Is it possible to make and install different shutters on a Konvas?

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Created on Monday, 10 September 2007 04:35

Last Updated on Friday, 14 December 2012 20:15

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Rita gave us this post a while back:
Hi, just to let you know if you are interested, that my film tech has made a number of mirrored shutters for Kinor 16mm and a Konvas 2M plus a couple of Arri's. You won't believe this but he cut up some old CD'S and by tracing the old original mirrored one onto the CD and using an electric fine blade fret saw to cut out the shape. He then balanced them by spinning them on an old adapted Nagra motor with a speed controller and drilling a couple of holes here and there to stop any vibration. He states that balancing is not major factor as the finished shutter is only a tenth of the weight of the original and vibration is minimal anyway. The secret is making sure that there is no warping and using a special plastic cement to glue in small steel washer's for the holes (before balancing) as the screw's may distort the shutter as you tighten them. He used matt black paint on the underside. Have put them on test and work's fine and equal to the mirrored original. Have shot over 3,000 feet so far on the Kinor's (got prints from lab) and can confirm that vibration has almost been eliminated. The camera's seems quieter too. Hope somebody may find this interesting. Regards Rita

Rita also had this to add in a later post:
Not all CD's are suitable as we found out the hard way but the one's we installed are virtually unbreaking. Some CD's shatter like glass when bent especially if they had been exposed to long period's of UV so time will tell if these last the course but we now have spares.

H.W. Stone (aka Colcam) had this to add:
The only refinement I can come up with is to be sure to paint the back black and to add a black stripe half way through the remaining blade.