Hi-Matic 7s Question

[ABrosig]

I picked up a Hi-Matic 7s in good condition. Shutter appears to be clean, speeds sound accurate (I know, not the best benchmark) and aperture blades are in good shape. Overall camera is in excellent condition, except for one thing.

The metal battery contact is completely free of its seating in the chamber and juice is (apparently) not getting to the metering system. New PX625 battery bought at Radio Shack, so don't believe that's the problem.

I'm hoping someone can help me find a schematic/repair diagram to let me get inside the camera and see if a I can reattach the battery contacts. Really don't have the cash to send this off right now. I've had the bottom plate off and it's very clean inside, but I couldn't figure out how to get into the battery compartment. With the plate off, it's just sitting there, part of the one-piece unit holding the advance gears, etc. I'm not sure I"m explaining this well.


This is as far as I've gotten:



Thanks in advance; any help is greatly appreciated

 

[Ranchu]

Maybe this will help, I think they're similar? http://www.oocities.org/zzhuy/hiMatic9/hiMatic9.html

 

[ABrosig]

Thank you!!

 

[ABrosig]

Update: Succeeded in disassembling the top case and cleaning the range finder (what a difference a qtip and a bit of rubbing alcohol makes!), but still haven't figured out how to access the battery compartment. On the plus side, the camera seems to be functioning otherwise and giving proper exposures using an old sekonic hand-held meter. May not mess with getting the meter fixed anyway unless I can DIY it.

 

[Jani_from_Finland]

Had an Himatic 7S sometime, it was really good mechanically, dont mess with the electro if you dont need to. Use it as mechanical RF with a superb lens and shutter.

 

[ABrosig]

That's the direction I'm leaning now. The hand-held meter weighs nothing, slips easily into a pocket and, for its age, still seems pretty accurate. It's working and I'm not going to have to spend any more money on the camera.

 

[Frontman]

There is a single wire which runs down to the round metal disk shown in your photo, it is normally soldered to the disk, and then the wire is fed through the hole in the battery chamber, and connected to the meter or meter switch. The disk is then glued into the battery compartment. You should be able find the wire under the top cover, you might need to remove the rangefinder to get to it, or feed a new wire from the battery chamber and splice it in.