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Eclair ACL 1.5 newbie questions (with pictures!)


Duncan Brown

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8 hours ago, Heikki Repo said:

......Here's how the motor connector looks like in ACL with the mid size base. As you can see, most connectors available won't fit. The right side accessory port is different: there a full size connector with the side "wings" fits.

The wings on the metal bodied connectors should grind ok shouldn't they. Will take a steady nerve and some care, skill (I take no responsibility if it doesn't work)

Gregg.

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OK, had a moment to bench test my motor.  I connected pins 2, 7, and 8 to GND.  I connected pins 5 and 9 to 12V.  I connected pin 3 to 5V.  That gives the motor circuitry power.  Then to actually turn it on, I connected pin 6 to 12V.

Interestingly the knob has 5 positions engraved (8, 12, N, 50, 75) but physically clicks into 6 positions.  The numbers on the knob don't line up with the mark on the body very well, even though I checked and the knob setscrew is on the flat part of the switch shaft.  Hmmmm....    The highest 2 physical positions (presumably 50 and 75) run at a fast speed, all the other 4 run at a slow speed.  Just two speeds.  Light always stays on.  The motor is not that loud when on the camera.  Either the body shields some of the noise, and/or it doesn't appreciate being run with its output shaft unsupported, with that heavy drive coupling out there on the end.

In any event this proves the problem is entirely with the motor; it's not something wrong with the camera itself adding too much drag on the motor.

Duncan

 

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Duncan,

Give Andrew at AZSpectrum a call or email, show him the video, you might get some free advice or some idea on cost if he diagnosed or repaired it. I've found him really approachable and helpful.

You will find a spare motor if you are patient. I have one here that I am considering selling (mirror parking model). No idea what they are worth now. Ebay sold value could tell us, but after 5 years selling hiatus I am treated like a new seller with limit of 3 items and $200 total listings per month. And squeezed from Paypal towards Payoneer, with a bizzare barrage of security checks.

Gregg.

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More measurements...

Rubber drive coupling is medium-hard rubber (I think we have a durometer tester at work, I'll have to get a more precise number for that.)  It's 9.5mm in diameter and 3mm thick.  Which are the specs of the cup it sits in on the camera body side, so it sits flush with the top of that once fitted in there.  The pins are 1.5mm in diameter and measure 8.25mm apart on the outside and 5.25mm apart on the inside, which puts them on 6.75mm centers.  So the holes in the drive coupling have those specs, with a second pair exactly 90 degrees out from the first.

The little pads they put to space the motor out from the body are .2mm thick, so vanishingly thin.

I hate to sponge off of someone's knowledge when they make their living at it, so I'll hold off contacting AZ Spectrum unless I'm seriously considering having them work on the motor.

When the Jaeger order shows up I'll do a whole separate show and tell thread on those.

Duncan

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29 minutes ago, Duncan Brown said:

.....I hate to sponge off of someone's knowledge when they make their living at it, so I'll hold off contacting AZ Spectrum unless I'm seriously considering having them work on the motor......

I know the feeling. He repaired a video assist for me so that helped me feel ok asking questions about other stuff. 

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On 3/28/2022 at 2:59 PM, Heikki Repo said:

BUT: There is also this guy I found by accident, who apparently has schematics for the heavy duty motor. He has done the work. You could ask if he would be willing to sell you the schematics: https://pouch4.wixsite.com/index/eclair

Circling back to this after a long drawn out process...

He's willing to sell the schematics.  Oddly, he charges per page, so at 20 Euros per page it would be 100 Euros for the whole set.  He was willing to discount that for me, but in the end there was no way for me to pay him, given everything that's going on with sanctions against Russia right now.  (We tried several options but nothing worked.)  I'll try again if/when the sanctions are lifted.

He apparently used to design and build all kinds of accessories for film movie cameras (The Aapo of Russia!) but is convinced that is all worthless now with the death of film.  (I tried to convince him that "it's not dead yet!")

Here is an older website of his that he pointed me to.  Interesting stuff.  I'm going to give it a NSFW warning both because of the random nearly-naked female picture there for reasons that aren't clear, and because the web design is 1990's GeoCities style, which might shock you if you weren't on the web in those days ?

http://pouch.narod.ru/

Duncan

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Interestingly my home network blocks that site as dangerous and tells me to "contact the network administrator" - I AM the network administrator!  I wonder if Comcast is blocking all of Russia or something.

Duncan

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3 hours ago, Duncan Brown said:

...He's willing to sell the schematics ...  ...He apparently used to design and build all kinds of accessories for film movie cameras (The Aapo of Russia!)....

Here is an older website of his that he pointed me to.  ....random nearly-naked female picture there....design is 1990's GeoCities style.....

http://pouch.narod.ru/

Sooner or later you'll get the motor schematics.

That website opened for me and was interesting. Google translate worked well.  Didn't yet see anything about ACL. Did see pics of electronics for Aaton motor and camera base. Lots of ICs. That must have been the big leap forward from ACL, going from transistors etc to ICs. Just kidding, I have almost no electronics IQ.

I saw a photo shoped looking nude, and a very cool looking tweety bird.

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1 minute ago, Gregg MacPherson said:

Sooner or later you'll get the motor schematics.

That website opened for me and was interesting. Google translate worked well.  Didn't yet see anything about ACL. Did see pics of electronics for Aaton motor and camera base. Lots of ICs. That must have been the big leap forward from ACL, going from transistors etc to ICs. Just kidding, I have almost no electronics IQ.

I saw a photo shoped looking nude, and a very cool looking tweety bird.

I asked him, if all that old equipment was valueless, if he'd sell me the motor cheaply ?    Apparently he was fixing it for someone else, so that explains his lack of Eclair info - seems like his own interest was with other brands (including Russian ones, naturally.)

The starfield background was so late 90's.

Duncan

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