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Hi, I'm a filmmaker of 13 years who has always wanted to shoot on 16mm, I came into possession of a Beaulieu r16, only I wish to use a "C" to Canon FD Lens adapter which is being stopped by what I believe is the auto aperture motor. I have tried asking online in other places if this mod can be done but ive had vague answers like "use a hammer", I like to go in with a bit of homework first so if anyone has anything helpful please let me know as I dont want to cause serious damage to the machine. Thank you for your time.

I recently bought a Beaulieu R16 camera body from a seller on eBay that was “untested”. The camera was in good shape, an ASA dial missing and original handle battery dead. Applying power to battery grip handle pin terminals and the DIN plug revealed it would run (hooray!). Based on a battery set-up by RotarySMP on YouTube of his R16 battery setup: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pv4CzyTmZjw&t=487s> I adapted a Sony 7.4v video camera battery as a power supply with a similar Small Rig rail set-up and this worked well, though a bit klunkier than the original battery handle grip. Here is a unedited scan test roll I shot on Kodak Vision 3 50D color negative film with this camera and Pentax 12.5mm (with and ND4 filter) and 25mm TV lens primes. This was shot at a local community car show event in Redwood City, CA (Google photos) https://photos.app.goo.gl/Yjfc2FXW29PNaW8W8 Exposure was manual with a separate hand-held meter. The built-in camera meter was functioning, very handy for shooting in changing light situations (sunlit to shade), but I had no ref without the ASA dial. You can see some stretched out distortion with the Pentax 12.5mm but not bad. I’ve been mostly using wind-up 16mm cameras (Pathe, Bolex Rex 4 and Bell & Howell) so the Beaulieu R16 is a very nice electric set-up and fairly lightweight to use with primes. Attached is a photo of the battery rig I used (but showing a different 12.5-75mm Angenieux lens). Mark Eastman Palo Alto, CA