Hi, I have a problem with my A-1 meter. If I half-press the shutter release I always get a flashing display showing the selected shutter speed/aperture-as if underexposed. This happens even if I have no lense attached and set it at 30 secs/f1.8. Is my meter totally dead?

-- Matthew Taylor (mtaylor@cleantalk.co.uk), May 06, 2001

Answers

Hi Matthew,

just checked with my A-1, with no lens attached the display shows "M" for manual operation and a suitable combination of shutter speed and aperture (no flashing most of the time, depends on amount of light entering the camera, of course).

Cheers, Thorsten

-- Thorsten Westheider (thorsten.westheider@teleos-web.de), May 08, 2001.

Hi -

This sounds like the sort of Canon A1 meter problem I've seen a few times - the film speed dial fails to make a difference and the camera "thinks" it's on ISO 6 permanently. The fix, in my limited experience, appears to be simple but very fiddly, so depending on how brave you're feeling you can dismantle the camera and fix it yourself or get someone to service it, which should sort it. A "CLA" (clean, lube, align) type service is probably a Good Thing, so I guess I'd have to recommend that.

Any attempt to fix it yourself is obviously strictly at your own risk, whereas a dealer will be honour bound to replace it if they screw it up.

That said, being no stranger to the innards of intricate gizmos, I had a crack at fixing one with the same syptoms and found that the problem was improper contact between the flexible circuit boards and the film speed dial's circuit board. There a a *lot* of parts in a Canon A1, and plenty of dis-assembly pitfalls to beware of; one ball bearing to lose, part of the shutter release easily mislaid, delicate flash sync socket wire to unsolder and re-solder, etc.

The actual problem seems to be that the contacts between flexible and rigid boards are made by a small cover plate applying pressure via a rectangular rubber block about 2mm in section. There are three of these types of connections on that board, and they're all suspect, but the one which causes the most mayhem if it's not properly connected is the most tricky one to access/clean. I have one in bits at the moment, and plan to take some digital snaps and try to slap together a page showing how to fix it, but don't hold your breath 'cos I'm *very* snowed-under. It's *not* a fix for the feint-hearted. Don't poke about in there without electrostatic precautions, either.

HTH

Carl

-- Carl Williams (carloz46@hotmail.com), June 15, 2001.