Camera Talk

Thanks, guys.

Okay, figured this all out. When I pulled the shutter from the camera, everything worked fine. Reinstalled, and the shutter release would hang again. So it's binding somewhere. Messed with things a bit more, then found this:

Untitled by Scott, on Flickr

The shutter release arm /tab/lever was bent. So when the shutter was tightened down in the standard, the release assembly would bind against the aperture plate. So when I'd move the aperture, it would move the release enough that it would return to zero. And repeat. I bent things back as best I could without completely disassembling it (not gonna happen right now). Working now.

Installed my little 6x6 ground glass on the film rails and checked rangefinder registration. Infinity was perfect. Minimum focus was dead on. Nothing needed adjusting. Very pleased with that. The rangefinder spot still seems contrasty enough, but it's small. Not sure as I need to do anything about it, or can. Maybe an ink spot on the front of the rangefinder but will test first.

Glued down a few small pieces of the leather covering that had lifted. Have added a ton of Bick 4 to the bellows; when the Elmer's dries I'll treat the covering as well.

Assuming everything still tests out okay after everything dries, I'll go walk around Birdsboro tomorrow morning (before the GD inferno starts again, holy Toledo) and test it out.

I'll be shooting/posting some glamor shots in a bit!

Thanks again to all for your help cyphering out the hiccups on this one. I'm remembering now why I spent so much time doing this in years passed.

Scott

Some work I did on a Compur-Rapid shutter, similar to the regular Compur or Prontor shutters, but with a 1/500 top speed. https://flic.kr/s/aHsjPzdUKH

PF

Hey, good to see you found the problem. Sometimes it's just the simplest little thing that can aggravate the living daylights out of you until you look at it one more time.

PF

Some days...

Okay, so was fixin to load up the camera with a fresh roll of FP4+. Test fired the shutter a few times to make sure all was still golden. Worked, fired again, worked, fired again, click. Hmm. Tried it a few times. No "whir" of the escapement releasing, blades didn't flinch. Drat.

Opened it up (again) and pretty quickly found that the little release that catches the escapement and opens the shutter blades was just kind of flopping in the breeze. Spring that tensions it, well, wasn't.

Untitled by Scott, on Flickr

Untitled by Scott, on Flickr

Can one of you fine folk enlighten me? Is that just slipped off its moorings, or is it, in fact, broken? I suspect the later, but am hoping clean living helps me out. I have a Prontor SV I can canabalize if necessary, but I really don't want to dig into this if I can avoid it. However, I'm guessing if it is just unhooked, gonna have to tear down anyway to reattach.

Help me, Obi Wan - you're my only hope...

Thanks for any insight.

Yeah, you'll have to do a tear-down to see if part of it is still there on the post. Plus, it will help you to get the spring back in the proper position.

PF

Bah. I was hoping to avoid that. Can’t even see it. Had to pull that out using my phone as a magnifier. Better order a lit magnifier on Prime Day.

Guess I better start looking for a tear-down description, I remember there were some years ago. Not sure this is going to be done in time for our trip now. Shoot.

Oh man!
I'm starting to see why not many of these have survived

I don't have any photos from a similar teardown, but basically you just start taking off whatever is on top and work your way down. I'd start with that screw on the post holding the drive lever in place, as that is the most likely place your loose spring came from.

Sorry about being a bit short on details, but the construction crew out back just hit the gas line, and I'm going to evacuate for a while.

PF

You will have to remove that part, and it’s a pain put it back, that’s for sure… but as see in your shutter the end of the spring is in the upper part so it should be easy to tension it back, in Prontor both sides are under the assembly… in Prontor shutters that broken spring is very thin and not so crude as the one you show, anyway Japan after war had to use really bad materials for building the cameras.

Take that part up and then figure out how the spring should be done, think it has to move that moving arm to the outer rim so it catches permanently the tab moving the shutter blades. If you need to make a new spring, use the thinnest piano string you might find available.

PFMcFarland wrote: ↑

Wed Jul 17, 2024 11:32 am

I don't have any photos from a similar teardown, but basically you just start taking off whatever is on top and work your way down. I'd start with that screw on the post holding the drive lever in place, as that is the most likely place your loose spring came from.

Sorry about being a bit short on details, but the construction crew out back just hit the gas line, and I'm going to evacuate for a while.

PF

Ouch! Hope the gas company was able to get things right, PF.

alexvaras wrote: ↑

Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:51 pm

You will have to remove that part, and it’s a pain put it back, that’s for sure… but as see in your shutter the end of the spring is in the upper part so it should be easy to tension it back, in Prontor both sides are under the assembly… in Prontor shutters that broken spring is very thin and not so crude as the one you show, anyway Japan after war had to use really bad materials for building the cameras.

Take that part up and then figure out how the spring should be done, think it has to move that moving arm to the outer rim so it catches permanently the tab moving the shutter blades. If you need to make a new spring, use the thinnest piano string you might find available.

So, Alex, You're saying that spring does look broken, correct? I agree - looks like a toddler made it.

I had hoped an old Prontor-SV I had would be a good model to figure out as I disassembled, and a good donor for a new spring.


The Nishida on the left, the Prontor-SV on the right. Don't know as they're congruent. And I'm leaving Friday next. Don't see how this is going to be resurrected before then. I have a lighted 10X magnifier on the way here (thanks, Prime Day), and will see what I can figure out, but I don't have any materials, let alone skill or knowledge, to make a new spring.

Dammit.