Nauticam A7RIII housing - turning knob difficult to move

[andieich]

Hi,

 

I have a Nauticam A7RIII housing. Now I noticed that one of the turning knows (the one on the top right) is more difficult to move than before.  I immersed the housing after each dive, did somebody experience this before? And advice on how to disassemble and clean the knob? Thanks!

[Chris Ross]

1 hour ago, andieich said:

Hi,

 

I have a Nauticam A7RIII housing. Now I noticed that one of the turning knows (the one on the top right) is more difficult to move than before.  I immersed the housing after each dive, did somebody experience this before? And advice on how to disassemble and clean the knob? Thanks!

Is the knob difficult to turn with the housing empty?  Or only when the camera is loaded?

[andieich]

Both 😉

I feel more resistance than before even without a camera, no change when I insert the camera. So I think it's a problem of the knof itself.

[Chris Ross]

You might need a new o-ring for the knob and you should use new c-rings if you disturb any, they are mainly used on button shafts to secure them to any internal levers used.

 

Nauticam housing are known to be difficult to to service due to the complicated mechanisms inside.  How you deal with it will vary depending on how accessible the knob is and whether you need to remove other internals to access the knob itself.  Often the motion is transmitted to the the camera knob by a gear train.  This means that the stiffness my be the knob itself or there could be an issue with the gear train and internal wheel. 

 

This is a snip of the internals of the A7RIII housing:

 

 

I assume you are referring to one of the knobs shown here, either exp comp or rear dial (the knob for rear dial only just appears above the housing in this shot).  The mechanism for this dial is buried beneath several other mechanisms and it is hard to tell from this image just what would need to be removed to allow it to be serviced.  It appears the drive for the rear dial is transmitted by the shaft at the top of the image.

 

On my housing the drive knob is in a spring loaded assembly with cap screws securing it to the housing body.  I highlighted what appears to be the drive wheel for the rear dial and you might be able to remove that assembly to check it.   You would need to examine it closely to determine how each component is secured and disassemble in the correct order.  The tools required should be straight forward, the difficulty is removing other mechanisms which might be in the way and re-installing them correctly.

 

[andieich]

Thanks!

 

It's the wheel on the top right. The mechanism seems to be behind everything in the 2nd photo. Do you know how to disassemble it? It seems to be difficult because all the mechanisms in front of it have springs. I live in French Polynesia, therefore, just sending the housing to Nauticam is no option for now. Do you know how open Nauticam generally is in sharing ways to service housings?

 

[Davide DB]

2 hours ago, andieich said:

Do you know how open Nauticam generally is in sharing ways to service housings?

 

AFAIK, little or nothing.

Maybe you should contact the Nauticam importer (if any) for your zone.

Here in Italy the Nauticam dealer is able to assist me with simple housing service.

[andieich]

There's no importer here. I'll still try to reach Nauticam, maybe I'm able to get a replacement knob or o-rings and c-rings.

[Chris Ross]

It's going to be hard to tell what's happening from photos, obviously the mechanism is partly hidden.  You would need to turn the knob back and forth and confirm which parts move inside and feel how things move in there.

 

So confirming that the knob turns the camera rear dial that would be the smooth knob directly below the vacuum valve in your photo, outlined in red here:

 

 

The parts outlined in blue look like the parts that control the two dials and they would be the parts you would be looking to remove.

 

Looking at the following view of the housing it appears this might be the drive train outlined in red:

 

 

You would need to confirm that by checking if the shaft rotates when you operate the knob.

 

Before you start pulling it apart it is probably best to confirm if you can buy the needed parts, perhaps you could contact Backscatter or Reef as they seem to to service Nauticam gear to see if they can provide the needed parts and assistance with how to install them.