The toolset
The toolset
We, at openSX70 love to share, to make stuff available for the community, but, unfortunately, because of the nature in itself of the SX-70 camera, that is not always possible.
Point in case: Harvard Baker Library. They have most of the documents from Polaroid (when they went chapter 11). We could research all that material, we could photograph it, but we cannot share it. And in Howard Carter words, it got “wonderful thing”
I don’t want to limit the boundaries of the materials I can gain access to, that is why sometimes information from third parties cannot be shared. In this case can be for any reason, but most commonly because the information is still useful.
And like that we arrive to the very touchy subject of the tools. Polaroid created a set of tools specific to fix SX-70 cameras. There are very few and limited remaining sets. Some tools are even mythical, in the sense that only drawings in manuals remain, but no actual instruments nor even photographs.
Are the tools (original or replicas) needed to properly repair an SX-70?
My answer is both yes and no and maybe.
When I say yes, I mean some very specific tools to rivet (and here, I consider the custom rivets also part of the toolset). Can you McGyver it? Of course you can! But it’s not the same thing. Also keep in mind that the Robertson 1mm screwdriver is essential to open most cameras. There have been multiple options to secure one of those, and many people have also made their own.
Other tools aren’t really necessary (but always nice to have). They let you speed things up and archive level of excellence equal to those of the old times.
But the correct answer most of the time is “maybe” meaning you can do it by other means (whatever it is) but with the right tools is faster and probably safer.
What does this mean from the repairs point of view? A good passionate technician cannot be replaced with tools, tools in themselves do not repair cameras: people repair cameras. For that you need expertise and passion.
And I have a confession to make: even though I am terrible at repairs or in general camera upgrades I have been obsessed with the tools from day one (perhaps in the back of my mind thinking they would make me a better technician).
I used to take screengrabs from video and try to figure out dimensions of stuff. Yeah really.
Sometimes people shared pictures with me…
And of course we had the repair manuals
Definitely tools are power, one well know supplier of cameras had pictures of the tools in the land page of their website.
So from day one I had this thought: I need those tools badly. I really do.
But they are almost impossible to get: nobody sells them, probably even they have been sold without knowledge of their purpose, and, thus, their value: just a set of weird sargent parallel pliers.
We needed a breakthrough. And we got a few. DrSX70 managed to obtain pictures and measurements of the tools directly from the boss, Jos Riddenhoff, the original SX-70 repair technician from the Netherlands. Jos also sent me a few samples or original rivets.
From these vital pictures we can take a very educated guess at how the tool is. Also we decided to make the tools “better” in the sense of taking the advances of technology, so instead of modifying the original jaws (in that case was Sargent) we can CNC the whole thing.
Instead of using Sargent we are purchasing the handle for the tools from Maun in the UK.
Initially I tried to design myself the tools, but I could go thus far. Fortunately what was a tall order for me is nothing to my friend and fellow gang member Francesc, the genius behind Autofoto.Barcelona that is bringing back to life photobooths.
Jeremy also was able to secure the infamous boot tool, that was later modelled by Zane.
Then there’s the mythical tools like the “Comprehensive tester model B” and with that we are going to have to be more creative. The idea is to create the ultimate SX-70 calibration tool.
Here the idea is to create the ultimate SX-70 calibration tool: no more guesswork, cameras dialed up to the millisecond. Here we are faithful to the concept, but make something way more advanced with modern electronics.
Going back to the beginning we have good and bad news.
Bad news first, unfortunately due to the circumstances this information has arrived to us we cannot share the designs nor sell them to the public.
The good news is that we are going to build a few toolsets for the authorized technicians building openSX70 cameras. These cameras are going to be the best SX-70 build. No more guess work no more charlatans. OpenSX70 is not money driven: all of us are passion driven and that makes the difference, and we intend to take the SX-70 universe where no SX70 has gone before. We are going to build the best damned cameras out there at a reasonable price.
For starters the main PCB and uDongle electronics is our gift to the community, so its cost is going to be really cheap. It will be a game changer.
This time we mean business!
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