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Marco
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, September 22, 2005 - 07:16 pm: | 
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Just bumped into not one but four! of these. Great shape, maybe unused, all with their leather cases. Unfortunately all four are very dim. There's one for sale at eB**, seller speaks wonders of it. I already picture one on top of my also pretty Kiev 4. Wonder why I didn't act out of impulse. Could Foinix (Phoenix?) be a transliteration from Greek to German?
Are turret viewfinders easy to clean or repair? Will be thankful for any advice. |
Winfried
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, September 23, 2005 - 12:16 am: |
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Foinix was a trademark by a small german early post-war camera manufacturer, Karl Foitzik. He manufactured some crude 35mm viewfinder cameras after he had to give up his plans to make a Leica clone camera.
There were quite a few turret viewfinders made in Germany in the early 50s. I have a Wedena finder originally made for the Lordox cameras.
Usually these finders are not hard to disassemble. I also have a Braun finder made by Steinheil where the cement of the reversal prisms is foggy, I have to disassemble and reglue them some day.
When disassembling the reversal prisms make notes how they come apart - there were some strange prism arrangements of loose prisms where it is not easy to figure out how they have to be assembled. |
Winfried
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, September 23, 2005 - 12:25 am: |
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Here is a link to a (unfortunately german) site about the history of Foitzik:
http://www.intrinet.de/freizeit/wochenendjournal/art944,715303.html
It mentions that there was a small production of the Foizika and Unca cameras with interchangeable lenses which had to be given up due to a lawsuit filed by Leitz. Probably this finder was designed for these cameras.
Those rare german turret finders usually sell for rather high prices. I was quite surprised that the seller of my Wedena finder only asked for 30EUR but I think the Foinix finder will be much more expensive. |
Marco
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, September 25, 2005 - 06:16 pm: |
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Many thanks Winfried - I'm off now, hoping not to have missed the chance to find at least one of these. |
