2026-05-28 Repairing a "Camera/Viewer"

The local thrift store founder I have known for 40-years motioned me over. She whispered,” I have a special camera I saved for you!” Then she handed me this sugar-cube sized keychain camera-viewer. We laughed together and then I headed by her to see what I could find in the thrift store.
I tried playing with the camera/viewer and found the “shutter” button wasn’t advancing the slides. So, being me, I pried the camera open.

If you insert a blade into the shutter button’s surround you can pry the two halves apart. This is what you would find if it had been assembled correctly. I found the almost dried out elastic—that yellow object—had popped off and so the mechanism was not working.

These are the parts (starting at the left side)—

A short “arm” pivoting on a post the band is wrapped around. It has a notch the center hub’s small posts drop into.
The centre disc of “slides” has a centre hole the disc rotates around (the rubber band runs around the top of that post). The black part with index posts has two posts on the backside that match twin holes in the slide disc.
Finally we have a shutter arm that pulls the disc around one notch at a press. The shutter is limited in motion to the slot mounted on the last post to the right.

Notice how many jobs one elastic band gets to do?

Starting again at the left the elastic band—

Holds the arm on the post in two places. It also provides downward pressure by being looped over the post cast on the arm.
Then in the middle the elastic holds the slide disc and center index post disc in their post.
On the right the elastic holds the “shutter” arm against the center while holding the entire shutter arm in place. The really short length of the elastic stretched from the fixed post to the bottom post cast in the shutter arm is the resistance you feel as you press the shutter.

At the camera’s four corners you can see the small posts that hold the camera body's two halves together by friction.

The back of the camera shaped viewer.

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