Dom Pates

To Logan, Dom and Mark - thank you all for your contributions in helping a stranger figure out a problem. If you're not already part of a community, it can be quite a jump to head in and ask a question - you all helped me to think forward. @Logan: Would have looked into the belt drive next, as I had a spare. Luckily, I didn't need to. @Dom: Thanks for the thoughts. I agree about the value of old family films for future generations - one of the reasons for turning to this forum was not wanting to chew up any more of what I've got. However (particularly as those that might currently see value in these films are all pretty widely distributed, but also for space-saving purposes), I'm more interested in the content of these films than the medium. There is far greater likelihood in anyone in my family being able to watch these films online rather than via a projection at my house. Once they're digitised, that might be another story :) @Mark: Cheers for the eBay link - sent me back to the projector to revisit the knob that Dave had described. Now, on with the digitisation process!

Thanks Dave - in the end, this is exactly what fixed it! Feel a little daft, of course, but I'd clearly not turned the knob far enough in the right direction. Sometimes, you look for complexity in the solution to a problem, when it's actually simplicity that does it. Now I can get on with the job of screening and capturing - much appreciated for the pointers!

Thanks Dave. The projector's a Cinerex Dual 8 - I've discovered from further searches on the model that this particular propjector had a bit of a reputation for just this problem. Unfortunatley none of these searches turned up a solution! Tried all external options, and there's no knob that will fix it. Will certainly report back when I fix it though.

Hello all, I'm brand new here. This seems to be the premier place on the 'Net to ask for help from people in the know, so I'm coming to you guys with a problem to see if anyone can help :) The problem. All films I successfully project have a horizontal 'split screen' effect that makes it impossible to capture them digitally. (excuse the poor photo - hopefully it shows the problem well enough) The background. I have a bag of mostly Super-8 films inherited from both grandfathers, and am in the process of trying to digitise them. I'm trying to do it myself as a] I'd like to learn how to do it, and b] it's way too expensive to get someone else to. Seems like the best way to achive this is to project the films, then film the projections with a digital camera. I bought a projector from a local street market a while back to get started (Cinerex Dual 8, Model 707). As far as I can remember, the projector seemed to be working fine when I began using it, with a whole image being projected. After it chewed up parts of a film, I took the front off to remove the damaged film and reassembled it. The next time I tried projecting a film, I got this horizontal 'split screen' issue with the middle and top thirds of a frame being displayed in one part of the projected image and the bottom third of a frame being displayed in the top part of the image. Initially, I had not put a spring back correctly onto the upper auto film guide. Today, however, I put this back in the right place, but am still having the same problem with the image. Films are (mostly) correctly feeding through onto the take-up reel, but are not displaying correctly. I've tried several of them, all with the same effect. One more film has already been chewed up again today, and I don't want to risk losing any more. Likely options would be: Something internally wrong with the projector I've missed something in reassembling it Unfortunately, I know next to nothing about Super-8 projector expected operations or repair, so can't be sure if it's either of these or something else. Anyone here experienced this kind of thing before and fixed it, or have any ideas on what might be going wrong?? Thanks in advance!