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Topic: The best 35mm projector

Mark Gulbrandsen
Resident Trollmaster

Posts: 16657
From: Music City
Registered: Jun 99

posted 01-02-2007 05:06 PM

Naw Phil.... Actually you are the real BRUTE!

Mark

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Steve Guttag
We forgot the crackers Gromit!!!

Posts: 12814
From: Annapolis, MD
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 01-02-2007 05:16 PM

Scott, The Century failure rate seems about 10:1 given similar operators. Main drives and shutter gear failures are quite common. I'll address Mark's wrongness later.

Steve

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Louis Bornwasser
Film God

Posts: 4441
From: prospect ky usa
Registered: Mar 2005

posted 01-02-2007 05:24 PM

Century "troubles" are mostly related to the extremely bad gears made by Wolk, ORC and LaVezzi during a certain period in the late 80's and early 90's. If older they are workhorses and if later can be extremely reliable with only a little care.

As far as wow & flutter, NO ONE beats a properly set up Century MSA (direct drive). It, of course, has a Davis bridge. No one else has ever tried another "closed loop" design. (It works slightly less well in the SA standard drive model due to problems in the projector drive belt.) Louis

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Mark Gulbrandsen
Resident Trollmaster

Posts: 16657
From: Music City
Registered: Jun 99

posted 01-03-2007 08:15 AM

quote: Louis Bornwasser
Century "troubles" are mostly related to the extremely bad gears made by Wolk, ORC and LaVezzi during a certain period in the late 80's and early 90's. If older they are workhorses and if later can be extremely reliable with only a little care.

Absolutely correct... I don't see anywhere near a 10 to 1 failure rate... and this is with Booth Monkeys running the equipment.

quote: Louis Bornwasser
As far as wow & flutter, NO ONE beats a properly set up Century MSA (direct drive).

I always measured all machines running film all the way through the film path....

Century MSA.... .09% at lowest dip on meter.

Kalee model 21... .065% at lowest dip on meter.

.05 is about the residual level on the old SMPTE W&F test Film.

Sorry

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Richard Fowler
Film God

Posts: 2392
From: Ft. Lauderdale, FL, USA
Registered: Jun 2001

posted 01-03-2007 09:31 AM

The pressure angle on Century gearing was state of the start of the art design for the late 1930's.....the era of small reels and changeovers. Steve Krams of ICECO/Magnatech, with the help of an engineering department of a University, experimented with gears of a different angle which gave much more life. The option never got too far due to people comfortable with "standard" Century issues which have allowed many service people reliable income.

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Gordon McLeod
Film God

Posts: 9532
From: Toronto Ontario Canada
Registered: Jun 99

posted 01-03-2007 11:48 AM

Westrex in the UK used a different gear angle with much better life

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Mark Gulbrandsen
Resident Trollmaster

Posts: 16657
From: Music City
Registered: Jun 99

posted 01-03-2007 03:10 PM

quote: Richard Fowler
Steve Krams of ICECO/Magnatech, with the help of an engineering department of a University, experimented with gears of a different angle which gave much more life. The option never got too far due to people comfortable with "standard" Century issues which have allowed many service people reliable income.

I tried several sets of those gears a number of years back. No real advantage for me... they lsat about the same length of time as a regular gear pair does... they are finer pitch teeth. They did run seemingly quieter though.

There are a pair of Westrex 35mm machines in Cody, WY that are in excess of 40 years old and are still running with ALL the original parts except for some of the film path parts and one C/O coil.

Then of course the Brits made a soundhead with the lowest W&F spec. I've ever measured in an optical reproducer [thumbsup]

!!

Mark

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William Del Valle
Film Handler

Posts: 7
From: Houston,Texas ,United States
Registered: Jan 2006

posted 01-10-2007 03:07 PM

which projector is the best is a matter of opinion and who or what you learned on and are most confortable with. Muself i have been a Century man most of my life (i'm 65) about 15 years ago i went to work for AMC and they had Christies. I grew to love those machines, they were easy to thread. Even the do-do kids they hired had no problem in running them. they were easy to maintain. They (Christie) had changed frim a metal drive intermitten gear to a fiber one, after about six months the gear was making so much noise that gear it had to be changed. Until i discovered that reversing the gear gave the fiberr gear new life. otherwise they were great machines.

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Cameron Glendinning
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 845
From: West Ryde, Sydney, NSW Australia
Registered: Dec 2005

posted 01-10-2007 09:37 PM

quote: Mark Gulbrandsen
Kalee model 21... .065% at lowest dip on meter.

Yes but for how long? My memories of working with these machines was that every few months, wow and flutter would become noticable. So off came the back, unscrew a locking device for the bolt on the sound sprocket, flip it over, screw it back on and presto, clear sound.

Mark, I wish that I was financially able to be a serious buyer of your VistaVision gear. I hope it finds a good home.

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Vaughn Hamrick
Film Handler

Posts: 21
From: Jacksonville , Florida USA
Registered: Dec 2006

posted 01-17-2007 08:50 AM

I'm fond of Century projectors.Fewer gears to worry about,very low maintenance and easy on film.I've also worked with Simplexes,Cinemacaniccas and Brenkerts.

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Monte L Fullmer
Film God

Posts: 8367
From: Nampa, Idaho, USA
Registered: Nov 2004

posted 01-17-2007 02:28 PM

quote: Vaughn Hamrick
I'm fond of Century projectors

...just keep your eyes peeled to the oil level in the intermittent assembly...and keep that front "Oilite" bearing lubed as well.

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Ben Wales
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 602
From: Southampton. England
Registered: Jul 99

posted 07-15-2007 05:46 PM

quote: Bernard Tonks
I did my training on the BTH model KB projector, so it was my favourite for sometime. For an open machine they ran very quietly, film absolutely purred

Interesting there will be two BTH KB's coming on the Market for sale from two private collectors in the UK.

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Mark Gulbrandsen
Resident Trollmaster

Posts: 16657
From: Music City
Registered: Jun 99

posted 07-15-2007 06:04 PM

quote: Steve Guttag
The Century failure rate seems about 10:1 given similar operators.

I've just not seen that kinda failure rate ever on Centurys. Out here The Simplex X-L contines to be the most repaired projector but in all fairness there are more of them and I attribute at least half the repairs I do on them to the poor quality and bad designs from Strong that were supposed to update them. Never the less I just don't see 10 to 1 failure rate in Centurys. If they were that bad they'd have never sold so many of them nor wold they still be making them to this day.

Mark

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Steve Guttag
We forgot the crackers Gromit!!!

Posts: 12814
From: Annapolis, MD
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 07-15-2007 06:46 PM

The Simplex has routinely outsold the Century. Just what sort of failures are you seeing in the Simplex? It is a very rare bird for us to see a Simplex cause a show to be lost. That is not the case for the Century projectors where a main drive gear can give way pretty easily. In fact, we have a Century "field" kit that has most everything a Century can wear out...never needed such a kit for the Simplex.

Steve

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John Walsh
Film God

Posts: 2490
From: Connecticut, USA, Earth, Milky Way
Registered: Oct 1999

posted 07-15-2007 07:10 PM

I am a big fan of the Cinemeccanica V9. Seemed to have the right combination of 'toughness" (V8 intermittent) and simple, open frame design. I had good luck with V5's also, but I felt the V5 was just a little too lightweight. The V5-8-9 series seemed to be designed such that, while easy to thread and keep clean, the internal parts are hard to replace (although they don't often need to be.) Whereas, with some American projectors they are harder to thread, (more rollers, etc.) but internal parts can be changed quicker.

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