DIY Sony A100 infra-red conversion

Greg, it's great that you're considering doing this, now to answer your questions:

- it takes about 15-20 minutes to understand how to cut glass (how hard to press on the cutter and how to break it afterward). Another 10 to do it on the filter and than sand it. It should take you half an hour, 45min tops to get to the sensor and replace the filter. 10 mins max to put it back together. If I remember correctly it took me about 1,5 hours for the entire thing. Might take two depending on cautiousness :)

- The AA filter is the low pass filter. The filter in front of the CCD is a sandwich of an AA filter and a visible light filter. My now infrared A100 is even sharper than before.

- As you do not touch the mirror or viewfinder nothing changes, it's just as bright as it was before.

- AF is another matter. If lenses are made to focus RGB in the same manner, IR can be different from lens to lens. You can expect some backfocusing, especially with longer focals. You can easily solve this with the AF adjust screws under the sticker near the tripod mount:

But it might be a bit off from what you see in the viewfinder so you have to learn to trust your AF. I've set my AF so that it focuses perfectly with 14, 24, 35, 50mm but it still back focuses with 85, 135mm and up, which I rarely use.

Kilkry, I strongly suggest against cutting the filter like that. You absolutely need to mask the glass first with masking tape aligned on both sides, then take it out of the filter. When you cut the glass you must only have one fine scratch at a time. Don't push to hard on the cutter, you just need a fine scratch, then hold the 2 sides of the cut and bend them outwards and that should give you a good clean cut. You actually don't cut the glass, you just break it along a line.

Once you cut it, get some fine sanding paper for a good finish and also to make it fit perfectly.

I hope this helps.

+1 on the above.

Hello again. I'm still at it, it just took some time for the flash capacitor to self-discharge enough so that I didn't risk damaging anything by short circuting it with a knife*. (Good luck getting anything else in contact with those two tiny solder points without some sort of wires)

My current issue is:
"Removal of the LCD is done by pulling on the orange flexible circuit board at left of the LCD, then flipping it down and pulling on the thicker orange flexible PCB (printed circuit board)."

Hmm.As per your photo, to the left of the LCD there's a vertical strip of white plastic across four round things, and a ribbon cable connecting the middle of it to something behind. This white thing sits on an orange PCB, but that is still on the black plastic frame attached to the LCD. It seems that the ribbon cable should disconnect from where it's attached behind the LCD or where it attaches to the LCD (white strip), other than that...?

Meanwhile, the a100 service manual speaks of a 'claw' holding what looks like the LCD in place?

In summary, I would greatly appreciate it if you could clarify that bit :)

I'm not trying to annoy anyone either; I just wish to complete the operation, as well as maybe cause clarification for others who are not so very handy either and still wish to attempt this.

*Won't know for sure until it's whole again, if ever, of course : )

Edited by Kilkry - 10 July 2011 at 17:37

I write a long answer twice and get 'insufficient privileges',go back - start over.

Well, to make a long story shorter:

1. Thanks for the above answer, again. It was helpful.

2. I'm prolly out of my depth, because:
2a. The little two-cable cables are ripped out of their plastic 'heads' if you pull on them, exposing copper pincers. Solution: Pry with screwdriver instead? Not likely.

2b. The hot mirror can be chipped by a flat screwdriver, but not budged, it seems. Solution: Give up, make a mojito, enjoy the perpetual clouds outside.

Edited by Kilkry - 11 July 2011 at 20:29

Thanks for the quick reply.

I'm afraid it's too late for the little cables, may their souls find pea- ..I shall try to reattach the wires into the plastic head though and hope for connection, if I get the hot mirror out anyway. Hmm,for the smaller flat cables, I found the lever you had to flip upwards, however. The piece of advice shall be archived for future excavations.

Good idea about the hot mirror glue, will find a hair dryer.

In regards to force:
Generally, compared to more handy friends, I tend to be too timid. This thime though,with the little cables, I didn't see any other way than pulling on them.

I would have needed the for dummies version of this guide. Still, I'm inspired, and after I've left this corpse in my wake it mayhap that the next victim shall fare better.

Postmortem:

As halfway expected, not a lifesign when battery is inserted or unit is switched on. Might have been the little cables, though pushing in the individual cables in the head seemed to make connection. Might have been the spring "that likes to go for a walk". Well, I'm not handy but getting it back as it's supposed to be according the servive manual was doomed to fail. Perhaps for that single reason, I will send the newly bought A100 house in to be modded like this rather than do attempt to do this myself. *Shrug*, it was worth the risk. This old house shall never backfocus again.

Edited by Kilkry - 24 July 2011 at 14:46

janders1957 wrote: Excellent article, I am really itching to give this a try. Will this process work on essentially any of the Alpha bodies?

In short yes. Though the disassembly of the different Alpha bodies varies slightly due to the different layouts, e.g. of the mainboard, in the end.

From my own experience Alpha200 can be converted straight forward (main tool here is a philips screwdriver only), whereas on the KM5D some wires on the mainboard need to be desoldered first to be able to remove the mainboard and get to the sensor finally