Help! Digital Rebel black curtain problem

I have a Canon EOS Digital Rebel. Yesterday I began having a black
curtain blocking part of every picture. Over the course of about 10
shutter actuations the curtain progressed further and further across
the image, to where now pictures are almost completely blacked out.

What might be causing this? Is repair possible?

Thanks for any input.

Stephen

On Nov 29, 7:44 pm, "sps.dls" wrote:
I have a Canon EOS Digital Rebel. Yesterday I began having a black
curtain blocking part of every picture. Over the course of about 10
shutter actuations the curtain progressed further and further across
the image, to where now pictures are almost completely blacked out.

What might be causing this? Is repair possible?

Thanks for any input.

Stephen

Sounds like the shutter is wonky.

On Nov 29, 10:23 pm, Mike Hamilton wrote:
On Nov 29, 7:44 pm, "sps.dls" wrote:

I have a Canon EOS Digital Rebel. Yesterday I began having a black
curtain blocking part of every picture. Over the course of about 10
shutter actuations the curtain progressed further and further across
the image, to where now pictures are almost completely blacked out.

What might be causing this? Is repair possible?

Thanks for any input.

Stephen

Sounds like the shutter is wonky.

Well, the edge of the "black curtain" is soft, not a hard line -- the
blackness fades in. Shutter *appears* to be operating normally.

On Thu, 29 Nov 2007 18:44:51 -0800 (PST), "sps.dls"
wrote:

I have a Canon EOS Digital Rebel. Yesterday I began having a black
curtain blocking part of every picture. Over the course of about 10
shutter actuations the curtain progressed further and further across
the image, to where now pictures are almost completely blacked out.

What might be causing this? Is repair possible?

Thanks for any input.

Stephen

Sounds like your shutter has malfunctioned. When you take a shot are
you gettng the characteristic CLICK of the mirror moving to expose the
shot?

Yes, the shutter clicks, the mirror flips up, etc. It appears all
moving parts are working correctly. Here is a sample pictu

http://picasaweb.google.com/sps.dls/...80138676495634

Yuki wrote:

Looks like a slow/stuck mirror to me. Note that the image is inverted in
the sensor.

Agree with Yuki. The mirror is getting progressively stuck.
Put the camera is sensor cleaning mode and see if the mirror flips up fully.
--
gautam

sps.dls wrote:
I have a Canon EOS Digital Rebel. Yesterday I began having a black
curtain blocking part of every picture. Over the course of about 10
shutter actuations the curtain progressed further and further across
the image, to where now pictures are almost completely blacked out.

What might be causing this? Is repair possible?

Thanks for any input.

Stephen

The Rebel actually has two mirrors, one to feed the image to the
viewfinder and the other to deflect the image down to the focusing sensors.

The small secondary mirror sometimes breaks it's plastic pivots, and
droops down instead of flipping up behind the main mirror, and when this
happens you will get a partially occluded image.

If you set the shutter to Bulb and hold it open with no lens fitted you
should be able to see the problem.

Colin D.

--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

On Thu, 29 Nov 2007 20:10:09 -0800 (PST), "sps.dls"
wrote:

Yes, the shutter clicks, the mirror flips up, etc. It appears all
moving parts are working correctly. Here is a sample pictu

http://picasaweb.google.com/sps.dls/...80138676495634

OK. If I am not mistaken the mirror is not the shutter mechanisism.

I don't EVER delve past a light wipe of the mirror these days but in
my younger and more adventurous days I recall being fascinated by the
shutter curtain operation BEHIND the mirror of one of my old film
SLR's.

The mirror raises and an opaque membrane with a thin slit in it
flashed from top to bottom of the frame allowing ligh to pass. Maybe
digitals work differently but my poor and failing memory seems to
flicker a little on this. If it is the same you might that shutter
curtain might be hanging up.

Or, I could be full of crap!

UPDATE!

Colin, thanks for the note. You are right. It was the smaller of the
two mirrors that was hanging down. I was able to easily push it back
up so that it no longer blocks the image being recorded, *however*,
now my autofocus doesn't work. It seems that this smaller mirror is
now stuck up instead of down. Do you think it could be just stuck, or
are the "plastic pivots" likely broken? Is there a way to fix/replace
the pivots that you mentioned?

Thanks--

Stephen

On Nov 30, 4:51 am, Colin_D wrote:
The Rebel actually has two mirrors, one to feed the image to the
viewfinder and the other to deflect the image down to the focusing sensors.

The small secondary mirror sometimes breaks it's plastic pivots, and
droops down instead of flipping up behind the main mirror, and when this
happens you will get a partially occluded image.

If you set the shutter to Bulb and hold it open with no lens fitted you
should be able to see the problem.

Colin D.

sps.dls wrote:
UPDATE!

Colin, thanks for the note. You are right. It was the smaller of the
two mirrors that was hanging down. I was able to easily push it back
up so that it no longer blocks the image being recorded, *however*,
now my autofocus doesn't work. It seems that this smaller mirror is
now stuck up instead of down. Do you think it could be just stuck, or
are the "plastic pivots" likely broken? Is there a way to fix/replace
the pivots that you mentioned?

Thanks--

Stephen

It's a Canon Service repair job, nothing you can do to fix it. It's
quite a common problem with Rebels. Time to upgrade.

Colin D.

On Nov 30, 4:51 am, Colin_D wrote:
The Rebel actually has two mirrors, one to feed the image to the
viewfinder and the other to deflect the image down to the focusing sensors.

The small secondary mirror sometimes breaks it's plastic pivots, and
droops down instead of flipping up behind the main mirror, and when this
happens you will get a partially occluded image.

If you set the shutter to Bulb and hold it open with no lens fitted you
should be able to see the problem.

Colin D.



--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com