I need to capture over a hundred tapes for a monster project and am wondering if it'll wear out the equipment. Right now I don't have a deck, I capture on a Canon Optura XI and a Sony HC20. Each cam captures two tapes, then takes a break, and gets drycleaned after a dozen or so tapes.

I just worry that the gear might not make it. These are my "cheaper" cameras but I'll still be bummed if they die. The Sony always needs "help" while loading and I fret for it the most. Has anyone killed a camera by capturing too much stuff?

just what i have read through the forums is yes cameras will wear out from capturing,film and so forth. I think you are going about it the right way maybe purchase a third camera just in case it one of them does fail on you while your capturing....that way you have on hand ready to go. Keep it boxed up that way if you dont use it just return it.

Yes the cams will wear out. Now having said that I use a JVC 1 chip for capture-I've used it for 3 years or so and has more hours on it than I care to even think about. I do 40-50 weddings a year (did 171 from 2002-2004 with 45 on the books for 2005) at 4 to 5 tapes per job plus corp work that can be from 1 to 20 tapes per job. Forget the corp stuff-just the weddings. 171 plus 39 already this year = 210Xsay 4 tapes each = 840 tapes of about 1 hour each. This camera/deck probably has around 1200 hours (if you add the corporate work, commericals etc to it-the stuff I really don't track in my head. I'm telling you this because when it dies and it will soon, it'll go into the trash and I'll go and buy another one for about $300 and be good to go again for another 800 to 1000 hours of capture.
If I were you, I wouldn't worry too much about the cameras crappin' out on you-they will but I would guess from your description, not anytime soon.
Don

Of course it will put wear on the machine...but that's what it's intended for.

Has anyone killed a camera by capturing too much stuff?I just killed the rewind on my Optura Xi, but that's after 4-5 years of heavy use. Thankfully, I'd bought a separate rewinder, which had been sitting idle on my desk for about a year.

Tape is great, but the tape mechanism is probably the most fragile item on a camcorder.