16MM SILENT

ZEISS

In the section on restoration, I have given a description of some work I did on what I assume to be a very early machine (See Zeiss for details). Here now is a picture of the machine as finally re-assembled. I have also included a pic to show an irritating design fault (left). If you look closely at the lower sprocket guard, you can see a little tab for opening the guard for threading. You can also see a slot that leaves only a tiny point of connection at each end of the curved section to which the tab is attached, to join to the rest of the guard. What is maybe less obvious is that this little piece has broken off and is just placed in situ for the pic. The spring on the guard is quite strong and it seems absolutely inevitable that it should break off (I've seen another just the same). It's not terribly serious, just an irritation.

However, investigating this gave me a small piece of new info. If you look at the main pic, you can see a small tag above the lens, attached to a sort of not-exactly-round ring that fits very loosely round the lens and slides up and down. I could not figure out what on earth it was for. I discovered that if you fully open the sprocket guard referred to above, it engages with this ring thing and is held up while you thread. Pulling the tag up releases the guard.

I've processed another Zeiss into my collection, another early 16mm. It had, I fear, been rather neglected by being exposed to damp. In consequence, much of the brightwork was quite badly rusted, requiring sanding while rotating at speed in a drill. The worst bit, a curved guard round the back of the lamphouse, had unfortunately to be done by hand. My experience of some early nickel plate is pretty negative - either there was nothing better  or they simply didn't put it on thick enough. It detracts from what is otherwise high quality engineering.

First is the highly complex claw mechanism. It's a 3-pin claw and is one of those that does a skip between each pull-down. I don't really know why this approach was ever used - it must increase wear. (Someone has now told me - it means the claw mech is moving twice as fast and so gives a quicker pull-down. I think this means smaller shutter blades and so more light thru to the screen.) The bronze circle at the back is the centrifugal heat shutter. Top left is a little reservoir with a felt pad, which you can fill with oil from the outside thru a little sliding porthole. Second is the partly spherical prism that turns the light from the lamp thru the necessary right angle. Rather better than a tatty bit of mirror. Third is a general view form the back. The back, top and sides of the projector all hinge back in one piece in the direction of the camera to provide excellent access. The odd contraption centre right above the motor is a resistance controlling the brightness of the lamp. This has a mechanical linkage from a knob on the front of the machine, and is also mechanically interlinked with the main switch, so that it is impossible to operate the switch unless the lamp is set at minimum brightness. You can also see the pulley arrangement for the top spool arm, which can be pushed down until the spindle is only just above the top of the machine.

Pic 4 is the unusual two-part front gate. The non-aperture plate is mounted on three springs and has a tension adjustment. I don't know what this is supposed to do. Finally, the complete machine (lens out for cleaning). Like I said, lots of bits suggesting high quality engineering, but that nickel....

SIEMENS

Here is a classic example for you of just how NOT to do it. A while ago, I acquired a (second) Siemens 16mm pre-war silent projector. They made several variations on the them, including both claw and beater mechanisms and 9.5, 16 and dual models. My first was a beater 16, this second is a claw 16. The problem with the second machine was that when switched on, the lamp lit but there was no sign whatever of life from the motor. On examination, the mech proved to be pretty stiff, and oiling and running the machine with a drill/driver attached to a conveniently-accessible end of the motor shaft did not help. So I gradually took more and more bits of, trying to find where the stiffness originated. I think this was the first big mistake; attacking the job piecemeal with no clear idea of what I was going to do or how far I was going to dismantle. The second was relying far too much on memory. In the good old days, I could expect a fair degree of recall of how a projector was put together, even after a gap of several months. I did actually label most, but not all, of the wires I disconnected, but the problem is, I can no longer understand some of the things I wrote on the labels.

So, let this be a lesson to me and to you to work always in an organised way, with photo's, plans, sketches, diagrams and whatever (assuming you don't have a workshop manual), so that you don't face the task I had with this machine. I dismantled it ages ago; I've been putting off rebuilding it partly because I had found no solution, partly because it was very fiddly and partly because I knew I hadn't got good enough records of how to.

It was Paul Schimmel who put me on the right path. I had had to remove the motor, because there was no other way to uncouple it from the mech to see where the problem was, and it was the motor itself that was the problem. I had spotted that the brushes seemed to be at an odd angle to the commutator, but was then stuck. Paul spotted it was Mazak distortion, loosened one of the screws holding the motor and lo! - the mech freed up. Some considerable time had already elapsed, and I continued to prevaricate until the other day. I finally got it back together and wired up as best I could in line with this wiring diagram. I have marked with a ? the connections I'm not really sure of.

However, perhaps my crowning folly was with the reversing switch. I didn't think it through, and just assumed that, in neutral, the motor would not run and, as shown in my wiring sketch, there should be no electrical contact made. What I subsequently came to realise was that the motor could not stop on neutral as the lamp would still be on and there was a mechanical linkage as well to the reversing lever that took care of that side of things. So I had needlessly bent the contacts, with no idea now of how they had been originally. I tried the projector, but I got no lamp even and still nothing from the motor. All I got was a red-hot glow from some thin windings at the lower end of the internal resistance, which may or may not have been there before. I wasn't too surprised the motor wouldn't work; even if I got the wiring right, it may well have been burnt out long before I got it. And the wires from the motor are single-core and therefore stiff; I may well have damaged them. Ron Ashton (Siemens Guru) tells me this Mazak business is a known problem with these machines and can readily cause them to be scrapped. Anyone need some spares?

Not, I think you will agree, my finest hour.

Here are some pix of my Siemens with the beater mech, showing how it changes size to effect the pull-down. I assume the extra roller at the top of the gate is needed because of the beater.

I have included pix of the claw machine to show that there are a surprising number of detailed changes and, of course, to show you some chitterlings. The beater has an inching knob on the back; the claw one is at the front immediately below the lens. Here's a publicity blurb.

Ensign

Bell and Howell

At one point I spent a lot of time working on various machines to try to meet a request for a 16mm silent. I had a go at a Specto 8/16, which appeared to have the 16mm gate missing, as well as the condenser lens, a B&H 613 with the wires rotting in the base and out of which a peep I could not get. Then a Specto 16, 400ft arms, claw jamming, then when freed picking at the film. Originally used a resistance, presumably for a 110v lamp, but I just shorted across and used a mains one. The only one that actually seems to work properly was an American motion analyser-type B&H 173. It has a crank handle which comes into play when you operate the  clutch, with a frame counter above the gate. It also has a large rotary thing on the back of the motor, which is graduated with what are presumably rpm numbers - it seems that this is a machine that gives a variable fixed speed. Only 400ft capacity, tho' and suffering from neglect and damp rusting the chrome bits.

 Actually, this machine I can't identify has something of the same air as the B&H 173. It looks like a so-called designer of the 70's took the old B&H silent (right) and "re-styled" it. It's very horrible.

Kodak

An unadorned Kodatoy, with the separately-available 400' extension arms, and one someone has, for some reason, gone to town on. The stack contains a "C" in it's case ( It's just a square steel box, leatherette covered, with a handle (missing on mine, but standard type. I acquired it years ago as it was in very good condition.)  and the rather more refined "D" at the top.

Although the two machines latter machines are very similar, there are a number of differences. The most important is the lamp; the C consumes 150w with a 100w lamp. The D uses 350w with, presumably, (not got one in mine) a 300w lamp. This in turn necessitates a proper fan with air ducted towards the lamphouse. The other changes are minor or cosmetic; the D has no rewind handle, power rewinding being provided. The outer skin of the lamphouse is a much more attractive perforated metal affair, rather than the nasty wire affair of the C, and is a nice bronze colour rather than Model T Ford black. This perforated pattern is extended to the motor speed control housing and a neat little cover over the top of the mech. In the C (well, mine, at least) the mech just open. It's only a 0.5in. slot between two steel plated that form the main frame. The speed control itself is a rheostat on the D; the C has what seems to be one of those carbon compression jobbies. The only other difference I've spotted is the threaded storage hole the D has for the lens. There are two different patterns of gate spring on my two C's; one is simply a loop of spring steel, the apparently later version, which is also on the D, uses an arm with a coil spring.

I have three different motors between three machines. One C has a Westinghouse, made in Springfield, showing signs of Mazac spalling. The other is from the North East Electric Co of Rochester. It has brushes at 90 degrees to each other rather than opposite; I can't recall ever seeing such a thing before. Sadly, one of the wires is broken off so far inside I can't fix it. The D has a Delco, again Rochester.

This is a Kodak loaned by Pat Moules. It's in virtually mint, unused condition and, for a marvel, so is the box - these so rarely survive in really good condition.

Ampro

You can clearly see that this is what the later sound Ampro mech was developed from, if "very little change" can be called development.