Q. I'm a novice camera collector in Brazil. I can't find much information in Brazil about collecting; have you any information about cleaning and restoration of old 8mm cine cameras? Could you recommend some book or internet address?
A. The big problem is that very little old cine equipment except some 35mm and a few rare machines have ever attracted much general interest or the sort of value associated with antiques. It's always been a specialist area; in fact, there are hardly any books at all about cine equipment and even fewer about cameras. What little I know is on my website.
. Under Miscellany, you will find a page for books, and there are just a few on cameras. In addition to his book on projectors, Jurgen Lossau did one on cameras - you would have to look for a second-hand copy. The only other source I can suggest is www.oldtimercameras.com - they provide copies of old instruction books and manuals, but are expensive. And there may well not be anything on the camera you are interested in. Otherwise, it's searching the internet - there are lots of sites in the US that cover all sorts of things and you may find something there.
A word of warning. If you are dealing with old wind-up/clockwork cameras, be very careful. The spring mechanisms are immensely powerful and could easily take an eye out if they undo suddenly. If you can give me any better idea about what you are trying to do, I will try to help further.
Q. Thanks a lot for your advice on springs. I just started collecting 8mm and 9.5 mm cameras and projectors. Actually, I don't intend to fix damaged cameras, but only clean them up, and put some life back in the leather. What do you recommend?
A.
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Q. Dear Aunt Em,
The 28mm Victor I recently acquired is extremely mucked up and I have been cleaning it, but wondered what do you use as a degreaser, and how have you handled rust in the past? The sprockets are fairly rusted.
A.
De- greaser is not important - just get most off by hand, then maybe a bit of WD40. Lots of rags and elbow grease. There are some things like turpentine/white spirit that do not do well with paintwork and can leave a white haze. Some stuff can also affect paint, eg the finish on the Bolex DA seems to be some sort of lacquer that you can all too easily take off. Like they say on the packet, test on a small inconspicuous area first!
Rust. It all depends. Light rust can be cleaned up with a good metal polish - I use a non-abrasive one designed for chrome, brass etc for most purposes. Needs plenty of elbow grease. You can achieve an acceptable finish even if the nickel or whatever is worn away in places. For more serious rust, there are various proprietary de-rusting fluids in which you can steep parts but be warned. They are not all equally good, and if you leave things in too long they can actually partially dissolve, even tho' they don't tell you this. Or get a nasty, dirty-looking result. Use with care and polish afterwards.
For painted parts, esp black, there are rust converters sold for use on classic cars which often give a black finish. Then you can sand off. Sanding is the other recourse for really bad stuff, usually by hand but sometimes machines can help. I have a foam plastic drum with a sanding belt on the outside. I stick the drill in a vice (need special attachment to do this really) then hold stuff against the belt. There are many pitfalls. If you don't grip firmly, and approach the drum from the right direction, parts can be snatched from your hand, thrown across the room and damaged (or you could be). With machines, you can easily take off too much - I use a very old sanding belt that can't do too much at once! Also stuff gets hot - wear gloves and have some water near to dip the part.
There are also various polishing devices which can help when you reach the appropriate stage - usually for drill fixing, eg sisal and cotton mops, with various unguents to help. I have found that with round parts it is sometimes easier to put the part in the drill (usually on a spindle) and apply the polishing mop by hand. In the extreme, you can go mad and get the parts re-chromed. The problem with chrome or nickel is that it is a wafer-thin layer which just reproduces all the faults of the original - so, if the original is pitted, you get a pitted finish with the new chrome (or nickel, which was often used on older stuff - be careful not to get the modern over-bright nickel - stick with the original more lustred finish).
And with most stuff, once you have got serious rust pitting, it's impossible to remove without destroying the part. One of the worst I have had was on the Triplico/Peerless; it don't look too bad in pix but the pitting is still there.
Another approach with painted parts is Hammerite - don't need to remove all the rust and a good thick layer can smooth the surface a bit. Or you can try filler - car stuff is probably too soft, but there are all sorts of proprietary stuff you can use like Milliput. This is what I used in Back From The Bodge.
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Q. Dear Aunt Em
I read your page about restoring an H with interest. I've just acquired one and mechanically it seems OK, even with a spare bulb, but the electrics are not fit to have in the house. I don't do resistors wrapped round flaking asbestos! So - the plan is to rebuild the electrics completely. The lamp, lampholder and low-voltage transformer are available - I'll be going for a 12v qi bulb.
But the motor? If it's a 240v unit all will be well but otherwise I'll need to get a transformer and possibly some sort of variable speed control as I intend ditch all the asbestos. Again that shouldn't be a problem, and I'm not too fussy about retaining exact original features - the object is to end up with a serviceable and SAFE machine.
For example I won't try threading the lamp cables through the motor which, reading your commentary, seems best left alone!!! The starting point would be getting some details about the motor in terms of voltage and current consumption. It seems to me it might be a 120v unit to judge by the enormous amount of resistance wire in the base - although I haven't checked how much is actually in circuit at normal mains settings yet. The whole machine was obviously intended to be transformerless - a scary resistance unit is included for the lamp volts. This would be to make it capable of running on DC (the mains plug is a lampholder bayonet plug and I recall that certainly where I live some buildings still had DC lighting in the 1960s).
Any ideas about motor volts, and any tips?
A. I can appreciate your concern about asbestos, tho' I think collectors would never live so long if there was a universal and serious problem. Nor am I wholly convinced that the "former" on which a resistance is bound is necessarily asbestos - it could be the sort of high-temperature ceramic they used to use in coke ovens etc. Not that it matters. What an H should have is an 80v 100w lamp, fed from a transformer. I have not come across one where the lamp is fed from a resistance, tho' I suppose they may well have made one precisely because of the DC problem.
I would like to see some pix if possible of yours in case it's a variant I've not come across. But now you ask, I'm not wholly sure what the motor voltage is; in fact, I don't think I've ever actively thought about it. There are at least two different versions of the H wiring; one has a cylindrical resistance marked with voltages 190/200 to 250, as per the outside. The other just has a tranny, which presumably does whatever it is the resistance does but I know not whether this affects the motor. Considering it logically, motors were often multi-voltage and could be over-volted without immediate problems.
Rumour has it the Son motor was wound for 160v but over-volted to 240 (cost-saving idea - a bad one). And, having consulted my own website, something I find myself doing with increasing frequency, I note there is a pic of an H conversion I did using a switched mode tranny as per low voltage lighting, so there is no possibility of any feed other than 240 to the motor. Having settled that, I think a standard mains lighting dimmer switch (old type rather than newest ones which are for energy saving lamps) would handle the speed control just fine. The only caveat is that if you do have an unusual resistance-fed machine, all bets are off.
Anyway, do send me some pix and let me know how you go on. Incidentally, have you considered a Specto rather than an H? It's a much better machine, with scope for more powerful lighting and bigger spool capacity. As for any other tips, there is probably more info on the website now than remains in my head. Just be careful if you do dismantle the motor not to stretch those connections to the brushes.
The problem with the wiring thru the motor is really one of extreme fiddliness, rather than danger as a direct result of this design. The danger arises because the insulation on the wires rots, leaving the machine open to short-circuits or live bits wot did not ought to be live. Old age. If these are replaced, there should be no problem.
Q. I got your details from your website and thought you might be able to help me out with a technical question. I have two Bell & Howell model 601 amplifiers, Part 202000 and was hoping you could advise on the power supply connection. I note it's 110v supply but am not sure how to connect the 4 pin connector. I've attached a couple of photos to show the amplifier complete and the connection in question. Any help you could provide, or guidance on where to find out more, would be very gratefully received.
A. B&H were really a pain with these 4-pin plugs, tho' there were far from alone in this dog-in-a-manger attitude. Lamps too, of course. (Have lots of these if you need any). There are of course only 3 connections, live, neutral and earth, but they often use the fourth pin to provide a feed to a different part of the machine, so you can't necessarily tell just by looking at the inside of the socket on the apparatus.
B&H Receptacle
l---------------l
RED l 16 14 l GREEN
l O__ l______________ Locating Pin
YELLOW l 15 13 l BLACK
l---------------l
This shows what I found in a B&H643; colours relate to wires connecting to the back of the pins, ie from inside the machine. The corresponding sockets of a B&H lead with a moulded-on Jones plug (presumably therefore original) were wired as follows:-
15 & 16 Live
14 Negative
13 Earth.
I cannot guarantee yours will be the same, so please be careful! I don't have any paperwork earlier than a service manual for a 625. There are two addresses on my Links page under Miscellany which may help:- A (mainly 16mm) website, www.paulivester.com. Inter alia, he has attempted a list of all Bell and Howell projector models.
www.film-tech.com has manuals and stuff, tho' mainly American and modern.
