[brewmaster15]

Hello all,
I have no idea if this will interest anyone but one of my older DSLRs, The K2000 recently gave up the ghost. Rather than sell for parts on Ebay, I decided to take it apart. Mostly out of curiosity to see if I could understand it better, maybe figure out a few things. Particularly of interest was the sensor and IR filter, as I am interested in converting another camera to IR.

Preface here... I am not a camera tech, I'm just a hobbyist photographer that enjoys DIY projects. Take what I say and post here with a grain of salt, and feel free to comment, or correct anything.
















2









Getting to the good stuff now...


















































One thing about electronics is they don't need to be plugged in to give you one heck of a shock. Even without batteries, cameras like this have one huge capacitor that stores electricity. I have read on the DIY sites that if you depress the camera shutter button several times it will discharge the capacitor. Not wanting to get knocked on my butt or worse, I discharged it with an insulated screw driver by touching both terminals in case the DIY sites were wrong. Guess the capacitor didn't read the DIY sites, because that thing made a snap crackle and pop like you wouldn't believe. I've no idea how much juice it stored, but its the size of a AA battery!















I ran into my first technical glitch at this time. I wanted to get to the image capture sensor.,.. but Pentax has it sandwiched between metal plates, that have tiny hex heads, and my particular version was cemented/glued in place as well. Whats a guy to do when he really doesn't have the right tool or alot of time, and isnt planning on reassembling? Have Dril will travel!




Of course if I was trying to put this back together, I'd have to be real careful here and see if I could free it up another way..I have a feeling its designed to not come apart, but be replaced as an assembly. Once the screws are drilled out the plates come apart with a little force. They are held together by a perimeter of magnets...






Here are the magnets...




and here is the back of the sensor...




And this was the GEM I was seeking.......What you are looking at is the "film" of the camera. In this case its a 10.2 megapixel CCD. The light you are seeing is reflected from my phones flash. Not sure what exactly causes it but its beautiful.











To protect the sensor from infrared (IR) light theres a special filter on top of the CCD that allows normal light in and blocks IR light which the digital cameras are sensitive too. Its blue in color.







and here is the CCD without the filter...again, really pretty colors there..







And heres what the patient looks like exploded out...




So what did I learn after spending 3 hours taking apart a dead camera... well actually a lot!.
The Pentax camera has a dust removal system that relies on shaking the sensor. From what I can tell the sensor actually "floats" in between those magnet bound plates... I could move it around a bit and can see how that mightbe how the dust removal works Pretty ingenious at the time it was developed.

The IR filter is something that alot of DIY hackers remove..This allows you to do Infrared photography, which was the main reason I did all this. I wanted to see how hard it was to get to that IR filter. On Some cameras its easier than others, but not this model! I found a company that will make this modification on this camera for $350. http://www.kolarivision.com/pentaxco...onservice.html


Of course they definitely know a heck more than I do and may know better ways than I could find, but tell you what. $350 is not unreasonable! OUT of my Budget, but if I had it..why not. I have a huge interest in IR photography and this little exercise was time well spent!

If I was to do this as a DIY on my other cameras I also need to de-solder a few wires from the circuit boards and re-solder when I re-assemble. Not too difficult.. In this break down I cheated and cut the problem wire.

The capacitor in the DSLR is massive, relative to the camera size.! I did not expect something that big in such a small camera... but I should have. Also noted..discharge , do not assume its discharged.

The IR filter is easy to remove and exchange any filter I want with.

Lastly theres one heck of alot wires,screws and circuit boards in the camera. Do yourself a favor, don't drop one!


Don't know if this was interesting or not for anyone, but gives you a better understanding of the "magic" that goes on when you try and take a picture with a Digital SLR camera.

al

ps.. DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME with a good camera! AND IF YOU DO.... DON"T ASK ME FOR ADVICE ON IT.. I like to try and figure out how things work. It doesn't make me an expert, just inquisitive.


---------- Post added 01-23-15 at 07:47 AM ----------

If I put this in the wrong place, please move to the best location. Still getting used to the forum layout.

thanks,
al

[grahame]

I followed your instruction and took apart my new K3. Very nice! A lot of pieces inside! -- Now how should i put them back? I need to shoot a weeding this Sunday! :-)

Are you going to try reassemble them? Leave the blue filter and put an R72 filter in front the CCD, and you will get an IR camera. and maybe AA-less!

Thanks for sharing.

[Docrwm]

Very impressive 2nd post! Welcome Aboard!

[brewmaster15]

I followed your instruction and took apart my new K3. Very nice! A lot of pieces inside! -- Now how should i put them back? I need to shoot a weeding this Sunday! :-)

Are you going to try reassemble them? Leave the blue filter and put an R72 filter in front the CCD, and you will get an IR camera. and maybe AA-less!

Thanks for sharing.

Better go rent a replacement! LOL Thanks reading!

al

---------- Post added 01-23-15 at 08:18 AM ----------

Very impressive 2nd post! Welcome Aboard!

Thank you Robert!

[Docrwm]

Better go rent a replacement! LOL Thanks reading!

al

---------- Post added 01-23-15 at 08:18 AM ----------




Thank you Robert!

You're welcome. The floating sensor is Pentax's trademark IMHO for their dSLRs. Others have copied it but we have a great in-camera SR system and when combined with the Astrotracer you get a genuinely remarkable system IMHO.

[stevebrot]

RE: The large capacitor

I suspect it serves primarily to provide charge to the built in flash.


Steve

[soycory]

I followed your instruction and took apart my new K3. Very nice! A lot of pieces inside! -- Now how should i put them back? I need to shoot a weeding this Sunday! :-)

Are you going to try reassemble them? Leave the blue filter and put an R72 filter in front the CCD, and you will get an IR camera. and maybe AA-less!

Thanks for sharing.

Me too, but I ordered a 645Z from B+H... It seems kinda different inside. What should I do... This is all your fault... This is covered by warranty though right?

[Sagitta]

RE: The large capacitor

I suspect it serves primarily to provide charge to the built in flash.


Steve

I took apart my half-dead old Powershot, and even that thing about knocked me on my butt when I accidentally hit the capacitor in it, and its about half the size of a K2000.

It reminds me why my father always told me to not mess with the back of a television set - even a 'dead' one thats been unplugged for weeks - when I was younger.

[THoog]

The K2000 recently gave up the ghost. Rather than sell for parts on Ebay, I decided to take it apart.

Thanks for posting! When I saw the big capacitor, my first thought was "oh, so that's where it is - watch out for the flash cap-" just as I scrolled down to your notes on discharging it.

An interesting thing (to me, at least) is how large the main circuit board is. To get the K-01 and K-S1 smaller than the K2000/K-m/K-x body, they had to squeeze the main board down to something less than a third that size.

[Basie]

Great post! Thanks for sharing, but my K5 is safe ..... for now

[delegopa]

That was a enjoyable teardown. The large capacitor is solely used for the flash as it gets charged to a high voltage (Rating stands usually on it), which would fry integrated circuits. The compact camera I dissasembled once had a capacitor that was not much smaller.

Grahame should definitely post pics of his K3 for comparison

[JimmyDranox]

A lot of work and patience. I've never done this to a digital, but some old film cameras, including a Pentax, had this cruel fate. And I know it's not easy.

Thanks for sharing.

[RonHendriks1966]

Thanks for sharing.

[r0ckstarr]

Very cool. I have a working K2000, so it's interesting to see the insides.

You should do some sort of macro shots with the colors on the sensor.

[brewmaster15]

Thanks for the comments everyone, Glad it was interesting for you.

al