Why does nobody talk about how easy it is to strip screw heads on old Mamiya cameras?

I wasted like $40 and 3 hours last week trying to fix a stuck film advance on a Mamiya C220. Turns out the previous owner used some cheap screws that just rounded off with the first turn of my JIS screwdriver. Lost the whole evening and had to drill out the screw anyway. Anyone else run into this with older Japanese gear?

2 comments

2 Comments

juliagonzalez3d ago

Right, because nothing says "precision engineering" like screws made of cheese. Mamiya's old Japanese stuff is great until you realize they used the same metal they put in toy watches for fasteners. I've got a C33 that took an hour just to get the bottom plate off, and I'm pretty sure the screw heads were just decorative by the time I was done. At least you didn't also strip the advance knob while trying to force it, that's a whole other level of pain.

davidh883d ago

At least @juliagonzalez didn't crack the focus knob like I did.