This is topic Replacement Traps (Century) in forum Film Handlers' Forum at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.
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Posted by Randy Stankey (Member # 64) on 01-19-2000, 06:41 PM:
At TT-17, we have a couple of proj. with bent trap castings. (The "horns" that hold the lat. guide wheels) -- The bone heads that bent them are all "gone". Trouble is, we're still stuck with the busted equip.We're thinking about replacing them (2) with the Kelmar (SA-TA) 'retrofit'traps. The idea is that we can put the new traps in the two big houses and put the traps from those two in the busted ones. Those ones could then be used for spare parts...
Anybody have experience with these? Are they truly drop-in / plug-and-play ? Of course, the aperture plates need to be swapped so they stay in their orig. houses...
Are they really worth it, or would it be better to get O.E.M. parts? (OR, is there another mfg. that makes better parts?) I've heard that the Kelmar ones are good, but I haven't really seen them.
Any feedback?
Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 01-19-2000, 10:41 PM:
I'd also be interested in knowing if the Kelmar traps are any good. Actually, I didn't know that Kelmar made replacement parts for Century film traps...
When I was working at a theatre, one of the two projectors was having edge-to-edge focus problems. The manager wanted to buy a new trap until he found out that they cost $700 and that the new ones aren't necessarily any better than the old ones. I spent about an hour fiddling with the guides and the rollers on the old trap (which had apparently been dropped and bent) and got the film to run pretty much flat, with good sharpness from edge to edge. For a part that's this expensive, it's worth spending some time fiddling with the old part before replacing it outright.
Posted by Randy Stankey (Member # 64) on 01-19-2000, 10:57 PM:
I've tried to straighten the 'horns' out and have done a fair job of it, if I say so myself, but to tell the truth, once they've been bent there's no way to get them back to 100%.You have to be very careful not to bust the horns off when you bend them back and you can't really tell just how far back to bend them. You can only 'eyeball' them. I just did the best I could, realigned the lat. guide wheels and told the tech. about it next time I saw him. He used the alignment guage on it and said it was about as good as it can be. (After he worked on it.) At this point it's either replace it or live with it, he said.
Like you said, just the new CASTING costs $700! You still have to take all the parts off your old trap and put them all togehter CORRECTLY. With the aperture changer, that's a lot of work!
I figure IF the new traps from Kelmar are truly a drop-in, plug-and-play replacement, (Or at least MOSTLY), it'll be worth it. That way you won't have to fiddle around getting things right and you won't have to call the tech. to re-align everything. (PLUS you've got a few spare parts!)
http://www.kelmarsystems.com/page26.html
Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 01-20-2000, 09:45 AM:
I believe you have to buy the turret with the gate trap assembly and the new Sankor HD lens are physically to long to fit in them and allow the turret to rotate