Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Westrex Tower Capacity w/36" reels

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Posted by Amanda Mundin (Member # 3386) on 10-02-2005, 04:21 AM:

Hi Everyone
I'm setting up a new cinema in the UK and have a Westrex double sided tower with 36inch reels, I believe these are about 13,000ft reels, I have heard that the capacity of reels are based on acetate stock and that since all new films are printed on polyester (thinner) stock you will actually fit more on a reel, any ideas what the max. capacity of one of these reels will be in feet or time?
Thanks in advance...

Posted by Pete Naples (Member # 761) on 10-02-2005, 05:09 AM:

Amanda, hello and welcome to Film-Tech!

Good choice on the Westrex 5035, they are easy enough to use, and indestructable. Contrary to popular belief, they do not damage film, if used correctly, follow the makers instructions and all will be well.

As to spool capacity, it depends on the size of the centre hub, there are a few sizes in common use. The Cinemecannica type has the largest hub and therefore the smallest capacity, there are two types available from Rigby, I don't recall the sizes of the hubs offhand, but here's a rough guideline. On the smaller size we used to get the entirety of Pulp Fiction , plus ads and trailers, which is estar based, and came in at a total of about 160 minutes. That equates to 14400 feet.

Posted by Hugh McCullough (Member # 1542) on 10-02-2005, 06:16 AM:

It is possible to get up to 3 hours worth of film onto one of these spools, picture below, made for the Westrex tower.
These have a diamater 2.5ins larger than the normal Westar spools. That is 37.5ins against 35ins.
You will have to increase the take up starting tension by about 20, but when up to speed can be adjusted back to the normal settings that you use.
They can be purchased from Robert Rigby.

Posted by Leo Enticknap (Member # 534) on 10-02-2005, 08:15 AM:

As I mentioned in the now infamous 'soldering iron' thread, the cost of Rigby stuff is into second mortgage territory. It might be worth checking whether Peter Hall has some secondhand ones first.

Posted by Michael Harlow (Member # 1353) on 10-02-2005, 11:28 AM:

www.fproj.com. Peter Hall's website.

Posted by Amanda Mundin (Member # 3386) on 10-02-2005, 03:05 PM:

I do have some reels, they are all 36inch, some seem to have an 8inch centre & some a 10inch centre, most say Premier on, some say Rigby.
Also Pete how do you know the tower is a 5035, or is there only one model of Westrex double sided tower?

Posted by Alan Gouger (Member # 543) on 10-02-2005, 05:15 PM:

Anyone have a picture of one of these. I cannot go with a platter because of limited space so Im looking at alternatives.
Im thinking double mutt or something else. Thank you.

Posted by Mark Hajducki (Member # 1732) on 10-02-2005, 05:32 PM:

There are some some pictures of new single sided towers on This PDF.
The Westrex double sided towers are able to be rotated so they can hold two (13k) films at once and are in wide use in the UK.

Posted by Alan Gouger (Member # 543) on 10-02-2005, 05:55 PM:

Wow I like that single unit. Who sells these in the states.

Thanks for the PDF.

Posted by Mark Hajducki (Member # 1732) on 10-02-2005, 06:41 PM:

I would assume that Kinoton America would be able to advise you.

Posted by Alan Gouger (Member # 543) on 10-03-2005, 04:21 PM:

I just got a quote on a new SPT 5000. WOW, Not what I was expecting. This must be the Cadillac of lines. I'm sure its a good product but ouch.

Posted by Lindsay Morris (Member # 1430) on 10-03-2005, 08:35 PM:

Amanda,
Somewhere amongst my guff on the Eprad Double Mutt I use there is a formula supplied which allows one to calculate the run time of any sized spool.
This covers the varying hub diameters and the overall diam when loaded with a program.
The variable is the film stock used and when this was done only acetate was around and I have had to guess a bit when poly stock is loaded.
It is pretty accurate within 5 or 10 mins and I will dig it out and post it here for general info.
Regards, Lindsay

Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 10-03-2005, 08:37 PM:

I believe the Goldberg Platter Reels are 38 inches diameter with a 10 inch hub. (I can verify tomorrow). Those can hold 2 hours 45-50 minutes of polyester film.

Posted by Daryl C. W. O'Shea (Member # 1303) on 10-03-2005, 08:54 PM:

At best you can fit 18% more tightly wound ESTAR based film on a reel than triacetate based film.

Specifically, the capacity in feet is:

L = (D^2 - C^2) x pi / (48 x t)

Where L is the length in feet.
D is the diameter of the reel in inches.
C is the diameter of the hub in inches.
pi is well, pi (3.14159 ...)
t is the thickness of the film in inches (0.0053" for ESTAR based films, 0.0062" for triacetate)

Posted by Pete Naples (Member # 761) on 10-04-2005, 04:17 AM:

Amanda, there were a few variants of the Westrex Tower, wide line, slim line, single sided, brake, non brake. However they are all model 5035.

The new Kinoton unit is excellent, as is the Projecsan ( I wouldn't say they copied Kinoton, but it's helluva close).

Posted by Lindsay Morris (Member # 1430) on 10-04-2005, 04:52 AM:

Amanda,
Run time on any reel size is easy to calculate.
Use this formula:

Time in Minutes = (D^2-d^2)/ 8.5 for Acetate stock or approx 7.8 for poly stock.
D = The Diam of the reel of film in inches.
d = The Diam of the Hub also in inches.
The 8.5 or 7.8 constant is apparently calculated from how the various films wind in free air with acetate averaging .00625" per layer and the poly stuff obviously less.
The accuracy can be thrown out with super tight winds or sloppy winds.The EPRAD Double MUT is pretty consistent with its winding tension so I have found that what I calculate is quite close to the actual run time thru the machine.
Most of my programs are a mix of acetate and poly so things get a bit rubbery then.

The same formula can be used for feet on the spool by using:
(D^2-d^2) X 10.56 = Feet for acetate stock... dunno about poly here as have not bothered to try and work that out as have had no need.
All my Front of House folk only want to know is program end time they aint the least bit interested in how many feet of film there are.
The EPRAD spools I have are 42" blighters and they all have 8" hubs so d^2 in my case is always 64 and to calc the run time takes all of 10 secs with a small calculator.
Hope this helps.
Lindsay

Posted by Peter Hall (Member # 695) on 10-04-2005, 12:41 PM:

Pete

Maybe you have the Kinoton / Proecson relationship the wrong way around ? On the towers anyway..

Westrex towers - we have modified a couple (simply spacing the plates out) to take 5000m, i.e. around 3h20m of polyester. Works well, however you should use either an easy spool or a controller on the projector motor..

Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 10-04-2005, 12:44 PM:

For general information - the Goldberg platter reels are 38 inches in diameter and have a 14.5 inch hub.

Posted by David Graham Rose (Member # 1450) on 10-04-2005, 02:49 PM:

Greetings From Cambridge Tower Fanatics

I once modified a Westrex 5035 (obviously with Variacs) by cutting the unit in two and wall mounting the two separate sides. Thus doing I was able to accomodate 63" discs that I had hand made with 6" diameter centres that would run just over 8 hours of film. I was able on one occasion to run 'The Sound of Music' followed by 'Gone With The Wind" with only having to lace up once. There was quite some tension, which I appreciate is not good for film in the last 40 mins of GWTW! I used 10' of white spacing within the programme to alert me to the various intermission points in the vast conglomeration of celluloid!

Yours with fond memories of days gone by I wish you all a Good Night.

David

Posted by Pete Naples (Member # 761) on 10-05-2005, 04:38 AM:

Peter, not according to Kinoton! However, prove me/them wrong and I will stand corrected.

That's a good point about projector motor run up with these beasts, something I should have mentioned. The original Westrex manual details simple and effective ways of slugging the run up with the popular machines of the era, Westar, DP75, FP20, Kalee 21 etc. The most obvious modern solution is to use a 3 phase drive motor, and a nice inverter. I always advocate the use of EZ start spools on the take up, NOT on the pay off as some operators insist on doing (the screeching noise on rewind is terrifying!)

Posted by Amanda Mundin (Member # 3386) on 10-06-2005, 07:04 AM:

Thanks for the help guys.
Just a thought has anyone ever modified a westrex double sided tower to payoff on 1 side and take up on the other, in order to fit potentially much larger spools on?
If not could it be done?

Posted by Leo Enticknap (Member # 534) on 10-06-2005, 08:11 AM:

The problem there would happen when you tried to rewind, as far as I can see. Assuming you'd be paying out and taking up onto the top spindles (using the bottom ones would foul the base of the unit beyond a certain diameter of spool), you couldn't mount two of the larger spools top and bottom on one side. Therefore you'd need to turn the film round 180° in order to rewind it. Unless I'm missing something, that could only be done safely using rollers when running at a very low speed - too low to be able to rewind a three-hour feature in a typical show turnaround slot.

Posted by Pete Naples (Member # 761) on 10-06-2005, 10:07 AM:

Never done it, but I see no reason why it couldn't be done.

Leo, remember that the motor plates can be moved up and down on the racking, so you coule raise the lower plates to get bigger spools on. Getting the motors to do different things would be a simple enough job of moving wiring.

The Kinoton/Projecsan single sided tower/pedestal has the spools arranged this way, and rewinds very successfully. Although I should point out that the motors are inverter controlled with tension sensing arms, whereas the Westrex control system is rather more crude.

Posted by Brian Guckian (Member # 1678) on 10-06-2005, 09:20 PM:

Pete, that's great advice re. using an EZ hub spool for the take-up. With a proper mylar leader and a (reasonably) gentle motor ramp-up you can't go wrong.

BUT...in this day and age of H&S is it really wise to be (a) still using towers, and (b) trying to get even bigger spools on?

Who's doing the lifting? Or is it the case that everything's made up on the tower (lower spool) then rewound to the top?

Making up on the tower - even from 6000ft spools done on a bench first - has never been ideal to me, but I've never done enough of it.

I'll put up a separate thread asking people what they consider is best practice in towers today!

(BTW a former colleague worked in London many years ago and told me that when towers first came out some boxes had block and tackle to safely move the reels around...was this part of the original Westrex spec?)

Posted by Leo Enticknap (Member # 534) on 10-07-2005, 03:06 AM:

In the early '90s I had a part time job in one of the south coast fleapits. It had been twinned in such a way that screen 2's booth was little bigger than a 'phone box (it was a jerrybuilt shack on the roof - which, it later transpired, had been put up without planning permission), with the result that prints had to be made up onto tower spools in the other booth and manhandled up a 72-step spiral staircase. I remember the 72 steps, because the only way to hold the spool in such a way that it would fit in the stairwell obscured your view of the way ahead, meaning that counting the steps was the only way to know when you'd reached the top or bottom.

After a month of suffering an almost constant backache, I suggested to the chief/manager/owner that we buy a couple of 6k spools to move prints up and down that staircase on, in order to reduce the risk of an accident. He had the personality of Basil Fawlty, but expressed himself using language that wouldn't normally be heard on the BBC. His response was to dismiss the idea, call me a 'fookin' student poofter' and sack me on the spot.

A few weeks later he fell down those stairs while moving a print of Speed, broke both arms, several ribs, a wrist and a shoulder blade. While he was in hospital, the council's health & safety police moved in and uncovered a catalogue of deathtraps throughout the building, the extent of which made you wonder how any of the staff and customers ever came out of that place alive. The theatre was closed for several months, and eventually changed hands.

Posted by Stephen Furley (Member # 1277) on 10-07-2005, 07:09 AM:

quote: Brian Guckian
BUT...in this day and age of H&S is it really wise to be (a) still using towers, and (b) trying to get even bigger spools on?

(a) I don't see why not.

(b) Probably not.

I've only run towers a few times; I find that a typical print isn't too bad to lift, but I wouldn't want to go much heavier. I would probably get help for a print of much over two hours. It is now the rule in some cinemas that prints over a certain length must be lifted onto the tower by two people.

quote: Brian Guckian

(BTW a former colleague worked in London many years ago and told me that when towers first came out some boxes had block and tackle to safely move the reels around...was this part of the original Westrex spec?)

I remember reading somewhere that lifting equipment was provided for the original Cinerama installations, I'm not sure if this applied to all of them, but I think the Cinerama spools were only about 8-9k, considerably smaller than tower spools.

I have seen a couple of towers which were made to be able to take 70mm spools, though I've never seen such a spool, and I certainly wouldn't want to lift a full one.

Most tower spools are made of aluminium, and are quite light, lighter than many older designs of 6k spools, so a print on a tower spool isn't much heavier than one on a platter ring; and is probably easier to lift; I wouldn't want to carry one up, or even worse down, a staircase though.

quote: David Graham Rose
I once modified a Westrex 5035 (obviously with Variacs) by cutting the unit in two and wall mounting the two separate sides. Thus doing I was able to accomodate 63" discs that I had hand made with 6" diameter centres that would run just over 8 hours of film.

I can't understand why anyone would want to run that amount of film on one spool. You wouldn't run a programme that long without an intermission, probably more than one, and if you have an intermission then why not just change smaller spools? I would have thought that the core to full spool diameter ratio of 10.5:1 would be likely to cause problems too.

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 10-07-2005, 08:16 AM:

I think Kinoton's SPT5000K is an elegant machine for what it is. It has BOTH reels (40", if I'm not mistaken) just about an inch off the ground. The electronics are such that floating hubs are not as needed as with other systems.

Posted by Robert Throop (Member # 61) on 10-07-2005, 08:55 AM:

[/QUOTE]I remember reading somewhere that lifting equipment was provided for the original Cinerama installations, I'm not sure if this applied to all of them, but I think the Cinerama spools were only about 8-9k, considerably smaller than tower spools.[/QUOTE]
The reel elevators were added for HTWWW as one of the acts was over 11000 ft.
Bob

Posted by Mark Hajducki (Member # 1732) on 10-07-2005, 09:02 AM:

quote: Leo Enticknap
that we buy a couple of 6k spools to move prints up and down

I thought virtually every tower using cinema made up the films onto 6k spools and only made the one splice on the tower.

I have heard of people hand winding onto 13ks using a modified winding bench, but that is not recomended.

Posted by Pete Naples (Member # 761) on 10-07-2005, 09:35 AM:

Yeah, make up on 6k's, join on the tower, break down with asplit spool on the top of the tower after the last run.

If you make up from cans, on the tower, you can't be checking the print properly, end of story!

The Dominion in Edinburgh has a modified bench that will take 13,000 foot spools, personally I hate it, but then their Cinemecannica towers aren't the friendlies of things when trying to use smaller spools on. There is NO adjustment for wind speed or tension.

Posted by Leo Enticknap (Member # 534) on 10-07-2005, 03:29 PM:

'Not recommended' would apply to practically everything which went on in that place. From the fuse box with 3-inch nails soldered across the terminals to the popcorn machine which hadn't been cleaned out in living memory, it would make The Smallest Show on Earth look like an object model in good practice.

All making up and breaking down happened in screen 1's booth, and yes, it was straight onto the tower. I did as much as I could to improve presentation standards - for example, I smuggled a role of Jack Roe splicing tape in from the student film society I also projected for at the time, as an alternative to the masking tape provided!

Nine times out of ten, the film in screen 2 would have played in 1 previously, so the tower spool was simply manhandled between the two. Splitting it into 6k reels to shift it would have made negotiating the spiral staircase a bit safer, but thankfully it wasn't me who ultimately ended up his regretting the idea. I needed the £3.50 an hour he paid me at the time (allowing for inflation, that's just under the legal minimum wage now), and so put up with it.

Posted by Pete Naples (Member # 761) on 10-07-2005, 05:34 PM:

Wasn't run by a company named after a small red breasted bird, commonly seen on chrimbo cards was it?!

Making up onto 6k spools is the recomended procedure in the Westrex bible.

There is no mention of safe handling of the large spools in the book, I've seen a few places with some kind of hoist for getting spools, even prints in boxes between floors. I've personally never had a problem handling a full 13,000' reel, but I'm not exactly small.

Posted by Leo Enticknap (Member # 534) on 10-07-2005, 07:32 PM:

quote:
Wasn't run by a company named after a small red breasted bird, commonly seen on chrimbo cards was it?!

Touché - but this was an independent. The reference to Basil Fawlty should give you a geographical clue.

quote: Pete Naples
I've personally never had a problem handling a full 13,000' reel, but I'm not exactly small.

I'm 6'3" and not what most people would call a shrinking violet: a straightforward lift never gave me any problem, either. The problem was transferring the weight of the spool plus that of my body from left to right foot and back again while climbing up (or even worse, down) the tight 90° turn of the spiral staircase. The clearance of the stairwell also meant you had to hold the spool up so that the bottom apex was at about knee height.

Ahh.. happy days!

[evil]

Posted by Bernard Tonks (Member # 809) on 10-08-2005, 07:51 AM:

Anyone know the most screens in a complex all running with Towers. I have visited the Classic Moulin cinemas in Piccadilly Circus that had six screens with Towers. There were three projection boxes, Screen 1 being in the original old Newsreel Theatre. Screens 2 – 5 was the new construction. Next door was the Dilly Cine which was incorporated into the complex as Screen 6. All showing triple bills of sexy ‘X’ films with very choice titles continuous daily from 11am until after midnight with late shows!

There were two projectionists on duty who obviously were kept very busy. Mostly made up on all the Towers, on the ‘A’ side were the first two features, ‘B’ side for the third feature. The Moulin closed around 1990 I believe.

quote: Pete Naples
Good choice on the Westrex 5035, they are easy enough to use, and indestructable. Contrary to popular belief, they do not damage film, if used correctly, follow the makers instructions and all will be well.

Pete is so right about the Westrex 5035. I had years of trouble free service. When I bought the tower 2nd hand I had all the motor bearings replaced. One spindle was slightly worn, which was replaced with an exchange unit supplied by Omnex. In later years a good chief projectionist friend gave me a set of spindles which he got made himself.

Posted by David Graham Rose (Member # 1450) on 10-12-2005, 01:29 PM:

Greetings All from a miserable Cambridge

Check out this link. This was an old UK Odeon 6 screen operation that used towers. Rather interesting to a tower fanatic such as myself!

http://web.ukonline.co.uk/stephen.johnson/drake/

Goodnight

David

Posted by Stephen Furley (Member # 1277) on 10-12-2005, 01:58 PM:

quote: Leo Enticknap
Touché - but this was an independent. The reference to Basil Fawlty should give you a geographical clue.

You mean the one next door to the transport undertaking? I've never used either the transport or the cinema, but I have been to the town, and seen both. If this is the one you mean, wasn't it owned by the transport undertaking, who wanted to convert it into something other than a cinema, but the application was refused, so it was simply closed, and was boarded up the last time I saw it, probably about 5-6 years ago?

Posted by Leo Enticknap (Member # 534) on 10-12-2005, 02:27 PM:

I couldn't possibly comment! [Wink]

As for the Plymouth Odeon, I saw a few films there when I was a student living in the city from 92-95. Interesting that it was built as recently as 1958 - it didn't strike me of having quite the layout of a 1930s single screen picture palace, somehow. But my visits had to be surreptitious ones, because I worked as a relief for the opposition at the time (well, it wasn't really the opposition, as it was an arthouse with very diffrerent programming).

Also interesting that the author of the page David linked to claims that parking charges killed the place off. There's been a parking charge controversy rumbling on in York for three years or so now, when the newly elected Lib Dem council decided to show its green credentials by whacking the charges up. At one point it was £4 an hour, including evenings and weekends, but it's come down a bit since (a posse of activist grannies complaining to their councillors that they could no longer go to their knitting clubs in the evening without being raped in some dark alley saw to that). Both the Odeon and City Screen don't have on-site car parks and so were especially vulnerable to the price hikes. I gather from chatting to people that both places did take a substantial box office hit, so much so that the Odeon was rumoured to be on the verge of closure at one point. City Screen was less vulnerable, as the cinema also has a public bar (an upmarket pub, to all intents and purposes), which probably does as much if not more business than the films.

Posted by Stephen Furley (Member # 1277) on 10-12-2005, 03:11 PM:

I seem to remember that the original-DP-70s from the Drake were the ones which were later installed at MOMI.

Posted by Pete Naples (Member # 761) on 10-12-2005, 04:34 PM:

The Lonsdale, Carlisle, has 5 screens, spread over 2 buildings. All have Westrex 5035 long play devices. The 2 screens in 'the City' building, have Strong CPA10 automation.

Rather sad to see cinemas like the Drake closed, never heard of or been to the place, but I can well imagine... There just aren't any left like that in Scotland now.

Posted by Stephen Furley (Member # 1277) on 10-13-2005, 06:49 PM:

Pete, thinking back to my CTA Cumbria visit some years ago, didn't they used to have towers in the older building, and platters in the newer one? If so, why did they change, to make moving prints between buildings easier?

Posted by Pete Naples (Member # 761) on 10-18-2005, 12:43 PM:

Stephen, yes, and also because they only seem to employ operators older than the building, who can't operate platters and are unwilling to learn.