[filmscanners] Re: Nikon LS-30 -- strange behavoir

["" <lists@lazygranch.com>]

I'll go along with the carrier moving the film being the problem. The
stepper motor should be just applying force to a platform that can only
move back and forth. It shouldn't be able to cause a wobble. The stepper
only has 4 unique patterns in how it is energized electronically, so you
would think any problem in the stepper would have a very fine pattern.
In any event, the wiggle seen is in the fixed direction of the CCD.

I've had nothing but bad luck with "independent" authorized repair
shops. I wonder if you can send it to Los Angeles (maybe Torrance) that
has the real Nikon repair center. They performed magic on an old F3 I
bought on ebay which the local repair shop claimed to restore.

At some point you need to decide if repairing an old scanner is worth
the money. The LS-30 is a 10 bit scanner which isn't state of the art
today. I had to male the same decision when I broke my Microtek
Artixscan 4000 by hitting the carrier with the back of an office-style
rotating chair. Shipping and the cost of repair was about $100 on a
scanner that cost me a bit over a thousand but was going for $400 new
buy the time I needed the repair. I opted for the repair, but the
decision wasn't a slam-dunk since the newer version (still near the $1k
mark) had a Dmin of 4 versus the 3.4 of my old version. For the LS-30,
you might want to go the route of insisting that this doesn't take any
more out of pocket expense, i.e make them fix it right this time or just
bit the bullet and get a new scanner if you can. It's yet another topic,
but the point where digital cameras match scanned film is probably less
than a decade away, so think of your new scanner as perhaps your last
scanner. When my 35mm film SLR developed a problem, I opted to buy my
"last" film camera versus a questionable repair on an eight year old body.


Arthur Entlich wrote:

>I'm not claiming to be an expert on scanner mechanics and electronics,
>but to me this looks like it could come from several sources.  From a
>strictly mechanical basic, it could be something very wrong with the
>mechanism that moves the film carrier, causing it to be shifted from
>slide to side as it worms it way through the travel.   I can't recall
>anymore which scanners Nikon made that had the film and carrier move and
>which had the whole image capture stage move, so whichever one moves in
>this scanner, it might be sliding around.
>
>However, this could also be am electronic problem with timing shifting
>between the capture and the digital conversion, slowly shifting the
>pixels over one direction until it meets a tolerance or check point, and
>then shifting the other way.
>
>Obviously, this guy will claim it was "fine when it left here" and must
>have happened during shipping or at while in your possession, or maybe
>he forgot to lock the scanner's head for shipment and something got
>knocked out of whack.
>
>I hope you get a good warranty on the repair, because I would be quite
>wary of this guy's work.  I would only give him one more chance to
>correct it, and to provide an extended warranty on his work.  If it
>comes back bad again, I would contact Nikon.
>
>Art
>
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