together again!!!!! Stupidly I removed the black screws and the inner ring to see the innards of the lens mount (curiosity killed the cat!). Einstein here thought the meter issue may be revealed, but all he got was grey hairs trying to line up the shutter speed ring with the right speed again. Luckily I found B and got that sorted. This unnecessary tinkering, I think, is what caused my big disaster as the little pin that locks in the lens to the mount also fell out of position (while Einstein was shaking out the 4th black screw that fell somewhere behind the mirror!) Once I got the lens mount all back together again (and triumphed that the shutter was working at all speeds again!) I was a little unsure about the locking pin, but it did seem to lower some when I pushed in the lens release button, so I screwed on the lens. Again I did a dance in triumph that the shutter fired at all speeds and over the whole aperture range... The big disaster is that now the lens will not screw off the mount... I assume that the little locking pin is not going down like it is supposed to (because I didn't put it back properly!)... If anyone out there knows what I can do to remove the lens without hurting the lens mount or more importantly the lens itself... I would be very much appreciative. Peter |