Just figured out I was oiling shutters wrong for 5 years

I've been repairing cameras out of my basement in Portland for a long time, and I always used a tiny drop of oil right on the pivot points of the shutter blades. Last Tuesday I had a Pentax K1000 with a sticky slow speed, and this old guy who used to work at a shop in Seattle watched me do it. He stopped me and said 'you're soaking the brass bushing, not the blade itself.' I had been putting the oil on top of the blade where it rides, which caused it to creep onto the leaves and attract dust. He had me pull the whole shutter assembly, hit the bushing from underneath, and spin it dry before reassembly. It ran smooth for the first time after I tested it at 1/8 and 1/4. Now I check every repair with a loupe under that specific pivot, and I'm wondering how many of my past jobs came back because of this. Anyone else find out a basic step they'd been missing after years of trial and error?

2 comments

2 Comments

jesse29017d ago

Nah, oil on top worked fine for decades, you just needed better cleaning habits.

-1

cooper.mark17d ago

The last time I tried oil on top, I ended up with a layer of grease so thick my kitchen looked like a crime scene from a cooking show. Cleaning habits were never my strong suit, that's for sure. My idea of "proper maintenance" is wiping things down with the same rag until it becomes a biohazard. So yeah, the method probably works fine for people with actual discipline. Me, I need the simpler stuff that forgives my laziness.