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rubric
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, November 24, 2004 - 03:42 am: | 
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I was trying very hard to remove the top cover of my Minolta 7sii (to check out the frozen meter needle), when I accidentally pushed the whole rewind shaft down the hole. Now the entire mechanism is stuck within the camera, and I have no way of opening the camera back? Is this a gone case? I would loathe to bring it to the camera repair shop as I was given this camera and have already spent some money on a CLA for it. Please help if you can. TIA! Ruby |
Winfried
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, November 24, 2004 - 04:30 am: |
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You can remove the top cover and lift the 'hook' made of sheet metal close to the place where the rewind shaft used to be. |
rubric
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, November 24, 2004 - 08:34 am: |
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Thanks, winfried. But I'm having problems removing the top cover. It's dumb, I know, but I just can't remove the film advance lever. I know a dowel with rubber tip can help but I don't have wither, and have tried all the tricks that I know. Any other tricks I can try? |
Winfried
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, November 24, 2004 - 11:39 am: |
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In some cases you need a proper tool to remove the snake-eyes screw. I use miniature snap ring pliers which have very thin shafts. They fit into the holes, and such screws usually can be loosened without problems this way. |
Roland F. Harriston
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, November 24, 2004 - 01:58 pm: |
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I just took a look at the "carcass" of a Minolta Hi Matic II I found in my "hopeless" bin.
Slots or notches on the film advance lever top cap are located on the outer edge (circumference)of the cap at 180 degrees. I have a pair of strong tweezers that have sharp points that I use as a sort of spanner tool to engage the two slots or notches in the cover cap to screw it off. As mentioned, a slightly modified retainer ring tool(points ground down thin) will also work.
The threading on the cap is conventional, i.e. counterclock wise to loosen.
The caution in removing the cap is not to let whatever tool you use slip and scratch or mar the finished top surface of the cap. For some reason, these caps always seem to be torqued down fairly
tight.
The top plate is fastened to the camera body with three screws: one on the side of the top plate and two located under the rewind knob.
Remember that there is a single wire that is solder connected to the flash shoe on the top plate.
Whenever I encounter a wind lever shaft that has dropped down below the top plate upper surface, I use a hooked dental tool inserted into the threaded center bore of the shaft to pull it back up to its normal position.
You DO need a set of simple tools to work on cameras.
Good Luck
Roland F. Harriston |
Curt Saxton
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, November 24, 2004 - 07:38 pm: |
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Hi rubric,
Relax, another often overlooked tool you can usually borrow from your wife is a good old crochet hook which will often do the same job as the hooked dental tool. Hope this helps and good luck. Curt in Canada. |
rubric
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, November 26, 2004 - 09:02 am: |
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Thank you very much for your most helpful answers! Winfried, I'm pretty clueless about tools, but did a google image search, so now I know what snap ring pliers look like! Roland, thank you for your detailed descriptions, I feel more confident about tackling the task now. And thanks, Curt, for the suggestion about crochet hook. I don't have a wife (I'm female!) but I might be able to find one somewhere in the house. Thank you once again! Cheers! |
