Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1997/10/02
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]>All right, I'll bite (especially since I'm not a proud Prodovit owner). >Although construction of Leica projectors is top rate, why would anyone >want a system that uses those flaky European trays? I had a Zeiss projector >once, and one tipped tray with slides all over the floor forever convinced >me. I believe that the maximum in one tray is 40 slides, and you had better >hold it within a few degrees of vertical or be ready to play 40-pickup. Gary, I use the European trays and like them. They are much more compact than carousels. The trays come in 30 and 50 sizes for either cardboard or glass mounts, and in 80 for cardboard mounts only. Although you can spill them, I don't have a problem with this. There is (or used to be) a tray that had a little barb on each partition, which prevents spilling. I believe that Leitz made these special trays. IMHO, the size of the trays is not a big issue. You can keep sliding a new tray in right behind the previous one, with hardly any interruption (unlike changing a carousel). The trays that I have are all 50s, and I like the way their little storage drawers fit together to form a filing cabinet. I can keep about 200 slides in less space that one 80 carousel would take up. (I use a lot of glass mounts, so I use the 50 trays and would have to use 80 carousels.) If you use cardboard mounts, you could use the 80 straight trays and have 320 slides in the space of one carousel). Also, if you store slides in the tray, you need to put carousels into their carboard boxes to keep dust off them; these are awkward to store and sort through, and are no competition for the convenience of the little storage drawers for straight trays. I got rid of my carousel projector and carousels about 20 years ago. >Actually, I do admit to owning a Leica projector - an old VIII-S with >Hektor 8.5cm f2.5 lens. It is an unusual model with a large fan base (not >water cooled) that the projector sits on. The serial number is A192 (any >collector comments?) Slide trays are definitely not an issue! Have you ever seen the old Leitz Automatic Continuous Projector Attachment? It looks like a giant Kodak Disk Camera disk (remember those?). That was an accessory for the VIII-S projector. Its main section was a large, rotating disk, which held 12 glass-mounted slides against its surface, around its circumference, with little clips. There is an aperture cut in the disk behind the place for each slide. The unit was used for automated presentations; it had an electric motor, and was adjusted via a rheostat to set the duration of each slide from 10 to 60 seconds. Just think--automated projection of TWELVE SLIDES! - - Paul