8mm Forum: My new Baby

This is topic My new Baby in forum 9.5mm Forum at 8mm Forum.

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Posted by Paul Adsett (Member # 25) on March 24, 2007, 04:59 PM:

Well I have finally completed the restoration and motor upgrade of my Pathe Baby. This machine was a Christmas gift from my daughter a couple of years ago. She got it off ebay and the machine is cosmetically in great shape. You could hardly turned the handle on it when we unpacked it, so I stripped it down and cleaned and lubed the whole mechanism. Then I converted the lighting system to 12 volt 20 watt halogen, stripping out the old resistance matt in the base and inserting a very small 12 volt transformer. The final work was to motorise the projector, and thanks to Tony Reypert at Buckingham Films for the motor, Grahame Newnham for the motor pulley, and Wharton Parfitt for the belts, the projector now runs like a Swiss watch while I relax in my easy chair! So here she is, in all her glory, a beautiful piece of cinema history which I find very satisfying to have restored, and now display and run for friends and family.

Posted by Douglas Meltzer (Member # 28) on March 24, 2007, 10:42 PM:

Nothing like Baby pictures from a proud father....er, owner.

Doug

Posted by Jean-Marc Toussaint (Member # 270) on March 25, 2007, 03:10 AM:

Very nice, Paul. Does it let you sleep at night?

Posted by David Pannell (Member # 300) on March 25, 2007, 04:48 AM:

What a beautiful piece of history, Paul.

Well done!!

Posted by Trevor Adams (Member # 42) on March 25, 2007, 07:01 AM:

Nice one Paul.Sometimes it is just nice watching the mechanism turn over [Smile]

Posted by Philippe Cuypers (Member # 55) on March 25, 2007, 12:20 PM:

thats a nice baby paul!! just think you dont have to worry that one day ,she or him will gett married !! enjoy very nice piece of film history to share with us! [Smile]

Posted by Craig Hamilton (Member # 258) on March 26, 2007, 12:40 PM:

Nice one Paul, let’s hope Jacob is not to upset that his hand cranked projector is missing its cranking handle.

Interesting to see that you have removed the entire take up mechanism from the glass cover chamber. I tried removing mine but found that the auto brake arm was being lifted to high and this caused a bit of gate movement. By just replacing the 1st guide arm I cured this problem as it is sprung loaded.

Craig

Posted by Paul Adsett (Member # 25) on March 26, 2007, 03:19 PM:

Hi Craig,
Well Jacob still gets to use the hand cranked Pathe Ace! [Wink]

Looking at the photo of your machine I see that it differs a little from mine. The Baby that I got did not come with those two little arms inside the take up chamber, which are used to help wind up the small 30ft cassette films. Possibly mine is an earlier machine (Model A), or the previous owner lost these parts. Anyway, referring to Gerald McKee's fantastic book The Home Cinema , the take up arrangement on the Baby varied quite a lot during its 13 year production run.
The 30ft cassettes are quaint but annoying. By the time you thread them up, the film is over! And the severe curl on the film makes them difficult to thread. The super attachment solves all these problems. I have seen 9.5mm films advertised with 12 parts, each in a cassette! Talk about reel changes! [Big Grin]

Posted by Jim Schrader (Member # 9) on March 26, 2007, 07:56 PM:

I bet that uis one baby that does notkeep you up at night [Cool]

Posted by Rod Stone (Member # 1097) on March 31, 2008, 04:48 PM:

Hi Paul - the restored Baby is quite impressive. I have a Pathe Baby that I am using for old family and some commerical films. I am having trouble with the automatic stop feature. The film will stop at the notch and the traveller will move across and snap the engagement arm but the mechanism to "catch" the arm and hold the teeth in the engaged positon does not seem to hold it and the fim does not advance past that point. Any ideas on a repair for this? Also, where did you purchase the 12 volt halogen bulb? Many thanks for your help.

Posted by Martyn Stevens (Member # 861) on April 07, 2008, 04:33 PM:

I recently acquired a copy of Michael Strogoff in 20 x 60ft cassettes. This is why early and home projectionists tend to have one arm bigger than the other, like some crabs.
As to this matter of the curl, it was quite deliberate and you will find that a cassette will not in effect auto-thread and take up properly without it. Pathe used some form of heat treatment to make the permanent curl and actually took out a patent on this. If curl is a problem with Super Reels, add leader until you have enough to thread before you get to the curly bit.

Martyn Stevens

Posted by Paul Adsett (Member # 25) on April 07, 2008, 07:18 PM:

I think the film has more than a curl Martyn, it seems to have memory! I notice that when I leave a film threaded up in my little Pathe Ace, that the film temporarily retains the curl induced by the three little rollers at the bottom of the gate. There are now modern Titanium metal alloys that remember their shape, but apparently Pathe had a high tech solution for memory in plastic Cellulose Acetate way back in 1920!
Personally though, I find the curl on the little 30ft Pathex cassettes so extreme that it hinders threading up the projector.

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