Canon AE-1 Repair

Repairing the AE-1 involves removing the top cover to reveal a flex circuit, together with conventional components. From here, you have access to two of the main integrated circuits (IC), whilst the third IC is above the viewfinder assembly measuring the light levels through the prism. As you can see, it is a compact build, and extremely skilled factory workers would have performed the soldering of resistors and wires manually.

Removing the top cover involves similar steps to other Canon cameras; however, this one has some additional complications worth knowing. It is vital to set the shutter speed to "B" and the ASA film speed to 3200. This is due to the spring-loaded components inside, and those settings ensure minimal tension in the spring. Some familiar steps involved in removing the top cover include wedging the film rewind shaft and unscrewing the knob. There is also a c-clip holding a cover around the rewind shaft, which requires removing. At the other end, you will need to remove the film advance lever, which involves unscrewing the snake-eyes head screw. There are two washers followed by a nut, which requires unscrewing. You will also need to remove the obvious looking screws at the sides holding the top cover; however, there are two hidden screws behind the front decorator cover, which will require removal first.

The added complication in this camera is in the form of a string, which connects the film speed coupler, to the functional resistor on other side of the camera. In this camera design, there are concentric shutter speed and ASA film speed dials, around the film advance lever, however the electronics (potentiometer) is on the other side of the camera and concentric around the film rewind knob. When you rotate the film speed dial, a string transmits the force to move the potentiometer at the other end. In the manual, they call the potentiometer a functional resistor, which has a track and a wiper.

The functional resistor is also spring loaded to maintain tension on the string and this tension increases when the shutter speed dial is on the high value end. Therefore placing it at the "B" position ensures minimal tension. For the same reason, the ASA setting has to be at 3200, which ensures minimal spring tension. If you do not take these precautions, then the string could snap back and break when you remove the top cover.

At this end, there is the functional resistor, with a coil spring. As you can see, a very thin string comes out from the mechanism.

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