Ugh! My Nikon FE advance lever is stuck

I've tried the auxiliary release as well. I think I've messed up the timing sequence at some point, and I cannot find the way back. If I can find somebody to fix it, I'll sell it afterwards. I've had enough trouble with this camera.
 
My first FE (many years ago) (many, many years) quit working on me, and I took it back to the place I bought it. They did a quick repair on it, and it failed again a couple of days later. They wouldn't give me my money back, so I took it to a reputable repair shop in town, and they informed me the shutter was broken, and there were no replacement parts. So maybe it was of the original production run, and Nikon quit making parts for that series since they had changed the design by then. Anyway, it just became a mantle display until it was sold with the rest of my gear when I was raising cash to keep paying the rent.

I got a second one about ten years ago, and never had an issue with it. It seemed to be a very late production version. I believe I have an FE2 also, but don't quote me on that.

PF
 
Bought an FE on Ebay and while unboxing it at the Post Office could not get it to work. Someone was there "watching" me take it out of the box....really beautiful camera...told me to try taking the battery out and putting it back in. I took them out, he watched, as I checked to see if they had been put in properly. The camera was sold "as is" not functioning. Well, they had been put in upside down! When I replaced them in the camera it wound and worked like new!~$35 from what I recall....I still have the camera. By the way according to a reputed site on automatic the shutter will fire as fast as 1/4000 sec. I also have an EM and checked its shutter and it seems to work like the Nikon FE...in bright light I get two bumps when I change the aperture allowing the exposure needle to move above 1/1000 second. Also, with no batteries in the EM I read that the shutter will fire at around 1/1000 second. So much for electronic cameras without batteries! By the way the EM to get 1/1000~ the battery has to be removed. It already has a mechanical 1/90 second setting. Good luck though with your FE!
 
My FE's shutter/film advanced jammed this weekend. The camera was an ebay purchase from 12 years ago when they were almost free, and has given me great service since then and has become my favorite camera. (Glad it happened this weekend and not next as I was planning on taking it on a trip to celebrate my daughter's birthday.)

I may take the bottom plate off and see if I can get it unstuck somehow. If not, off to the repair shop it will go.

Fortunately, I bought another FE last year and also have a few Pentaxes, so I am not short of manual focus SLRs for backup.
 
Sorry to dredge this old thread up. I had my FE repaired around Jan./Feb. of last year by a very reputable (and expensive) shop and put maybe three rolls through it since then. I tried to load it this morning and the shutter/film advance jammed again. I am very displeased. I have emailed the shop to see what they suggest, and am awaiting a reply.
 
I created an account, JUST to share this. I was at a complete loss, having the same issues, with with my Nikon FE also not matching any of the videos, or the pictures, until I saw the photo that the original poster shared - it was just like MINE. I finally found the solve, and wanted to share it here. This video is super in focus and detail, and it uses the same Nikon FE we have been hunting for. I just solve my shutter release / advance with this. I hope it works for you, or someone else following or searching this thread in the future.
 
So, the video shows how it gets fixed.
I'd like to know how the problem comes to happen in the first place.
It looks like the 'plate' he installs on top of the lever he re positions, should keep it in place.
Anyone with an answer to that?
I have an FE that is the first new, 'real' camera I purchased to record my family growing up.
 
AlwaysOnAuto said:
So, the video shows how it gets fixed.
I'd like to know how the problem comes to happen in the first place.
It looks like the 'plate' he installs on top of the lever he re positions, should keep it in place.
Anyone with an answer to that?
I have an FE that is the first new, 'real' camera I purchased to record my family growing up.
Click to expand...
My case may or may not be common. I was allowing my nephew to advance, snap, advance, snap this camera in between rolls. He's 5, so he didn't always advance it fully, so it was a lot of partial advancing, then re-advancing before he could get the shutter to click. To his credit, he didn't give me the camera back because it stopped working for him, I noticed the issue as I was trying to load a roll of film once I got it back from him, when threading it into the reel and advanving it to get to frame 0-1 on the counter. I was able to save the film, remove it, then start troubleshooting. My assumption was that the issue came up from this camera being 1- old, 2 - old, and 3 - just happened to pop out due to odd use. Seems like a semi-freak thing, but given the brass plate is what prevents that silver arm from "falling out" of the track, I guess it is possible that there was too much play in the space between the brass plate and that arm. If the issue happens again, my solve might be to add a very thin layer of tape or something to thicken the underside of the brass plate, minimizing the amount of travel that arm has against it (with gravity). You will notice in the video (and live on your own camera if you are using this method) that once that brass plate is removed, if you flip your camera rightside up, the arm falls completely out when you advance it. Hope this helps.
 
My FM that worked when it was given to me for free looks like the one in that video, also jammed up in a similar way. I can't seem to get it fixed though. I think it just needs a good service though, the exterior is pretty beatup on it and I had an impression the original owner who I spoke to was not easy on his equipment. Might just keep it as a shelf piece though.
 
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