Vintage film cameras

[Kenzie]

Yep, and very pocketable! Film door is a sod to open though. Its in pretty good condition as well, found it buried in a box.
This was my other find



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[Kenzie]

Hey Yoko, I have been sorting through my collection and I found I have three (!) Zenit EMs. I will be keeping one but I have two left that need to go. I don't want anything for them but there are two versions of the 44M, one has a A/M lever for stop down and the other doesn't. Do you want one of them before they go? I dug out the A1 again, it seems to only like fresh batteries. Plus, it seems to chew them as well, so when not in use I will need to take the battery out.

I got the film from the Vitomatic ii done, been sat since May.

[johnnyrod]

Nice looking pics from the Vitomatic. I had a Zenit E as my first SLR, I remember the A/M lever, made no odds since the selenium cell sat above the lens not TTL, and it had auto aperture when you fired it. I guess it worked as DoF preview as well.
Not sorted through it yet but got the massive sack of junk (approx 50% I think) this weekend. The Super Ikonta isn't going to be taking any more pictures, the focus ring is missing (to drive the rangefinder), the film plate is loose (falling out), there are other bits missing and on the whole it looks like it's been exhumed. So will see what else is in there, but I'll be selling it as spares. Shame, but really it's just scrap. Someone could use the lens (Novar I think, not Tessar), or the bellows, or maybe some random bits that they may have broken or lost. Hopefully get my money back that way but otherwise I think it's been a bust.

[Kenzie]

It's not all of them, was sure I had more though.That's a shame, but post up whatever else you have. Still interested in the little grey one. Did you have any joy with your Mamiya folder? Didn't realise I had so many EMs, I have a TTL somewhere as well. I "fixed" a Lomo lc-a today, tried swabbing the shutter with lighter fluid as my previous attempts to dismantle and clean resulted in failure, I tipped a load of fluid straight into the back. Wouldn't work still. Went back to it a few hours later and it now fires! Replaced the front section and slipped on a new strap and it looks good. Needs new seals but will run a test film through. Got a bag of accessories to sort through at some point. I found pretty much the same P30 kit at Ardleigh car boot yesterday but he wanted at least £20, there was also an OM101 but it was £20 as well. Only had £25 on me but didn't fancy buying either. A replacement lamp for the projector I bought is about £60

[yokohama]

Yeah, the Vitomatic pics look good. The Bell and Howell contraption looks like something out of Doctor Who circa Patrick Troughton though.
If you're getting rid of the Zenith EMs Kenzie, I'll have one if that's OK. It was the first SLR I ever used so has a bit of nostalgic/ historical meaning. I suppose I ought to get a Praktica LTL 3 to fill in the gaps too. I'm not sure what difference the A/M button makes to be honest.

I ended up buying the 2 M42 lenses off Gumtree too. Good excuse to get the SV out and ride down to Harrogate. One of those is a Helios but the 44-2 version - very, very stiff focus ring, which I'll need to take a look at I think.

[Kenzie]

Well one is a plain black with functioning meter, the other is an Olympic one but the meter is dead and it is missing the clear plastic bit over the meter (unless it fell inside and is jamming the meter)
I'll probably send the non Olympic one as its pretty much mint with case.

[johnnyrod]

Will do Kenzie, not looked at the Mamiya, it'll be a while I reckon, but sooner if the pics from the Ensign don't look good! Re. the shutter, when wet the shutter leaves will grip each other pretty hard, the same way oily residue makes the shutter stick. It takes a while for the solvent to evaporate from in between the leaves but once dry they'll be free again. I find if you're swabbing but not flushing the shutter, be generous with the solvent, see if you can operate the shutter slowly by hand, and let the solvent work its way around and wash more oil onto the leaves, that way you can get more out of the bits you can't see. Knowing me I'll have said this before!
Yoko The A/M button means manual i.e. when you close the aperture, the blades close (so same as a DoF preview lever), or auto, where they stay open until you fire the shutter, when the camera closes down the aperture automatically i.e. open-aperture metering/composing. I presume it's either a preview feature or so lenses will work with both open-aperture or stop-down metering cameras.

[Kenzie]

The same "sod it lets drown it" worked with the Dial 35, but I will only do it as a last resort when I have tried everything else and its heading for the spares pile. Will add it to the long queue of cameras still to shoot! Did you ever get a light meter Yoko?

[yokohama]

Nope, still without a light meter. Wonder whatever happened to LPH?
The Zenith with the functioning meter would be great. My turn to owe you one now! Have to see if I can find anything.

I hadn't bought anything for almost 2 months, then, like the proverbial buses, a bunch of things turn up at once.

[Kenzie]

I think she is in the States at the moment. That Minolta lens looks the biz, think you should send it down here!
I need to test my 500 G again.