Mechanical vs electric film camera repairibility

anta40 · Apr 25, 2017

Yesterday, I met a few film shooters. They told me that they prefer good old mechanical film cameras (Nikon F, Leica M3, etc) to electrical film cameras (Contax G2, Nikon 35 TI, etc) because usually the mechanical ones are easier to fix. If your Contax G2 is dead, then you have an expensive paper weight, for example.

I still don't get it. Be it mechanical or electrical, as long as you can get the replacement part, you can have your camera fixed, right? What make the electrical is harder?

zanxion72 · Apr 25, 2017

Yeap! This is how it goes with electronics. If something dies and spares are out of production and availability, you are done. Mechanical parts are a different story, they do not fail like electronics and when they break you can replace them even with custom made parts (usually).
For the G2 replacement parts are already sparse and hence not anyone can repair it when it fails (those err problems).

Frank53 · Apr 25, 2017

It's not harder as long as there are parts, but for most electronic cameras no more parts are available.
Regards,
Frank

AgX · Apr 25, 2017

Some electronic parts are custom made (ICs, LCDs, printed foils). Generic parts could be replaced. But then the repairer has to have the knowledge and means (tools and meters) to do so.
A repairer then needs to be competetent in precision mechanics, microelectronics and optics.

Another issue is that it needs some time to know how to deal with a certain model (open it, find the error etc.) In the good times the vast offer of cameras to be repaired enabled the repairer to specialize on certain models. With few exceptions this is no more valid, thus the repair cost rose, the same time the costs of substitute used cameras fell.

Berri · Apr 25, 2017

Electronic cameras are more complicated to repair and there are more things that could go wrong. Mechanic cameras usually stop working properly for simple reasons; a spring gone out of place, old stale lubricant or things like that. In the case the mechanic shutter breaks it will be very difficult to repair and probably not worth the money. A vintage car is easier to repair than a fully electronic modern one. (I'm not sure how many today's car will be around in the next 50 years)

tedr1 · Apr 25, 2017

Much depends on the quality of the parts used to make the camera originally. Cheaply made cameras with inferior parts fail more often than well made cameras that have high quality parts. I don't think it is possible to generalize that all mechanical cameras are more reliable than all electronic cameras.
We have entered a time when it has become harder to find a repair service for all cameras of all types and spare parts are no longer made for most types of camera, electronic and mechanical.
A good policy with any vintage camera is to have a spare.

Ko.Fe. · Apr 25, 2017

"Easier to fix" is not 100% real world description. I have FED-2 camera which is easier to fix in true form. I could fix this camera by myself. I could change any part and I could make parts of it works together.
To fix my M4-2 camera I paid 300$ and waited weeks for parts. And... it wasn't completely fixed. It is at another repair, waiting for parts. You know what I did? I went and purchased Olympus 35 Trip.
It is camera with electronic and it works....

Oh, yes, I have M3 as the spare for M4-2.

warden · Apr 25, 2017

I've had two high quality cameras (both purchased new and used carefully) that both failed. My Contax G2 developed a digital gremlin that would occasionally prevent the camera from firing properly and while Tocad could replicate the problem they could not fix it. The camera worked perfectly for ten years though and that's something to consider. I replaced it with a far simpler Zeiss Ikon, which had a complete failure (dead camera won't wake up) after only five years. Zeiss USA examined the camera and couldn't fix it, and sent it to Zeiss Germany, who examined the camera, pronounced it not worth repairing and offered to sell me one of their demo cameras at a steep discount instead. I declined, and replaced the Ikon with a Leica M3, allowing me to continue using my existing lenses.

The Leica is a good camera, but I miss the superior features of the more modern cameras (faster, more accurate shutter, faster and more accurate focus on-the-go, 4fps shooting, light meter, etc.)

markbarendt · Apr 25, 2017

While it is true that mechanical parts can be custom built to repair old cameras, the reality is that making a custom part might very well cost more than the camera is worth.

AgX · Apr 25, 2017

tedr1 said:
A good policy with any vintage camera is to have a spare.

My policy is: one to use, one as immediate substitute, one for parts

Mainecoonmaniac · Apr 25, 2017

I think in general, the more electronic the camera, the less reparable it is as time goes on. Also, the more electronic the camera is, the more dependent on the factory for repairs. In a similar case, I had a Minolta meter that was 4 stops off. I called a factory repair outlet about the issue and he quoted a flat price. I asked how does he know the price since he didn't diagnose the meter. He told me they just replace the whole circuit board. Component level repairs are very rare these days.

Luckless · Apr 25, 2017

It really depends on the nature of the electronics, and the nature of the failure.

Something like a focus sensor is not going to be the easiest thing to repair with what the average Maker Space will have access to. But a shutter release and timer board? That's easy enough to re-fabricate.

In many cases redesigning a replacement piece from scratch for a simple electronic device is going to be easier and more reliable to do than trying to re-fabricate complex clockwork pieces or similar to have mate with existing old pieces.

BMbikerider · Apr 25, 2017

When you think that spares are no longer supplied for cameras such as the EOS fim cameras, or are very scarce and even Nikon no longer have spares for the F100 and all the autofocus cameras prior to that it sort of brings things home. I do believe that there are spares still available for the Nikon FE3a and the F6 but ultimately these will dry up.

At the other end of the spectrum, the Nikon F1/F2 models are all repairable by a good engineer. Even the photomic heads with the worn out carbon track for the meters can be restored to working condition by an engineer who has designed and made replacements.Have a look at http://www.soverf2repair.webs.com/

As for Canon, possible the same lack of parts for electronic cameras prior to the A1/AE1/AT1 and others from the same era will condem them to a slow demise.

flavio81 · Apr 25, 2017

zanxion72 said:
Yeap! This is how it goes with electronics. If something dies and spares are out of production and availability, you are done. Mechanical parts are a different story, they do not fail like electronics and when they break you can replace them even with custom made parts (usually).
For the G2 replacement parts are already sparse and hence not anyone can repair it when it fails (those err problems).

This is not completely true.

Camera repair techies are usually well versed in mechanics, but know electronics superficially.

Not only electronic components can be replaced, but today some 'unobtainable' electronic ICs can be replaced with modern, miniature microcontrollers. Camera techs don't know about these things, but I can bet that in 30 years that would be a required skill of a classic camera restorer.

Moreover, most electronic camera failures are simply down to corrosion, bad solder joints, or aged capacitors. those are easy repairs.

flavio81 · Apr 25, 2017

Berri said:
Electronic cameras are more complicated to repair and there are more things that could go wrong.

In SLRs it can be the opposite. For example look at the Canon AE-1P. More electronics enabled Canon to simplify the mechanics and reduce the parts counts. There is no slow speed governor. The shutter mechanism is simpler. The AE mechanism is dramamatically simpler than mechanic shutter priority AE cameras like the early Konicas. Canon japanese-italian engineer Hiroshi Antani got an award in 1978 for the application of ICs to camrra electronics.

Last SLR i repaired was a Pentax P30 and the mechanics were far simpler than a mechanical SLR. Really easy. Just be gentle with the electronics.

flavio81 · Apr 25, 2017

Luckless said:
It really depends on the nature of the electronics, and the nature of the failure.

Something like a focus sensor is not going to be the easiest thing to repair with what the average Maker Space will have access to. But a shutter release and timer board? That's easy enough to re-fabricate.

In many cases redesigning a replacement piece from scratch for a simple electronic device is going to be easier and more reliable to do than trying to re-fabricate complex clockwork pieces or similar to have mate with existing old pieces.

+1

My point exactly.

For example my Nikkormat EL could have its electronics replaced by a microcontroller.

Sirius Glass · Apr 25, 2017

Mechanical cameras can be fixed most of the time. Electronic cameras depend on the availability of boards and components. Lacking those critical parts electronic cameras can be impossible to fix. MY most important cameras are mechanical. The 35mm electronic camera can be replaced by mechanical ones or electronic ones if available when the time comes.

AgX · Apr 25, 2017

flavio81 said:
Today some 'unobtainable' electronic ICs can be replaced with modern, miniature microcontrollers. Camera techs don't know about these things, but I can bet that in 30 years that would be a required skill of a classic camera restorer.

But how to access the neccessary logarithm to feed into the microcontroller?
And is there enough space for the additional board and wiring (one cannot replace that custom IC directly with that generic microcontroller)?

OptiKen · Apr 25, 2017

I think you also have to take into consideration that fully mechanical cameras were manufactured with longevity in mind. Not many electrical 'anything' in the past 30 yrs has been manufactured with longevity in mind.
In addition, with electrical cameras we rely more and more on the electronics to do the work - focusing, setting the exposure (shutter and aperture), etc. There is far more mystery behind how the diode works than behind the dial that adjusts your focus or aperture.

Leigh B · Apr 25, 2017

Most simple parts for electronic cameras are still available from wholesale electronic distributors.
This includes resistors, capacitors, and simple transistors.

The problem is the larger integrated circuits that control most camera functions.
These are universally unique to the manufacturers and usually to a particular model or family.
The manufacturer only bought a certain number of these, and most were put into product.
The small number remaining in the service pipeline are often reserved for authorized service shops.

There are no generic replacements for these parts.
The only source other than the OEM is to cannibalize other cameras.

Even then you don't know what fine tuning was required after assembly.
Quite often some small parts had their values adjusted for proper operation.

- Leigh

Luckless · Apr 25, 2017

Re-engineering an electronic replacement part is a bit of an art, and is one of those case-by-case basis solution things that really depends on the age and complexity of the part being replicated.

One of the important things to remember is that you do not need a 1:1 solution when re-developing a drop in electrical replacement. It is not the same as replicating 32 teeth of a given pitch on a properly sized cog... You actually can have way more flexibility, and if you choose you could even modify functionality to better meet your needs.

Rebuilding something advanced and complex, like all the controllers in a 1DX Mk II is not going to be an easy challenge, and probably only a select few electrical engineers have the resources to pull something like that off as a hobby project.

Re-designing far older and less complex systems could let you do things such as completely scrap all the old controls, possibly spread across a number of chips, and centralize them all on a single smaller modern one.

It is huge and complex for those who don't design and fabricate their own embedded systems, but we do live in an era where students rebuild the computers that we used to go to the moon... Times have changed and tech has advanced and become far more accessible.

flavio81 · Apr 25, 2017

AgX said:
But how to access the neccessary logarithm to feed into the microcontroller?

I'm not an electronics engineer (electronics is one of my hobbies) but in theory the idea is:

- Incorporate a Temperature compensated log amplifier (in theory the Nikkormat EL already has it inside the circuit). This is done with an opamp, and I think there are modern dedicated ICs that do the specific job.
- Feed the output to an ADC (analog to digital converter) to read the value.
- Feed the ADC's output to the microcontroller

AgX said:
And is there enough space for the additional board and wiring (one cannot replace that custom IC directly with that generic microcontroller)?

Yes, there is. That's why i think it should be possible. So not only replacing the IC but the whole circuit.
There are tiny microcontrollers that already incorporate ADC and DAC on a single chip. And operate on 5V, which is within the battery source of the Nikkormat EL (6V)

flavio81 · Apr 25, 2017

Luckless said:
Re-engineering an electronic replacement part is a bit of an art, and is one of those case-by-case basis solution things that really depends on the age and complexity of the part being replicated.

One of the important things to remember is that you do not need a 1:1 solution when re-developing a drop in electrical replacement. It is not the same as replicating 32 teeth of a given pitch on a properly sized cog... You actually can have way more flexibility, and if you choose you could even modify functionality to better meet your needs.

+1
Great post.

You know, on the DSLR camp there are people that have taken the patience to disassemble the firmware of some DSLR cameras, modify it and upload it again to the camera.

Or there are people who have written new, alternate "operating systems" to replace the software within the camera.

This is more labourious, i think, that dropping a microcontroller with an ADC and DAC inside a film SLR using an electronic vertical shutter !!!

AgX · Apr 25, 2017

But if that custom IC is defect, how then can one read out its function?

Leigh B · Apr 25, 2017

The huge hurdle to any reverse engineering effort is money.

IC fab houses don't build individual ICs.
They build hundreds or thousands, whatever will fit on one wafer.
And wafers keep getting larger and larger.

Add to that the tooling and setup required for a production run.
Then amortize that over building a single wafer rather than thousands.

A single replacement IC could easily cost more than $10,000.

- Leigh

Mechanical vs electric film camera repairibility

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