kanner@tymix.UUCP (Herb Kanner) (05/07/85)
I am having a jamming problem with my Minox 35GT and wonder whether anyone else out there has encountered the same problem and found a solution. Specifically, it happens with Ilford XP1 film. The last three times I used the camera, about halfway through the roll of film it became impossible to wind further. In fact, on one occasion, I actually tore the sprocket holes. Repair people find nothing wrong with the camera, and, of course, it passes the same test with me. You can put a roll of film in it and wind it through ok. The problem arises when it sits for a couple of weeks. Now, this morning, on reloading the camera, I noticed that the film leader had a definite wrinkle in it, and was hard to pull through the cassette. Apparently the film stock Ilford uses for XP1 will take a permanent set where it passes through the lip, if it is allowed to sit there for a while. And, of course, the Minox has only one sprocket instead of the two that larger cameras have, and is therefore less able to cope with a stiff cassette. The second thing I noticed is that the lip of the Ilford cassette is at a rather different angle from those of other companies: the film in passing through the lip wants to head more toward the spindle than toward the periphery of the spool. I wonder if the problem were to go away were I to by the film in bulk and load it into a different style of cassette, for example, a Kodak one. Any help would be greatly appreciated. This has been so distressing that I was on the verge yesterday of mail ordering another Minox in the hope that a new specimen would behave better, but fortunately rationality prevailed and I didn't. -- Herb Kanner Tymnet, Inc.
ron@brl-tgr.ARPA (Ron Natalie <ron>) (05/17/85)
> I wonder if the problem were to go away were I to by the film in bulk and > load it into a different style of cassette, for example, a Kodak one. > Any help would be greatly appreciated. This has been so distressing that I > was on the verge yesterday of mail ordering another Minox in the hope that > a new specimen would behave better, but fortunately rationality prevailed > and I didn't. Buy Minox film in bulk...hmm, interesting. I used to bulk load my Minolta P-16, but it used 16mm B-Wind movie film. Pretty easy to come by. No one seems to use a lot of 9.5mm movie film anymore. Sprockets down the middle never seemed to catch on. -Ron
phr@ucbvax.ARPA (Paul Rubin) (05/21/85)
In article <10761@brl-tgr.ARPA>, ron@brl-tgr.ARPA (Ron Natalie <ron>) writes: > Buy Minox film in bulk...hmm, interesting. I used to bulk load my Minolta > P-16, but it used 16mm B-Wind movie film. Pretty easy to come by. No one > seems to use a lot of 9.5mm movie film anymore. Sprockets down the middle > never seemed to catch on. Actually the Minox spy models don't use 9.5mm movie film. They use 9.5 mm wide sprocketless strips of film that are cut down from 35mm stock at the Minox factory. I have thought about trying to do this myself for a while, but haven't thought of a good way to slit the film with any precision (get a template made at a machine shop?). Unfortunately the only color neg emulsion available from Minox is repackaged old-fashioned Agfacolor 80 -- slow and grainy. A Minox neg is very slightly larger than a Disc neg, and much sharper because of the flatter film plane and superior Minox optics, but noticably grainier even though Disc film is 200 ISO. Any ideas? 9.5mm Minoxes aren't very popular any more, so please reply by mail and I'll summarize. paul