That time a 65 year old Polaroid Land Camera nearly caught fire on my bench

I had a customer bring in a Model 100 from an estate sale in Portland, and while I was testing the shutter, the internal battery pack started smoking from old corroded wires touching the frame. Has anyone else run into old Polaroid pack film cameras with dangerous battery leakage issues?

2 comments

2 Comments

patkelly2d ago

Wait didn't those old Polaroids use some kind of foil battery pack that was basically just waiting to short out? I had a similar scare with a Model 250 I found at a flea market in Eugene years ago. I opened it up to clean the rollers and the battery terminals had this green crust all over them, and when I touched it with a screwdriver it sparked and jumped. Scared me half to death, I threw the whole thing in the trash right there because I wasn't about to have that thing sitting in my house. You're totally right that those old cameras were built like tanks but the batteries were a total afterthought, like nobody back then thought about what happens when that foil and wire sits for 50 years.

caseyclark2d ago

Wait, are you sure it was actually smoking or just hot? Because I've seen that happen with old electronics where people mistake heat for fire, but in Polaroids it's real because of how they built those things. Honestly it feels like everything from that era has some hidden danger that wasn't obvious back then. Like, we look at old appliances and think they're cool, but they were basically death traps waiting to happen. I've noticed this pattern where anything from the 60s and 70s with a power source seems to have a built-in expiration date that involves melting or burning. Your story just confirms that vintage gear isn't always worth the risk, especially when you can get a modern instant camera for cheap that won't try to kill you.