My Pentax S1 is acting up

[Jamie123]

My aunt recently gave me an old Pentax S1 with a 35mm f3.5 Auto-Takumar from my late uncle's camera collection. Nice little combo. I put a roll through the camera the day I got it and everything worked fine (speeds above 1/60th all sound a bit slow but I'm not worried).
However, today I put a new roll in the camera and when I shot the first frame the viewfinder blacked out. I unscrew the lens and see that the mirror is up. There's no way to get it back down other than to wind to the next frame, make an exposure (mirror comes down) and wind on again to take a picture.
Obviously I can't use a camera that wastes every other shot and since it is not exactly worth a fortune I'm not about to spend any significant amount of money on a CLA. So my question is, is there any way I could 'fix' this myself?

 

[charjohncarter]

I remember someone saying that the foam gets sticky and then when the shot is done it is locked. Just something I heard (so maybe a little separator on the foam???). Also, Eric Hendrickson is really good with these cameras. He is reasonable and I have used him three times:

http://pentaxs.com/

 

[Jerevan]

Yeah, Eric is a good repairman. It's probably sticky old foam keeping the mirror up.

 

[skibeerr]

There was another Pentax famous for the sticky mirror, the LX.

 

[Landshark]

Next time it sticks pop it down with your fingernail. If it drops into place it's the foam.
Another test for the foam is to just press it with your finger. If it compresses and stays that way it's time for foam.
Interslice on the bay has very inexpensive foam kits It's easy to do if you're patient.

 

[Jamie123]

It's not the foam. Actually, there is no foam and it looks like that's the way it's supposed to be. I can say for sure that this is not the issue. The problem is definitely mechanical. The mirror snaps up with one exposure and then it snaps back down with the next exposure. It's possible that it started after I took a few exposures on the "T" setting.

I'm sure Eric Hendrickson does a great job but I'm not located in the US so that's not really an option. I might just have to retire the camera for the time being. It was nice while it lasted (1 day) but money's very tight at the moment so I can't afford to go around having my cameras fixed 🙂.