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Peter Wallage
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, January 01, 2005 - 10:04 am: | 
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Hi all,
My daughter-in-law returned from a flea market with a present for me, a Baldamatic I in lovely cosmetic condition except for a slight dent in the frame round the viewfinder/rangefinder windows which was no problem to remove. Then I started on the shutter, a Synchro-Compur, because it works fine down to 1/15sec but slower speeds are way, way too slow. I’ve removed the front lens element and a couple of associated rings but now I’m stuck on how to get past the plate with various levers and couple of rings with gear segments so I can get to the shutter itself to clean it. If anyone’s been inside one of these brutes and can offer any tips I’d be grateful.
Peter |
Winfried
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, January 01, 2005 - 12:59 pm: |
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I think Dave Mitchell has an exploration of Synchro Compur shutters on his site, too.
However, I would not recommend to go any deeper than removing the cam plate. The Synchro-Compur shutters (especially the later ones, there have been early ones with an X-M setting only and later ones with an X-M-V setting) are pretty complex and not easy to readjust once they are disassembled.
I would recommend just to put some drops of lighter fluid on the speed escapement (the gear assembly the cams of the cam plate run over). You should be careful since the Compur shutters have large cutouts in their bottom plate and lighter fluid may easily wash grease on the shutter blades.
I have a scanned version of the Compur service manual, it mentions that some special lubricants are used to grease the cam plate and a few other parts. However, I can't say that the one or two Synchro-Compurs I cleaned run badly although I did not regrease them to factory specs. |
Peter Wallage
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, January 01, 2005 - 05:17 pm: |
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Thanks for replying, Winfried,
I think you mean Daniel Mitchell's excellent site. Yes, I am familiar with it and have often found it a great help. I have had a couple of Synchro Compurs to pieces in the past, both X-M and X-M-V. The problem on this one, in the Baldamatic, is that I can't at the moment see how to get to the speed ring cam. There isn't the usual serrated screwed ring locked by a dog screw, the whole thing has a separate cover plate which carries two contra-rotating rings with gear segments (one of them spring loaded) and which carry the depth of field indicator pointers. There is also a ring carrying a pivoted cam which seems to control the stop-down of the aperture iris (at least it moves when you alter the iris setting), and a small lever on the left hand side. I'm not yet sure what this does. The rangefinder coupling is a very thin needle-like rod sticking up through the cover plate. This is pushed inwards to alter the rangefinder focus as the lens element is screwed in and out, and is also linked to a mechanism which lifts or lowers the brightline viewfinder frame for parallax correction. Quite interestingly complicated, really.
If no-one has been inside one of these installations I'm considering taking things to pieces, making notes, till I find the plate fixing screws. At the moment I can see three candidates but I was hoping someone had done the job before me and had some tips about what has to come off and what can be left behind on this cover plate, and also any settings to get things properly interconnected on reassembly.
Alternatively, which may be safer, I may chicken out and dribble some lighter fluid through some slots in the cover plate which I estimate are about where the slow speed escapement should be. If this works, I'll wait till I can get hold of an exploded diagram of the whole set-up before I disassemble.
Thanks again,
Peter |
Peter Wallage
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, January 02, 2005 - 04:13 pm: |
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Well, I couldn't find any real info about the cover plate so this time I chickened out and injected a tiny amount of lighter fuel through two slots in the cover plate with a syringe. I felt around inside as best I could and *think* I found the slow speed escapement. I kept the camera vertical to stop any excess wandering down on to the shutter blades. After exercising the shutter a few times it now seems to be working fine 24 hours later. 1 sec really sounds like 1 sec compared with other shutters I've stripped and cleaned, and there's no sign of oil on the inside faces of the lens elements, so I'll leave it at that for now.
I made a small boob on reassembly and didn't get the two moving depth of field indicators quite symmetrical. It's not vital because I don't use them, but it annoys me so I'll take it apart again tomorrow and see if I can get them lined up properly.
All that's left now is to take a small ding out of the filter ring, lube the helicoid, set the front element at infinity and check that the rangefinder also reads near enough infinity and the job's done. Vertical alignment of the rangefinder is fine. I'm pleased about it because with a 45mm f/2.8 Xenar in a Synchro-Compur it should be a useful performer, and I'm pleased to be able to put back in service a GBP2.5 'junk' camera. All in all, it's an interesting camera with just about every cubic centimetre packed with mechanism.
Peter |
David
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, January 27, 2005 - 05:25 am: |
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I have a synchro-compur on an Isolette that works just fine except for one thing - The "B" setting doesn't work - the shutter opens and then quickly closes (yes, I'm keeping the shutter button pressed).
The warnings I've read say not to mess with this shutter - is there a relatively easy fix for this (without dissassembly?
Thanks
David |
Winfried
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, January 28, 2005 - 03:57 am: |
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You will have to open the shutter cover at least. Maybe the cam follower which engages when the cam plate is set to B is not working properly or hung up. However, if you can live without the B setting you should leave it as it is - the Synchro Compur shutters (both old and new versions) are fairly complex shutters. |
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