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Apollo Hasselblad Magazine Lock

Assembled by Eric Jones.
Last revised 31 October 2014

At 133:47:46 in the Apollo 12 Lunar Surface Journal, Pete Conrad and Al Bean are near the rim of Surveyor Crater, getting ready to make their way into the crater.  A short time previously, they discovered that the thumbwheels used to tighten the connections between the cameras, camera brackets, and trigger handles had come loose.  When they removed Al's LMP camera to tighten the assembly, the thumbwheel fell off, making reassembly impossible.  They put the LMP camera with its attached Hasselblad film magazine in the Hand Tool Carrier.  Because Al was going to be taking documentation photos during their examination of Surveyor III, they decided that Al should wear Pete's CDR camera.  They got Pete's camera off his chest-mounted Remote Control Unit (RCU), got the assembly tightened, and installed the camera on Al's RCU.  There was very little unexposed film left on the magazine Pete had been using, so Al shot the four remaining frames as a mini-pan.  He then took the magazine off the CDR camera and replaced it with the magazine Al had been using on the LMP camera.  However, Al had trouble working the lock that secured the magazine to the camera body.  "The (magazine) lock is what's driving me buggy," he told Pete.



Detail from KSC-69PC-545


Detail from Apollo training image KSC-69PC-545 showing Al during an indoor training session at the Cape.  The magazine lock is labelled. Photo taken 6 October 1969. Note Al's watch strapped to his left wrist.  The time is about 4:30 p.m.



The following photographs were taken by Ulrich Lotzmann of a broken NASA HEC (SN1044) in his collection.
We are looking at the camera body from the same prospective Al would have had
of a Hasselblad mounted on his RCU.


Mag Lock in 'Locked' position


In Locked position, the latches on either side of the lever are as near the lever as possible and are withdrawn into the body of the camera as far as they will go.  A properly positioned magazine would be firmly attached to the camera body.



Magzine lock in intermediate position


With the lever in the Open position, the latch hooks have extended out of the camera body but have not moved outward from the left-right center line.  In this position, the magazine will be loose but can not be detached from the camera body.




Loose Hasselblad Magazine



Detail from Apollo training photo 69-HC-415 showing the lever in the open position, but not far enough to release the magazine.  The magazine is only loosely connected to the camera body.



Hasselblad magaine lock in the Open position


With the lever moved beyond the Open position, the latches have moved away from the left-right center line and the magazine can be detached from the camera body.

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