Retreiving the Leader without any tools

[photoreu]

Wondering if anyone knows of a trick or a method that works for

retreiving the leader of a partially exposed (rewound) roll of

film... without a leader retreiver tool.

[phule]

I've done it by licking the emulsion side of the leader of roll of b&w film. It will stick to the leader of the roll you need to retreive and you can pull it out. The posistion of the leader inside the film canister is important to getting it to stick and being able to pull it out through the slot.

[duolian]

It would require some advance planning, but -- could you just crimp the leader before loading it into the camera in the first place, so that it will catch and not be pulled into the can when it is rewound?

[bill_tuthill]

Although I've never tried it (my SLR allows leader-out rewind) guys

on rec.photo.equipment.35mm say you can use double-sided scotch tape

attached to a 1x3" piece of thin plastic. See post by Mike Elek on

11 February 2001.

[winfried_buechsenschuetz1]

I totally agree with the last posting. I have successfully done it this way several times. The plastic should be as thin as possible yet sturdy. Glue a piece of double-sided adhesive tape approx. 1/ inch long, and press the plastic piece into the slot of the cartridge with the tape to the center. Now turn the spool as if you would rewind the film further. After one turn maximum (does not make sense to turn more) you should feel a resistance when the film end has stuck to the tape.

[steve_swinehart]

Take it to your local photo store. When I managed photo stores, we used to regularly retrieve leaders for people. Buy a couple of rolls of film from them to say "thank you."

[Aoresteen]

The one hour lab that I use gave me a 5 inch lenght of "sticky strip" (leader pull tape) that they use to pull leader out with. I've used it manually for a year and it's still going strong.

 

http://minilab.net/fh-160.html

[Robert_Lai]

I knew I should have checked here first before I just totally ruined my last roll of Kodachrome 64 trying to retrieve the leader!<p>How NOT to do it: open it up in a change bag. Get totally frustrated because the new Kodak cans don't allow the caps to go back on once you've taken them off. Consider putting the film into generic bulk film reloading cassettes. Get frustrated with the whole thing and throw the film out.

[John Crowe]

Just buy the cheap plastic tool and keep it in your camera bag. I've been using mine for 15 years and it works flawlessly every time.

[Ed_Ingold]

"the new Kodak cans..."

 

Kodak made the switch to crimped cassettes in 1965. Don't let anybody know!

 

I haven't seen a plastic retriever (sic); mine is thin metal. I haven't used it much since going digital. I like the idea of leaving the leader out when rewinding. Not only do you never need a retriever, you can shoot a whole roll of double exposures without any special effort.

[bob_mcbob]

Another technique I've used is to take a piece of Dymo tape and roll it up inside the cassette, then pull it out with the leader. This works like a charm every time, but the tape only lasts for a few attempts. I recently ordered a cheap Kalt leader retriever, and it's nice and easy to use.