Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Century (Westrex) MeltDown -- Help!

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Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 07-10-2003, 03:21 AM:

It's only one week before opening night and one of my Century heads crashes. This is the Century that has the Westrex logo on the window and I think they designated them as SAW or SWA, not sure -- they have the water cooled gate.

I was doing an alignment test to prefocus all the lens stops and suddenly a rhythmical knocking sound starts -- I couldn't determine the sound's precisely location but it sounded bad enough that I didn't want to leave the motor running, but before I could turn off the motor, the noise got MUCH louder and changed to a grinding sound. I stopped the machine and found that I couldn't turn it over by hand. Obviously some serious damage has occurred. Looking at the gearbox I couldn't see anything overt -- none of the visible break-away gears were damaged, nothing seemed loose with excessive play or misaligned.

But it makes no difference because I am not asking for suggestions as to what may be going on -- I am not giving enough info for that. I just need to rush this head to a reputable shop perferably in the New York area for repair. What I really want to know is if anyone can recommend a decent repair shop?

Mind you, this is a refurbished machine and if I were to add up all the shows we've run since we purchased it four years ago, the projector could not have run more than 25 to 30 hours worth of film through it. It certainly shouldn't be having catastrophic problems. I've got two XLs that have been running since 1975 without so much as a hickup. I kind of expected the same from the Century.

I have a Super Simplex head in storage; as a last resort I was thinking of putting this in (the Century sits on a Simplex SH1000 sound head). Only thing is, we are running 4.5Kw lamps --should I worry about excessive heat in Super head as it doesn't have a water cooled gate or air turbine cooling like the Century?

Any help would be very much appreciated. Otherwise, I run CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON on a single machine.

Frank

PS -- Yes, in 3D -- anaglyphic 3D....gag me with a spoon.

Posted by Pete Naples (Member # 761) on 07-10-2003, 03:49 AM:

As none of the gears are visibly damaged, and going by the noise it made before siezing, I'd say that your intermittent is the problem. Try loosening the four screws that hold it into the carriage, rotate the intermittent in the carriage so that it's disengaged from the gear train, and see if you can turn the mech over. If so, then you need an intermittent.

Posted by Mike Pennell (Member # 1692) on 07-10-2003, 04:12 AM:

Frank, you dont need to take the whole head in for work. Find someone who can loan you a spare intermittant while you get your's repaired. Its an easy swap out, follow the directions it the manual, and re-time the shutter. Also check for any gear damage from the ceizing of the intermittant. Was there oil in the intermittant?

Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 07-10-2003, 11:26 AM:

From the photos in the warehouse those machines are actually century SWA not a westar/westrex. ICECO has a policy of sticking a Westar name plate on every machine they sell even if it isn't correct. This has on occasion caused numerous legal problems when I have imported equipment that the name plate didn't match the manefest at customs

Posted by Bill Gabel (Member # 1105) on 07-10-2003, 11:37 AM:

Frank

One company we use is Cinema Technology Services L.L.C.
(845) 354-6563 , they are in the New York area.

Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 07-10-2003, 11:42 AM:

Oooh, Bad ICECO.

And yes, the intermittant certainly is suspect. Out it comes. I also found a repair shop today that a small chain uses here in Brooklyn and they should have an intermittant that I can swap out.

Thanks guys.

Frank

And PS -- just for my curiosity, how big of a lamp do you think a Super can stand without any water cooling or that extra forced air for the gate?

Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 07-10-2003, 02:13 PM:

Frank, remove the intermittent then let us know if the projector can be turned over by hand easily. If not, I'll bet it's something silly like a screw worked it's way loose from a gear. Down in the Century soundhead there is a screw on a gear behind the flywheel I've seen come loose and it will seize the entire projector if not shut down quick enough.

Did it make any noises before it seized? When you get the intermittent out, can you spin it by hand with ease?

Posted by Dave Macaulay (Member # 813) on 07-10-2003, 04:48 PM:

4500W would be likely too hot for a platter show, you might get by on 2000' changeovers but the trap would probably be damned hot by the end of a reel.
The actual heat depends on the mirror. Some glass mirrors are amazingly cool and you might get away with it. Some metal mirrors are pretty good but with both glass and metal the coatings can degrade or be damaged, and pass more IR than when new. Both metal and glass mirrors can be made with no "cold light" coating at all and need additional heat filters even with much smaller lamps. The only way to find out would be to try running open gate for a while (remove the lens!) and see how hot the thing gets... In desperation you could set up a shopvac as a blower pointed towards the gate area.
Swapping Century intermittents is easy - remove the shutter flywheel, loosen the clamp screws, and it just twists and pulls out. You should be able to get the shutter timing by trial and error; take a look, twist the intermittent a bit to disengage the gears, turn the motor a bit then try again. If you opt to loosen the shutter screws and set it that way, center the shutter timing adjuster first. If it makes a terrifying clatter when you first run it you probably forgot to put the flywheel on...

Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 07-12-2003, 04:02 PM:

Crisis averted, sort of. BTW, my mistake, this head is a DAW, not SAW which ICECO calls a Westar. So I went to pull the intermittent as Brad suggested; removing the screws and rotating it disengaged it from the gear train so when I went to remove the flywheel, turning it I found the intermittent was unremarkable, i.e., it turned like whipped butter. So there was no real reason to actually remove it as I could feel it was turning freely.

So next I figure, it's the gear train itself, so I pushed the head back to disengage it from the soundhead drive gear. I turned the threading knob and the mechanism and that also was unremarkable. It turned smooth as silk.

Ah, says I, it MUST be either the soundhead transmission gears or the motor itself. I drained the oil from the soundhead to see if the brass gears were floating in it like happened to me once before. No, just a touch of gold color in the oil which, because of my paranoia about this particular possibility, concerned me but, later I was told that it was normal.

Now I turned on the motor -- UNREMARKABLE -- the motor and soundhead hummed along like they didn't have a care in the world. I even removed the motor flywheel cover so I could feel the motor and soundhead turning over by hand (this is a Bodin motor that has no shaft handle on the front to turn). The flywheel turned LIKE BUTTER. No resistance, not even any "funky spots" in the rotation....nothing at all -- motor and soundhead unremarkable. I put them all back together, and although I didn't feel the total resistance that I did when the "event" occurred, there was some funky points when I hand turned the motor flywheel.

Here comes Roger (Bill -- he's Roger of the defunct but legendary RMS) and he felt the motor flywheel and then checked the intermittent and said the slight resistance was only that I had rotated the intermittent back too tightly -- he loosened it a bit, showed me how much play I should feel in it and showed me how to time the dual blade shutter, which I had never done before.

Bottom line, now the machine purrs away like a baby kitten. Why am I still uneasy? Roger could only give me possibilities of why the thing made that loud knocking sound and then the grinding sound and then couldn't be turned over: possibly the projector head slipped so that the drive gears were meshing too tightly, the intermittent was too tight, etc., none of which seemed likely to either of us.

I am not comfortable with the cause of such a catastrophic failure needing to be chalked up to the perversity of inanimate objects; confidence, as the say at the FBI, is low for this machine. But it's running perfectly so how do you argue with success? If it fails again, I won't settle for anything less than completely ripping it apart to find out the cause (and hopefully really causing it some serious pain).

And again, thanks for all the suggestions, and Bill, especially for that contact number.

Frank

PS -- I was told that it is not good to turn the machine by what I thought was the threading knob -- it sits on the lens side of the head. So I am thinking of leaving the cover off the motor flywheel so I can hand crank the machine during threading. I know it is not too safe, but I need to be able to turn the thing over, right?

Also, he said that I should seriously consider putting an external exhaust fan in the range of 400-500cpf on top of the ORC exhaust shoot. We are burning 4.5Kw lamps and he said the ORC is notorious for not having enough cooling power in that lamphouse. Any suggestions? Somewhere along the line here I remember someone saying that you can also shorten the life of the bulbs by TOO much cooling. How do you know if what you are adding will make things worse and not better?

Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 07-12-2003, 04:43 PM:

Have you ran any film through it yet? Make yourself a junk loop and be sure to do so, turning the projector on and off several times. If I am reading your post correctly, the machine seized a few days ago, then miraculously today without doing anything to it all is now fine??? This really sounds to me like a set screw on a gear worked it's way loose, seizing it up, and now it has completely fallen out, permitting the machine to spin freely again. If that's the case, you're up for some major film damage as that gear spins on it's shaft out of sync with the rest of the projector. Run that loop before you put anything good in there. I may be completely wrong here, but please do at least run some loops with multiple starting and stopping of the projector before you run any good film.

Posted by Ken McFall (Member # 845) on 07-12-2003, 06:14 PM:

Be afraid... be very afraid!

Everything has a cause.... and a cure. You've not cured it so the cause is still there. It won't happen until there are bum's on seats so as Brad say's work the projector real hard.

Sorry nothing really useful to add just bored and felt the need [Big Grin]

[ 07-15-2003, 11:37 AM: Message edited by: Ken McFall ]

Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 07-12-2003, 06:21 PM:

The knob that sticks out the front by the lens mount is the end of the shutter shaft
The reason it isn't advisable to use it to inch the machine over is you are then trying to drive the soundhead and motor. Since the SH1000 uses a pinion gear to couple to the motor you are ineffect trying to turn a worm gear which is a no no
use the flywheel on the motor or the knob on the end of the motor to inch the machine over

Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 07-15-2003, 01:36 AM:

Exactly my sentiments -- BE AFRAID....BE VERY AFRAID. This thing is bound to come back and bite me, I know. And yes, after we timed the shutter, we put an RP40 test loop in and ran it, but not hard like Brad is suggesting -- just to see if there was any ghosting. No apparent problem with the gears not synching properly.

Tomorrow I will run some junk and really stress it as much as I can with On/Off cycling. Then wait for the other shoe to drop, which propably will happen under that full moon with 5000 people watching.

And worse yet, it's not like I can easily just run on the other projector on long play reels since this is not just a straight projection but a "specialty" artsy event with a live orchestra playing along with the film -- if I have to stop for each reel, the musicians may or may not be talented enough to pick up the pace, although I say tough luck for the them -- I'll have my hands full stopping and threading after each reel while the audience throws all that concessions stuff at the scaffolding booth.

AND what's worse, I can't mount the thing on 6000ft reels, which would be a major help in case I do loose that machine. This is a print that belongs to some university (they paid to have it struck) and they are loaning it on the one condition which they reitereated over and over: No platters; no long play reels - NO SPLICING. So, if this head craps out during the show, it will be one major mess.

Could this BE any more fun?!! [Roll Eyes]

Frank

Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 07-15-2003, 02:44 AM:

It's a good thing that university didn't specify "no film damage", because if your projector takes a dump, it will be on that print. [Razz]

Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 07-15-2003, 08:18 AM:

Before that important show with a valuable print, I'd run LOTS of scrap film and TRY to make the projector go into the failure mode. Going ahead with a dicy projector that is likely to fail during an important show is not career-enhancing. [Roll Eyes]

Just another hunch for when you have unpredictable "knocking" or "clunking" sounds --- is the large intermittent flywheel firmly attached to the shaft, and well-balanced?

Posted by Daryl C. W. O'Shea (Member # 1303) on 07-15-2003, 05:52 PM:

quote:
I'll have my hands full stopping and threading after each reel while the audience throws all that concessions stuff at the scaffolding booth.

AND what's worse, I can't mount the thing on 6000ft reels, which would be a major help in case I do loose that machine. ... NO SPLICING. So, if this head craps out during the show, it will be one major mess.

If worse comes to worse, you could always splice the reels together without removing the head and tail leaders. Then just shut off the sound and close the douser for ~30 seconds at each reel change. At most you'd have to cut a total of three perfs off of one of the leaders on each reel to keep it in frame. Or, you could just reframe it at each reel change if need be.

Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 07-16-2003, 01:34 AM:

Nicely put Brad. [Big Grin]

John, yes, it is balanced and timed -- this is the first Century I've worked on in 30 years so I am not intimately knowledgeable, but a service tech made a visit and spent a few hours double checking everything, showed me how much play there should be, and after all the prodding and poking, he couldn't find anything wrong. So, maybe it was something simple -- maybe a piece of gack that had somehow work its way in when they moved the heads up to the scaffold booth, rather than any screws or nuts coming loose; I am assuming the tech guy would have seen that.

And Daryl, as they say here in Brooklyn...."Not for nuthin" but that is actually a great idea (I do that all the time at the film festivals when I am working with "this is the only print" prints). I may go that route, if only I can convince them to send that live orchestra home!

Thanks to all -- will report back after the show.

Frank

Posted by Bruce McGee (Member # 131) on 07-16-2003, 08:21 AM:

If you let the machine just sit there and run for a couple of hours with the lamp turned off, wouldn't that help to see if the machine can be trusted? OR? does the tension of the film being pulled through the trap cause the intermittent to heat-up?

My Holmes machines (not in the same league, I know!) get warm after running for an hour or more, but dont get hot.

My $.02 worth.

Posted by Ken McFall (Member # 845) on 07-16-2003, 08:26 AM:

Frank you could well be screwed either way...

If you run it for a few hours and its ok it could breakdown when running... so if you hadn't run it it might have got thru the show.

But if you don't run it and it breaks down... why didn't you run it!

Bet you're getting paranoid by now....

Make sure you've got a pair of clean pants with you on the night [Big Grin]

Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 07-16-2003, 03:14 PM:

I'd turn that puppy on and let her run for a few days. When you are around, run an acetate loop through it with a weighted roller on the bottom.

Posted by Rick Long (Member # 213) on 07-17-2003, 02:28 AM:

Frank, for what the hell it's worth, we're all sitting there with you on the scaffold that night.

PLEASE let us know how it worked out.

Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 07-17-2003, 06:09 AM:

Ran it all day yesterday, starting, stopping, splicy acetate film, loops....couldn't make it even hiccup. I think it will be OK.

BTW, I used Greg Mueller's Align-O-Tron, and I am getting much better light out of both old ORC lamphouses and with none of the freakin hotspots that I had been plagued with in the past. Really quite amazing. When you have the right tools.....!

I appreciate the goodwill, guys. They predict a nice breezy night tonight. Will let you know how it goes.

Frank

Posted by Martin Brooks (Member # 1269) on 07-17-2003, 11:54 PM:

I was at Frank's show tonight and it went off without a hitch.

SIX THOUSAND PEOPLE (!) showed up in Brooklyn's Prospect Park to watch Creature From the Black Lagoon in 3D with a live jazz score and overdubbed dialogue. I couldn't tell whether the overdubbed dialogue was live or prerecorded, but the sound quality on both the dialogue and the orchestra was phenomenal. The score was ingenious and the subtle dialogue changes and line readings were completely hilarious. And what made it so effective was the great sound - tremendous balance and presence to the dialogue and music - sounded better than the best six track 70mm mag mix. The print was pristine except for one scratch at a changeover, but Frank's changeovers were perfect. Considering this was a temporary setup and the projectors were mounted on scaffolds, this was extraordinary.

I expected to be bored and instead walked away having the best night of filmed entertainment in a very long time. Kudos to all involved in this venture.

Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 07-18-2003, 02:58 AM:

Thanks Martin....my only regret tonight was not being able to come down to say hello (they chain us up there), and you can't even shout back and forth because the booth is just a torrent of turbine and fan noise, even with the projectors off. Nonetheless, it was teriffic seeing a friendly face in that huge audience.

I must admit, when you've got 6000 people in the audience and a whole orchestra waiting to start playing, I felt an abundance of butterflies in the stomach until we got rolling. I looked out over the crowd way back to the lawn people up way back to the fence (could these people actually perceive 3D that far back?), and I realized that the only projectionist in the country who could present a film to that large an audience would be the guy who works (worked, I should say) at Radio City Music Hall -- no more motion pictures at the Great Lady. But then the RCMH projectionist didn;t get the incredible rush hearing the audience ohh and ahh at all the 3D effects and laugh at the clever overdubbed dialogue, some of which had me laughing out loud. A very unique experience indeed.

Yes, I was in seventh heaven at the end of the night. I guess for all the worring about Projector #1, it ran sweet as a baby. Perhaps it was all the tech support and good wishes from you guys. Thanks again.

And to answer Martin's question, yes, they were actually lip-syncing the dialogue; pretty amazing, huh?. They were so close sometimes you actually thought it was the film track, but we only sent the film sound to the effects man's headset. He heard film soundtrack in one ear and his CD in the other. All the soundeffects were wild and played on a speed controlled CD which he kept in sync manually by listening to it in his other ear. The only time we ran filmsound was for the attractions (wasn't that Ed Sullivan trailer for GUYS AND DOLLS a hoot? ...and RED as beet!)

That's it for me.....Good night all.

Frank

Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 07-18-2003, 03:01 AM:

Incredible! Wish I could've been there to see it. Don't suppose anyone took pictures?

Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 07-19-2003, 10:15 PM:

Yup, we did. Here's the one that is so reminiscent of those early pics of the 3D movie audiences. This also will give you some idea of what 6000 people all watching a movie together look like:

These also:

And:

Finally:

All photos by Robert Smith

We want to say in the press release that 6000 people is the largest gathering of people to watch a movie EVER in New York City, but Radio City has just over 6000 seats, so maybe there they might beat us, but we definately are safe if we state "in the New York City Outer Boroughs." There never was any theatre in Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island, or the Bronx that came even close to that number. Not that it makes any difference....it certainly was a big enough crowd for me and (as we used to say in the 70s) a TOTAL rush!

Frank

Posted by Andrew Duggan (Member # 1302) on 07-20-2003, 12:03 AM:

Wow, those pictures are wild & that whole thing sounds really awesome. Way to pull out of a spectacular nose dive! [Wink]

I was just trying to explain to my friend tonight, that jumpy, excited and nervous feeling you get when you run a REALLY important show to a full house, even moreso with a print or piece of equipment that's a little "iffy". A park full of 6000 people, an orchestra and a university all screaming for your blood when a projector eats [bs]

....man....that sounds like a scenario out of a nightmare! Releived to hear how well that went for you!

Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 07-20-2003, 08:38 PM:

Final PS to this thing -- the print WAS mint. Not a splice in it, not even on the head of R1 where even 2000ft change-over houses usually splice in their Feature Attraction snipe. The only splices I made was to add a two foot section of frame line leader to each reel at the front end before the lab gack so that I could thread up without having to deal with pulling the 25ft of lab frame line-less footage that was on the head of each reel. Lots of gack film before the body of the print is great for protection (Brad, don't you recommend 50ft?), but it's not so good for keeping dirt off the film while the projectionist is forced to pull it all off the supply reel to get to threadable frame lines. Adding that short bit of frame line film to the front end (synced of course so it's in frame with the body of the print) is really helpful in keeping the film from touching anything other than the mechanism.

Frank

Posted by John Hawkinson (Member # 1135) on 07-20-2003, 10:26 PM:

Personally, I just go with a piece of tape and a sharpie line
a few feet in from the head...

--jhawk

Posted by Daryl C. W. O'Shea (Member # 1303) on 07-21-2003, 01:30 AM:

As long as you're winding the film directly onto the takeup reel and not the floor, the film shouldn't get dirty, aside from finger prints where you thread up.

Posted by Dan Lyons (Member # 1454) on 07-21-2003, 04:21 AM:

From looking at the screen shots, I'm not sure I'd call that Eastman RED print mint. What is the "mint" film you showed?

Danny

Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 07-21-2003, 05:30 AM:

Frank said it was just an old trailer, not the feature:

quote:
...wasn't that Ed Sullivan trailer for GUYS AND DOLLS a hoot? ...and RED as beet!)