CALUMET solid state shutter tester...... HELP!

[Bogdan Karasek]

It must be turned off following each reading and then back on for the next. There is no way to get "continuous" reading.

Sorry, What I meant by continuous, was that I could take one reading after another (continuous). And then after several reading, no more numbers.. I would turn it on and off. Nothing.

[Bogdan Karasek]

Thanks all for your input, very helpful. I have a feeling that the problem is the innards 0f the tester, resistors. capacitators ,and what have you that has gone wonky.

I would get several on/off consecutive readings and then nothing, on/off 5-6x and nothing. Then I would hold the tester right up against the 150w enlarger bulb and the readout would start and I could get and several readings on the shutter before the cycle repeats... Makes for very tedious shutter testing.... Methinks that it may be whatever it is that captures the light. Anyway, a friend who is very competent in electronics has offered to look at the patient's innards.

The shutter that I was testing had been tested yesterday by my friend above, so I had a point of comparison as to whether the tester gave the right readings..... With the results I did manage to get, from 1s> 1/200, they correlated very closely, 1/3f variation in one case. Then the tester stops working, as I pointed out above, with the ensuing cycles......

Regards, Bogdan

[Luis-F-S]

Mine gives reading after reading and runs continuously with the bright light on it. You don't have to turn it off until you're done. A tensor high intensity lamp shining straight down on the lens works great.

+1 that's how mine works. If you don't get a reading you do usually need the light is not writing enough . I use an LED bulb without any issues. L

[Kevin Crisp]

I'd also vote for a bad capacitor in the circuit.

[Drew Wiley]

Ditto

[Bogdan Karasek]

A friend who is savvy in these kind of things is going to have a look at it, He thinks either a bad capacitor, or bad cold weld. I'll know in a few days and will report back.

[Alan Gales]

It's 50 years old, it may have internal difficulties. Corrosion, a capacitor, resistor can go bad from age. I think some sellers pass on defectives...

I've got three of them so I can cross check with all three to make sure of accuracy.

I bought one on Ebay that arrived DOA. I contacted the Seller and they refunded my money no problem. The way they acted I'm sure they knew it didn't work when they listed it.

There are always some people.

[Bogdan Karasek]

It must be turned off following each reading and then back on for the next. There is no way to get "continuous" reading.

I finally had the Calumet shutter tester cleaned by a friend and it is working fine. To do a reset, you don't have to turn it off completely, just press the button enough to get a reset,so this way you don't have to turn on and off.

I tested my leaf shutters. Now I want to test my focalplane shutters, Leica, Nikon, Exakta, Bessa, and several Speed Graphics. The manual is not very clear on this. Any input from somebody who has done it would be very welcome.

[Dan Fromm]

What on page 2 of the instructions is hard to understand?

[dom]

Mine has this on the back.