Tuesday, August 18, 2015

4x5 Press Kit

What a nice day! My genuine package arrived today, howling a full 4x5 press camera kit to me, including a case, 10+ film holders, a flash and that came in a fitting case! And yes, this cost me just over US$150.
The images on the bay showed some corrosion... for that price, who cares? Actually, the film holders alone would have been worth the purchase.

To be honest, the camera seems to be missing some bits and bops. Nothing vital however.

At first, the shutter was all frozen up due to corrosion. I took some forceful persuasion to get the T setting to work. I continue on B, with decent force and some patience. Some tries later, I got the shorter time operational, so, from s/400 to s/10 where up fine. So, the 2 higher speed gears are up and running now. Still., the lower speed gear seems to giving me attitude.
Some playing got s/5 going fine.
However, there are still 2 speeds not going smoothly: half second and one second.
Contrary to my earlier Graflex shutter fix, this time it seems that I do not have to disassemble the shutter and re-grease all the gears.

However, with that kit, it is not all smooth sailing. This kit employs a Graphlock back, which depends on springs. Said springs are in this model corroded too, and hence, do not show the prompt springy action you will need for operating the camera smoothly.

Also, there seems to be some fungus on the outer surfaces of the rear lens group. The front group appears to have suffered from a quick clean (hopefully w/o any damage).

Next steps for me:
  • clean the lens groups
  • clean the ground glass
  • replace some lost screw
  • make sure the bellow is tight
  • make a new hand strap
  • remove corrosion from and grease all springs
  • fix an electronic flash into the flash unit
All in all, this was another XMAS-Xperience today!