Attempting to fix the camera...
2/27/2006 01:27:00 PM
Here are some pics from while I had the cover off the camera (it was pretty much completely externally disassembled). I didn't disassemble any of the innards for fear of breaking it (more).
The first thing I did was to print out the PDF I found detailing how the camera is kept in one piece. Then I started taking out screws. I was going to try to just remove the back of the camera (thinking, the less I take apart the better), but no joy there - I had to take the back and the front off to get at the darn shutter button assembly.
After removing all the screws I could find, I got the back to come off with relatively little effort (read: I didn't feel like I broke the thing while taking the skin off). And I snapped the pic above.
There was one screw under the back cover that I thought released the front (more on that later), so I removed that one and took off the front cover. This took a little more wiggling than the back, but it came off OK, and again, I didn't feel like I broke anything. Snapped the pic below...
After this, I saw what it was I was after - the shutter button assembly, and noted that the screw I thought I needed to remove so I could get the front cover off was actually the screw holding the shutter button assembly on. So having already removed it, I saw where a little tab was holding the assembly on, and tweaked it off.
These pics suck, by the way, because they're from my cameraphone. What you're looking at above is a top-down view of the camera with the shutter button assembly removed and upside-down on the table above it. If you follow this link to the picture on flickr, you can see my notes about what was broken.
I noticed that from the inside looking out, the hole where the shutter button would typically pass through to engage the nub that tells the camera to take pictures had a kind of beveled cone that narrowed as it got closer to the outside of the camera (if you follow what I'm saying). So I went into the other room and found Dana's OLD (film) Canon, and took IT apart (sorry, no pics of that) to see if I could hijack the button (or parts of it) for my purposes here. I couldn't, but that didn't stop me. I noted that if I was lucky one of the case screws from her camera would fit through the hole, and it did. So, I replaced the button with an old Canon camera screw, facing out. (Picture it - instead of a button to press now, we have a threaded screw poking out - so I can screw ON to it anything I like to use as a shutter button).
BRILLIANT!
I tested my screw-as-button to see if it worked, and it was able to press the nub reasonably well. But before putting the sucker back together, I decided to try it (why put it back together only to realize it doesn't work and open it back up again?).
So I put the battery back in, and...... nothing. No smoke, no grinding noise, no nothing. Took out the battery, let it charge for a little bit, and tried again. Nothing.
Put the case back on (didn't screw it in or anything) thinking maybe the case itself was holding some vital bits together... popped the battery back in, and... nothing. Crap, I broke our camera.
So I took the cover off again and noticed that when I shook the camera, there was something quite obviously loose inside. Awesome. Took a glance at it and realized there was no way I was actually going to take the camera ITSELF apart (as opposed to just removing the case) to find out what it was. At least not NOW.
So, I resigned myself to putting the case back on (and screwing it in) thinking again that MAYBE by some miracle the act of simply screwing it back together would create a magical shell around the otherwise useless innards that somehow causes it to work properly. But this time, some little plastic bit popped out (out of nowhere). I was kind of put off, but kind of excited. I thought maybe THIS was the part that was rattling around inside, and gave the camera a shake. Damn. Still rattles. Oh well.
So I studied the schematics and saw where this little weird plastic bit went (between the flash and the viewfinder. It is seemingly useless), put it back in, and continued with my reassembly.
Surprisingly, there were no extra bits and no missing bits while I put the thing together. I credit my ingenious little screw tracking method: I taped the buggers to the printout of the exploded camera I had where they had come from. And actually, the spring-activated door where the CF card goes now works better than it has for a year (it was dropped during a VERY drunken evening in Ireland about a year ago; probably the same injury that caused the shutter button to go AWOL).
Last screw in, I popped in the memory card and battery for one last hurrah - and it WORKED! Aha! I RULE! Call me the Dr. Frankenstein of cameras, I fixed the bastard.
Proof:
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6 Comments:
Maybe now you will have time to get a haircut.
Where did you find the camera schematic? Maybe I can take apart my camera that broke in France.
posted at 3:45 PM
Dave is right, you hair is approaching "Freshman Year Mark" size.
Congrats on fixing the camera!
posted at 7:36 PM
Puhleeze! The hair is MAYBE at second semester senior year in high school big. MAYBE. Freshman year I had almost a whole year of growth on top of this.
BUT, did anyone else notice that when I had the huge hair was the last time I was THIN? I'm thinking there's a correlation, so the fro is making a comeback.
If I feel inclined to hook up Dana's scanner, I'll do a nice little animated-gif comparison between '95 hair and '06 hair. The difference will be evident then.
posted at 7:10 AM
I'm a little disappointed. The first picture you take with a camera you fixed yourself should be something special or spectacular...not a picture of you taking a picture. Nicely done though.
posted at 7:31 AM
Wohoo! Your excitement shows through in that pic! (its a good thing it didn't capture below the waist!)
Congrats on fixing the camera! Now maybe we can actually see some REAL pics! :)
posted at 8:53 AM
One word: Disturbing.
posted at 11:45 AM
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