[Astro-Baby]

I have had this on the back burner for ages now but had some time free.

I got handed this old Yashica Auto Electro 35 that was as dead as fried chicken. Some reading led me to think it was being caused by the 'Pad of Death'. Part of the mechanism relies on a small rubber pad that keeps some stuff electrically isolated and presumably acts as a kind of bumper for part of the mechanism. Unfortunately like light seals these deteriorate over time and once the rubber breaks down thats it - the camera wont work.

So anyway the fault diagnostic appears to be Pad of Death and from what I could see inside the camera with the lid off that would have been a fair conclusion. Sticky mess where the pad should have been.
You can (according to some) replace the pad just by taking the top off the camera but I just couldn't do it so ended up taking the box to bits to get at the mechanism which also gave me a chance to inspect other stuff.

Unfortunately after fixing the pad the camera still fails - though initially it worked, making me suspect there is trouble afoot in its 1960s electronics. The culprit I think is one of the capacitors (or maybe more of them) because this thing was left in a shed for years. I really want to get her going as optically she is mint and all of her rangefinder functions work ok.

As someone nagged me to show pics next time I was beavering I took a pic this time so you can see whats inside the guts of this. Frankly getting the front off was a lot tougher than I had expected and the web guides on this had some missing bits. perhaps Yashica changed design halfway through - dont know.

The Pad of Death is the small rubber bung thats at the end of the pointy thing near the bottom of the pic. The gate that it is attached to is normally underneath the push rod that has the smaller spring on it. The gate has been swung out to allow access to the pad. The pad is about 3x4x2mm so its actually very tiny.

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[Sam_I_am]

I really appreciate you posting pics. I think you just insured that I never pull the front off any camera. Yikes !

[Lhorn]

That picture might have saved from buying an untested Electro 35. Yikes.

[Astro-Baby]

Dont risk a not tested one of these, the rangefinder function can be a problem plus the parallax system can fail, add in iffy old lightmeters and the pad of death and you have a camera set up to fail....I have seen plenty of posts of unhappy buyers with these when bought untested and untried.

[boriscleto]

Dont risk a not tested one of these, the rangefinder function can be a problem plus the parallax system can fail, add in iffy old lightmeters and the pad of death and you have a camera set up to fail....I have seen plenty of posts of unhappy buyers with these when bought untested and untried.

I have two. They look very nice on the shelf.

[ismaelg]

Call me weird but that's a beautiful picture
No idea on this one, but those springs look mint with no signs of rust. Solder joints look good but they have to be closely inspected.

Thanks,

[UncleVanya]

My first 35mm was a Yashica rangefinder. I'm getting all nostalgic thinking about it. This may save me from buying one however...

[Benz3ne]

I hadn't realised they were that problematic. They do look excellent and I've been debating about getting a film-powered rangefinder.
I agree with Ismael, that is mighty clean inside, judging the picture alone.

[ZombieArmy]

This seems like a relatively easy problem to fix no? I'm sure it could be handled in a regular CLA, as long as nothing has shorted.

The electronics on mine are working fine but I do plan to get mine sent out at some point for safety I suppose.

[Astro-Baby]

The Pad of Death isnt that hard to get too. Ignore the web guides and get the service manual is my advice but sadly the PoD problem isnt the only headache in here. Its still a dead duck.

Last night I took the lens assembly to bits to see if the internal contacts were clean as it started working intermittently on only f16 so on a crazy idea the issues may be related to the internal lens contacts which relay the f stop setting to the cameras brain I decided to give that a go, they werent clean so they have been cleaned out so thats another issue resolved but its still a no go so it has it be something in the electronics. The upside is this is 60s electronics so discrete components off the shelf, the down side is the electronics are partially encapuslated in a white coloured encapuslation agent and the smarts are in an ancient metal canned IC and with heavy heart I feel its either the IC or the cDs cell thats whacked.

It will very intermittently almost work so at least I know the bulbs are good and this isn’t a wild goose chase and my experience tells me with a vaguely intermittent issue a capacitor is the likley cause. All soder joints look good, clean and shiny.

While reseraching it seems these things can be troublesome, the PoD is the biggest killer but they suffer from other stuff too. People seemd to have issues with the rangefinder not working, parallax corrector being out of whack and rangefinder masks fading off making the RF ineffective on top of all the usual mechanical mishaps.

The leatherettes was wrecked on this one, to get ghe lens assembly out you have to peel the leatherette back, unfortunatly some clown had glued the leatherett down with contact adhesive and it just didnt want to let go, tried various solvents to no avail and in the end has to just tear the leatherette off it.

If I ever get it going its going to be recovered in something exotic.

[Astro-Baby]

Heres a few more pics of one of these with the cover off.

The investigation is now focusing on the small grey colured capacitor thats almost dead centre on this pic, this is the shutter timing capacitor if I am reading the circuit diagfams right. If this isn't the fault I will have to move on and look at something else. The electronics package appears to have had components epoxied in using something akin to electronic potting compound so probably nosing much further into the electronics is going to be nigh impossible.

[Astro-Baby]

And here are a few more pics just so you can see whats inside - the camera top from the front - showing left to right...

Light Meter cell and its masking plates - as you turn the ASA speed down the mask in front of the cell gets smaller.

Rangefinder lens (small square to the left of the larger square and just under the green wires at centre it form a single block with the adjacent....

Parallax mask (large square with corners cut out). Underneath the copper coloured cover are the various reflectors and adjusters to set the RF and Parallax correction.
As the lens moves in and out the parallax mask moves in synch and 'paints' the markings into the viewfinder so you can see where the picture edges are. Agfa called this 'Brightline' back in the day on their cameras.

And finally the viewfinder optics.

If you look to the front of the camera at the top of the casing you can see a small brass plate just to the left of the light meter mask. To the right of that brass plate on the small silver plate (between the brass plate and the coloured wires) is where the pad of death goes . The gap looks large when you photograph it but in reality is only about 2mm wide and the pad has to sit on the bottom of one half of that metal plate.

[Astro-Baby]

And heres a close up of the rear of the lightmeter and electronics assembly.

---------- Post added 11-13-20 at 06:58 AM ----------

Ismael - so far this is a string of three I haven't been able to fix - first was the Pentax SP500 (Prism delimitation), second was a Minolta X500 (major failure in the winding and shutter gear) and now this.... Maybe thats my bad three for the year.

[Sam_I_am]

I have looked at the repair manuals for two of the Pentax cameras I have and they really do not convey just how many intricate and precision parts are actually hidden under the outside shell of a camera. That is simply amazing.

[Lhorn]

^^^^ that was my impression too when I opened up a broken ME Super. Heck even the bits under the bottom plate of an Auto 110 are an impressive feat of engineering