Vent: Thought I could fix a sticky shutter in 20 minutes, that was 4 days ago

I got this old Canon FTb in last week with a shutter that was hanging up at slow speeds. Figured it was just some dried up lube, you know, a quick clean and I'd be done. Well, three disassemblies later I finally found the real issue - a tiny burr on the shutter curtain drum that was catching on the fabric. That sucker took me about 18 hours total to find and file down smooth. I spent two full evenings just staring at parts under a loupe, wondering if I'd lost my touch. What really got me is how something so small (like barely visible to the naked eye) can stop a whole camera dead. Has anyone else sunk way more time than expected into a problem that seemed simple? I could use some war stories to feel better about this one.

2 comments

2 Comments

lily_sullivan8225d ago

Wait, is a tiny burr really that big of a deal? I feel like you could have just hit it with a little sandpaper and been done in like 10 minutes.

val_taylor25d ago

Three years ago I spent 8 hours trying to adjust a sticky aperture on a Minolta SRT-101 only to realize I had the lens on backwards the whole time. Seriously, I had it mounted wrong and was wondering why the blades wouldn't move. I felt like a real genius that day, sitting there with all my tools and a completely bonehead mistake. Your burr story makes me feel a little better about that one, but not by much.