thanks for the info, helen. i haven't used that tank for movies. i've only done still photography. kind of a bummer that it won't work properly. those russian tanks seem to be hard to find.
Welcome to the forum. I'm guessing that you haven't used that tank to develop Standard 8 film - it won't hold a full spool of film - you would have to cut it into about six sections to get it onto the developing reel. There are quite a few tanks that have reels that will take short lengths of 16 mm film, but few that will take long enough lengths.
The film is indeed 16 mm wide (you only had to read this thread to find that out!) but it is about 33 ft long - 25 ft plus leaders. It's all explained in post #5 above. You need a tank that will hold 33 ft of film if you want to use a tank. There are Russian spiral tanks that hold that length, and there are Morse/Doran rewind tanks that will hold 100 ft of anything from 8 mm to 35 mm, but the processing quality isn't generally as good with a rewind tank as it is with a spiral tank. I've used both.
Best,
Helen