Vintage film cameras

[Kenzie]

Merry Christmas all! Fingers crossed for something shiny then. I bought the MV, always useful for spares.

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[johnnyrod]

Merry Christmas to you too! Am off to bed soon but have been checking out my presents. I'd suggested a Zeiss Contax to Mrs Rod as she was struggling for present ideas, really though without hope of getting anything. She spent ages looking into them (it's pretty murky, what went on back then), but as she was getting more frustrated I suggested a Kiev instead. So opened things this morning and was very happy to find a Kiev 3, great condition (just a few scratches on the front of the lens), looks to be fully working. Anyway after we had all opened everything she pulled out another box... containing a Contax IIa. I'm still a bit unclear to be honest but she got the Kiev for a good price and I think the GAS had taken her. Anyway I'm pretty happy as you can tell, I need to check them both out properly before putting film in them. The 5cm f2 Sonnar on the Contax has a small mark in it somewhere, am hoping it's not serious, and the RF window is so dirty that the patch is almost invisible - so I am hoping that cleaning it is the only problem there. The spring lock for the lens mount is broken, but you have to fairly twist the lens to dismount it, so it's not a deal-breaker. Not really looked at the Kiev yet, not had much time, plus it's a lot cheaper so in terms of any comeback on the seller (if required) then I checked out the Contax first. Beautiful piece of kit though. Also got some photo storage boxes and a voucher for processing. And a metric tonne of liquorice, God help me.

[Kenzie]

Sounds like you had a good haul. I would love a Contax but I think I will stick with the Kievs for now. Got any plans for shooting this week? I'm off until the 3rd and my wife is at work Weds/Thurs/Fri this week so weather permitting I want to get out and do some walking/shooting. You might be right about the GAS, she might start buying for herself.

[johnnyrod]

At the weekend when the weather picks up a little we'll hopefully get out for a ramble, so will take a camera with me, got a few shots left on the Contessa, and three on the Ensign (still).

[Kenzie]

I have quite a few to finish off, its actually getting difficult to decide what to take out! I could take a new one out like a Kiev of something but at the same time I have film to finish! Way too much choice. Off the top of my head I have the T3, A1, Yashica 44, Nikon EM, GER and Lomo Diana F+ all loaded to be finished. Also, if I take too many out then I jump from camera to camera and don't enjoy it as much. Also, I want to do some 6x9 colour with the Bessa but it means starting another film.

[yokohama]

That sounds like a bumper Christmas for you Johnny, new toys to play with. That's me the only one without a Kiev now. I've resisted the temptation to buy anything apart from more light seal foam.
After lots of fiddling, I've now got one fully working Tessar with clean optics and oil free blades. I had to reassemble it god knows how many times because the diaphragm mechanism kept falling to pieces, and then again to get the focus right but the distance marks on the lens seem accurate now. Hypothetically, if I take the hours I spent on it at the minimum wage, I could probably have bought three!
One more to do, the Zebra; the diaphragm is cleaned up but I can't coax the lens barrel back into the focus ring on this one.
I'm off work until the 4th but at the moment, I'm too lazy to drag myself out of the house.

[Kenzie]

Well I have the Nikon lens to fix but no idea of how to go about it. I'm sure the right Kiev will come along for you. I tried fixing a Vivitar 135I'm before but ended up wrecking it.

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[johnnyrod]

I'm no closer to shooting with either of them! While testing the shutter speeds on the Kiev, which were pretty accurate, the shutter jammed part way through winding on, I need to find out how to unjam it and hope it's okay. I'm away for a couple of days so hopefully that won't hurt. Also Mrs. Rod broke the flange off the take-up spool when she put the back on. She checked them both over when they arrived, even going by videos on Youtube, but looks like she got it a bit wrong.
As for the Contax, the lens lock spring is broken, the RF prisms are as dirty as the numberplate on the back of my truck just now (but at least the RF is otherwise working), it looks like the lens has a little separation spot (though I am told it should make no difference), and the shutter speeds are all over the place. 250+ are basically unregulated, middle ones are slow, 1/10 was actually 0.7 seconds, and 1/1 just hung open for a while.
Poor Mrs Rod is stressing now because she'd put a lot of effort in and thought they were fine. The Kiev would have been (not going to tell her about the spool), and while I knew the Contax would need some work, we need to go back to the seller and see if they'll give some sort of refund, at least down to the cost of a non-working body and lens. She got a good deal anyway so will have to see what we can do, and then figure out whether to give it a go or send it off. This is a proper 10th dan black belt camera to fix though!

[Kenzie]

I did watch some repair videos and they look a bit of a mare. My first Kiev didn't come with a proper take up spool so I just used one from an old 35mm canister and taped the film to it. Still works the same but you have to give it a slight jiggle to get the back to close otherwise it won't line up with the winder stub properly.

[Kenzie]

Boots have buy one get one half price again on film.

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