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Author Topic: tail not running through projector--why? Carl Martin Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1424 From: Oakland, CA, USA Registered: Feb 2002 posted 12-03-2003 04:15 AM                        when our print of mystic river plays in our main house, the automation shuts down the show shortly after the dowser close, without running the whole tail through the projector. this doesn't happen with any other print, or in any other projector. it didn't even happen at all until last sunday, several weeks into the run. it's a century jj with ta-10 automation and fm-37 cue detector/failsafe. i watched the fm-37 through the credits and sure enough, after the dowser closes, the film motion led goes off and it shuts down. nothing else unusual happens on the fm-37. our tech suggested removing some sections of the tail with chewed edges (this happened _because_ of this problem), but that did nothing. i've closely examined the remaining tail in the area where the sensor failure happens and i can't find anything at all wrong with it. what could be causing this? fortunately this problem is after the show is offscreen so the audience is none the wiser, and it's not _that_ much of a burden to have to motor the rest of the tail through, but i'm still curious. unfortunately, this print will not play in that house again so i can't really do any more troubleshooting at this point. carl  |  IP: Logged Jon Bartow Master Film Handler Posts: 287 From: Massachusetts Registered: Nov 1999 posted 12-03-2003 05:28 AM                     It sounds like the automation is in "interlock" mode and not "normal" mode. When in "interlock" mode an automation will shut down immedeatly on a show end cue (in intermission mode the cue is reassigned to "intermission") rather than tail out like in normal mode. Jonathan  |  IP: Logged Peter Hall Master Film Handler Posts: 314 From: London, UK Registered: Dec 2000 posted 12-03-2003 07:05 AM                        Does the TA10 alarm ? We programme sites with tower systems to stop on shutter close to keep the film off the floor..  |  IP: Logged Randy Stankey Film God Posts: 6539 From: Erie, Pennsylvania Registered: Jun 99 posted 12-03-2003 09:42 AM                     Clean the film sensor in your FM-35. (Failsafe/Detector) The film sensor is optical. It works by reading the (infrared) light reflected off the film. If the little "windows" on the underside of that detector are the LEAST little bit dirty it will start to degrade the ability of the detector to detect the film. (ie: If the dirt is blocking the light from getting through the window, how can the detector "see" the light reflected off the film?) Sometimes, there are dark sections of film in the head/tails of the reels. Those sections are less reflective than other parts of the reel. The reflected light is less intense and is more difficult for the detector to "see". Couple that with a dirty sensor window and you've got a problem. The instructions that come with the TA-10 and/or the FM-35 tell you how to clean it. Its as simple as removing two small screws from the underside of the detecor and pulling it off. Get some cleaner like alcohol or "Formula 409" and a Q-Tip. Clean off those 8 little "windows" really well. Make sure you dry the unit throughly before you put it back on. (Did I mention to turn the power off first? ) I DO NOT recommend using "Windex" or any kind of lens cleaning solution that has blue dye in it. I had some bad experiences with that. Way back in the day, I used to use "Rosco" lens cleaner to clean these things. The thought was, "If it's good enough to clean projector lenses it ought to be good enough to clean these piddly little "lenses". Well that's OK in the beginning. After a while, if you don't get EVERY LAST BIT of that cleaning solution off the unit before it dries, a blue "haze" starts to build up on the windows. This is worse than the dirt that was there in the first place. I switched to using plain old, clear alcohol and the problem disappeared. Once the unit is clean, maintain it daily by taking a CLEAN paint brush and brusing out any film dust. You don't have to disassemble the unit. Just carefully poke the brush in there and dust things out. Clean the junk off the rollers too! This only takes 15 seconds. It's worth it to save you 15 minutes worth of trouble down the road! If cleaning the sensor doesn't help, there are three things you'll need to think about: 1) Checking film path alignment. 2) Replacing the sensor unit. 3) Defeating the failsafe. Make sure the film goes over the black roller on the failsafe correctly. It needs to run perfectly against the roller. If it "bubbles up" on one side or jumps when the film hits a splice it could be sending spurious readings to the sensor. After all, the sensor's job is to tell if the film is going the right way through that roller, no? If the film isn't doing that at all times, the sensor can't do its job. Realign your rollers and/or the failsafe for perfect alignment at all times and you'll minimize false alarms. While you are working on it, double check to make sure that all of the parts of the failsafe, themselves, are still aligned properly. Sometimes the black roller gets bent out of line from too many accidents. (Or careless operators!) Make sure the "plate" that holds the film sensor is perfectly parallel to the black roller. Bend/adjust parts as needed to restore good alignment. The sensor units are replacable. After a time they do get weak and wear out. Yours MIGHT be getting weak. If the problem starts getting worse over time, despite cleaning, you are probably experiencing weakness due to age. Call Component Engineering. They'll sell you a new sensor. They aren't expensive. They are probably $50 or less. Component Engineering has also improved the design of the sensor. Ask them about this. They'll explain it and tell you how to determine if yours is the improved design or not. Finally, if all the above doesn't work or if you don't have time to wait for replacement parts to arrive, you can "save the show" by defeating the failsafe. Inside the TA-10 there are two switches that will deactivate the failsafe. Read your manual. It will tell you how to do that. If you do, you'll have to keep a CLOSE WATCH on the projector AT ALL TIMES! Any little problem that happens can quickly become a big problem if you aren't keeping an eye out! This is decidedly a TEMPORARY measure to get you through until more permanent repairs can be made. Keep that in mind! What I recommend is that you try to determine which sensor is failing. There are TWO sensors in that unit. One looks for simple presence of the film. The other tries to watch the sprocket holes going by. If you can tell by watching the indicators on the control panel of your TA-10 which sensor is "dropping out", you can disable only the one which is giving you trouble, thereby keeping part of your protection. I think the TA-10 and FM-35 are really good pieces of equipment but you have to know the ins and outs of them. Once you do, I think you'll find they are among the best out there!  |  IP: Logged Steve Scott Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1300 From: Minneapolis, MN Registered: Sep 2000 posted 12-03-2003 10:16 AM                     I've had this happen on one of my projectors, with only certain prints too (mostly from Warner Bros. strangely). I'd agree with Randy that cleaning the optics is the best solution. You may want to check the sensitivity of the sensor as well.  |  IP: Logged Jack Ondracek Film God Posts: 2348 From: Port Orchard, WA, USA Registered: Oct 2002 posted 12-03-2003 10:18 AM                        A short addition to Randy's suggestion: If you've got any tape on the end of the film, watch your motion light on the cue detector. I had that same thing happen last week. When the tape went through the projector, it would fool the pickup & shut the projector down. For awhile, I thought I'd found a way around the TA10 not having an intermission shutoff... but it didn't do work the same in my other machines. Turned out, my detector needed cleaning, too. Ditto what Randy said... just use alcohol & you should be fine.  |  IP: Logged Carl Martin Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1424 From: Oakland, CA, USA Registered: Feb 2002 posted 12-03-2003 02:48 PM                        our tech also suggested it might be in interlock mode. that wasn't the problem. i forgot to mention i cleaned the sensors on the fm-37 (the 35/70 version of the fm-35) twice since this happened, with alcohol. that was actually because of an old dirty newsreel we were playing before another film that was causing shutdowns. this failsafe is known to be more sensitive than our fm-35's to dirt. i think it's also older, so maybe the led's are dying. i'll keep that in mind if it happens again. i'll have another look at the tail of mystic to see if maybe it's black between the perfs. i'd only been looking for damage. thanks guys, carl  |  IP: Logged Ken McFall Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 615 From: Haringey, London. Registered: Apr 2001 posted 12-03-2003 03:30 PM                     In interlock mode the TA10 does NOT shut down when the shutter closes. In fact it behaves exactly the same as for a normal show. If the shutter has closed then you will not get an alarm as the automation is waiting for either film run out, end of feature or another cue to start the show off again. How old is the FM37. There has been an upgrade of the motion/presence detector borad as there were some problems with certain types of film stock. The upgrade is not expensive so is worth considering. The problem you have is almost certainly being cuased by some damage to the perforation area or the film is very dirty. There may some remenants of label or tape. As you have no problems with the rest of the print you should remove the tail run out and examin and clean it very carefully. Replace it with some new spacing and see what happens. Then put the original runout back on and see what happens. I had a similar problem a couple of years ago when I started using some high density spacing, black on one side and white on the other. If I tried to use it with white as base and black as emulsion side it would always shut down. Turn it the other way and no problem. Fitted the upgrade, pcb and roller and no problem either way round. The FM35 & 37 are great, simple and very reliable as is the TA10 itself.  |  IP: Logged Carl Martin Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1424 From: Oakland, CA, USA Registered: Feb 2002 posted 12-04-2003 04:14 AM                        the print has been in filmguard rotation (1 cleaner for 3 screens) so it's not a dirt issue, nor is there any tape or damage (now). the outboard inter-perf area does turn black after the srd track ends so that's my best guess. the print running there now (elephant) also goes black there, but perhaps not for as long. maybe the sensor can handle a short glitch without tripping. or maybe it's just the film stock. after all the sensors "see" the base side of the film. on friday the print moves to another theater for scratching and dirt application , so they can mess around more with the tail if they feel like it. i'll suggest the replacement board to our tech. do you have a part # on that, ken, just in case? carl  |  IP: Logged Randy Stankey Film God Posts: 6539 From: Erie, Pennsylvania Registered: Jun 99 posted 12-04-2003 09:46 AM                     Component Eng. is (has been) pretty casual about their part numbers, often going by description more than an actual part number. I guess it depends on who you end up talking to. The way I understand it, the part numbers gor the detector units go by part numbers like "FM-xx-PU". (Where the "xx" is the original number of your FS unit.) Thus I would guess yours would be "FM-37-PU".  |  IP: Logged Aaron Sisemore Flaming Ribs beat Reeses Peanut Butter Cups any day! Posts: 3061 From: Rockwall TX USA Registered: Sep 1999 posted 12-08-2003 01:20 AM                     I will second what Ken said. CE upgraded the detectors around 1998-ish, and for a short time allowed a free or near-free trade-in for your old FM35/37 detector head/black roller (the roller is different on the upgraded version) assemblies. The old style CE detectors were notorious for failing to detect B/W (which is why your old newsreel probably didn't detect properly), IB receiver, and certain polyester films' stocks and process coatings. The new ones work flawlessly on these stocks. -Aaron  |  IP: Logged Carl Martin Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1424 From: Oakland, CA, USA Registered: Feb 2002 posted 12-08-2003 04:46 AM                        well, apparently we did get the upgrade last year, so it's still not fool-proof. i'm not too worried though, as this is the first instance of this particular problem. the newsreel problem did not occur as consistently as the mystic river tail run-through failure. we only ran it 3 or 4 days (it was the kennedy funeral, for the anniversary), and it never got film-guarded. when i do one-off shows of old prints without filmguard, it's not uncommon for them to shut down, or the following show, and cleaning the sensors solves that. but this has never happened with a film-guarded print. needless to say, i always filmguard them now. so anyways, i'm chalking this new problem up to imperfect equipment, and since i know it's not a short or anything, i won't worry about it any more until it happens again. carl  |  IP: Logged Manny Knowles "What are these things and WHY are they BLUE???" Posts: 4247 From: Bloomington, IN, USA Registered: Feb 2002 posted 01-03-2004 06:29 AM                     I had this same symptom occuring at the end of some movies and also during lens changes on some projectors. The problem was that some of my c/o and dragstrip leader films were completely opaque all the way out to the edges (where SDDS normally is found). The "Presence" detector in the CE FM-35 interprets this sudden darkness as a fault. As far as I knew, we weren't using the presence detector but, sure enough, it was engaged on some projectors. I don't mind disabling that feature because the motion sensor handles the job just fine. (BTW, that location does not have status panels.) If this is your problem then you have two choices -- either lose the presence detector or lose the opaque edges on your leaders and slugs.  |  IP: Logged John Walsh Film God Posts: 2490 From: Connecticut, USA, Earth, Milky Way Registered: Oct 1999 posted 01-03-2004 09:52 AM                     Instead of "interlock", I think what some meant to say, was "intermission." I'm not familiar with the TA10, but many automations have a setting to stop the projector as soon as it sees the last cue, so the film stays threaded. Since it seemed work OK at first, maybe there's a bad connection in the automation? Although I did have this problem with trailers for the film 'Independance Day.' As soon as the failsafe sansor saw that film stock, it shut down. Steve's suggestion to check the sensitivity of the sensor is a good idea.  |  IP: Logged Jack Ondracek Film God Posts: 2348 From: Port Orchard, WA, USA Registered: Oct 2002 posted 01-03-2004 12:44 PM                        Rather than shrug my shoulders at anything unusual, I'd want to know why the problem happened. Considering the nature of how the FM35 senses film presence & motion, it ought to be a fairly simple study to watch for the motion light to blink, then pull that part of the film and see how it differs from the rest of the feature. I'd bet you'd have to find something either on or about the film whether the sensor's clean or not.  |  IP: Logged

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