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There are a few other screws on the cover of the intermittent, there. DO NOT muck around with those babies! You'll trash the intermittent. In fact, I'm not even going to tell you what those screws are for so as not to tempt people into messing with them.

One thing I do when changing the oil is to flush it out with fresh oil. I put a cup or funnel under the opening and squirt oil in the top and rotate the flywheel a couple-three turns by hand. You might see some gunk and little pieces of metal come out that wouldn't have come out, otherwise. I would say this is especially important if you haven't changed the oil in a long time.

Another thing I do is take a Q-Tip® and clean out the drain hole. Get as much of the oil out of the "groove" around the hole as you can. If there are any little pieces of gunk in there the plug might not seal as well and you could get a slow leak. Do a good job cleaning off the screw and the 3 washers while your're at it. The cleaner the better.

Since you are at it you might as well take a crack at cleaning out all the dust bunnies. Take off the light shield and remove the trap. (You may have to in order to to get at the oil filler.) Get your rag and paintbrush and "Kill da' Wabbit!" (Wabbit... Dust Bunnies... get it? )

If you really want to cover your arse six ways from next Sunday you can open the rear door and take off the back covers. Use a rag to wipe out all the old grease from all the gears. Then squirt new, clean grease on the gears and rotate the machine by hand a few more times. This will distribute the grease evenly over the gears. Before you buckle the projector back up, take a look at the belts (or drive gears) and make sure that they aren't in need of attention.

While you have the oil can in your hand, there are two or three oil cups inside the projector head near the upper and lower sprockets. Put two or three drops of oil in these too. There's a little tiny "dent" in the outboard bearing arm of the intermitent. That gets ONE drop of oil. (You should be doing this every few weeks anyway. It's within easy reach and it's a quickie to do.)

When I was on the front lines in the booth I would do all of this in roatation for all the machines. I'd do one or two per day. After a couple of weeks I'd have them all done. After while I'd start over again.

One last thing: I see a lot of people that have this tendancy to over lubricate these machines. You don't need but a few drops of oil in those bearing cups. The gears in the back need only be "wet" with grease. You don't want the projector to be swimming in oil and grease. Not only is is messy looking, the gears and things will "fling" little gobs of grease all over the place.

Some of the Century SA's had a quality control problem with holes in the shutter and vertical shafts being not exact, which did not allow the correct toe and heel contact of the gears. Could also be the gear itself is defective.

Use the correct lubricant. Chassis grease will NOT do. Century's gear lube looks and feels like industrial strength vasoline.

Follow the lube instructions in the Century manual. That manual is available in the Film-Tech manuals link.

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