arricam LT 2 perf mag jams

richard bellon · July 7, 2010

i recently did a feature and shooting on arricam LT 2-Perf,

this was my first 2 perf job and on both A&B cam the mags jammed.

they jammed on A-cam every 2-4 rolls and on B-cam at least once every 2 days.

nothing was wrong with the way the film was loaded and the film never concentinad in the mag. I.E nothing wrong with film in mag.

swapped out both cameras, same thing happened, updated software, samething happened, flew in more cameras from London, same thing.

no one could figure it so basically we had to live with it and hoped it wouldnt jam during a gr8 take.

Anyone else had this prob before or know of someone who had?

kindest

K Borowski · July 7, 2010

Did you inform the rental house?

I assume this is a recent modification to the camera, so maybe they made a minor mistake with the adjustment that occasionally popped up during filming.

Or it could be that 2-perf. movements are more prone to jamming? I don't see why that would be though.

richard bellon · July 7, 2010

Did you inform the rental house?

I assume this is a recent modification to the camera, so maybe they made a minor mistake with the adjustment that occasionally popped up during filming.

Or it could be that 2-perf. movements are more prone to jamming? I don't see why that would be though.

hi

yes of course we informed the rental company, hence the swapping of cameras and flying in new ones from London for the job.

we even had the engineers in Austria write software for for us for the mags but nothing helped.

2 perf has been around for a number of years, so i dont think being a new modification would be the problem

Rob Vogt · July 7, 2010

My friend and fellow cine.com member is currently on a feature with an Arricam LT or ST from Arri CSC in NJ and they've had 6 mags crap out on them recently, but they're shooting 3 perf. I think there is some sort of Arri flu going around. Its definitely the mag though not the camera body... I believe their problem had something to do with the connecting gear being angled slightly so it would still sit on the camera properly but eventually jam but thats second hand I honestly don't remember completely.

Dom Jaeger · July 8, 2010

My friend and fellow cine.com member is currently on a feature with an Arricam LT or ST from Arri CSC in NJ and they've had 6 mags crap out on them recently, but they're shooting 3 perf. I think there is some sort of Arri flu going around. Its definitely the mag though not the camera body... I believe their problem had something to do with the connecting gear being angled slightly so it would still sit on the camera properly but eventually jam but thats second hand I honestly don't remember completely.

6 mags crapped out but it's "definitely the mag"? So 6 different magazines all had the same "angled gear" problem? Either the rental house is a sheltered workplace or your friend is the unluckiest guy ever. Arricam cameras and mags have been used on countless jobs by now, they don't have design flaws like angled connecting gears or catch Arri flu.

When a recurring problem happens to multiple mags on different cameras, the fault is almost always either the stock or (most likely) loader error. Or you're dealing with a rental house run by Bernie Madoff.

The first poster's issue may be a software glitch, but given that Arricam 2-perf has been around a while you would imagine the issue would have cropped up before.

Perhaps a software update went wrong, but when it's every mag on multiple cameras sourced from different locations, the only constant is the film stock and the crew...

Rob Vogt · July 9, 2010

According to CSC it was the mag. Like I said this is all second hand, but I know the first and second ac and they can handle loading and threading the camera. Also I know the cameras cant catch the flu, theyre machines...

Gregory Irwin · July 9, 2010

According to CSC it was the mag. Like I said this is all second hand, but I know the first and second ac and they can handle loading and threading the camera. Also I know the cameras cant catch the flu, theyre machines...

CSC is a very reputable rental house. I believe what they say. I did a 2 perf movie last year for Paramount Pictures (that get's released in December of 2010) called "THE FIGHTER" and I experienced mag jamming. We didn't have Arri. We had the new Aaton Penelope cameras and even though, overall, they did a great job, the mags did occasionally jammed. Maybe it's a 2 perf thing. I'm not sure.

Best,

Greg Irwin

Dom Jaeger · July 9, 2010

Apologies if you took offense, I just didn't think your post was helpful. Saying 6 mags crapped out but it was definitely the mag gives the impression that there is a systemic problem with Arricams, when what really appears to be the case is that one mag was faulty.

Also the original post was about possible problems with the 2-perf modification.

As a rental house tech I get a bit tetchy when misinformation about equipment gets spread around. Recently on this site someone was advising a newbie that the footage counters on Arricam mags are dodgy, when obviously he had simply encountered one mag that needed a new memory battery.

Film as a medium is under enough pressure without vague rumours casting doubt on the equipment reliability.

I don't know about Arri flu but lots of people down here in Oz have caught the RED bug... hack...hack..