Helios-44-2: Reversed aperture ring?

Retrography · Joined: 01 Oct 2012 Posts: 8

Yesterday our russian building manager saw me playing with my Zorki 4 and, inspired by my enthusiasm, brought me his old Zenit ET with a Helios-44-2 mounted on it. Both the body and the lens seem to work nicely. I got some test shots with the Helios, and they look just fine. The only issue is that for some obscure reason the aperture ring works in the reverse direction: pointing the red indicator to 16 opens the aperture wide open and putting it on 2 closes the iris down to its smallest size. I have some old Russian rangefinder lenses and I always repair them on my own, so, it does not bother me to open the Helios and fix it. But can anybody explain to me how this has happened, and how I can possibly fix it?

P.S. Zenit ET's viewfinder makes my modern DSLR's look like crap. I don't even feel like picking it up anymore... Smile

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Aanything · Expire: 2014-05-30

It's a common issue with those (and other preset) lenses - actually not a problem, just a bit confusing.
Here it's explained better than I will ever be able to:
http://forum.mflenses.com/helios-44-2-aperture-t24330,highlight,%2Bhelios+%2B44+%2Baperture.html

Retrography · Joined: 01 Oct 2012 Posts: 8

The second aperture ring was so stiff that I did not notice it was actually a ring.

I should have done my homework better and found this thread myself before posting.

Thanks for the explanation...

Lloydy · Expire: 2022-01-01

I bought one very cheap because of this. Wink

Lightshow · Joined: 04 Nov 2011 Posts: 3666 Location: Calgary

Just a little quirk about the 44(44-2), I had wondered if it was an error they just decided not to fix since it still works.

ForenSeil · Joined: 15 Apr 2011 Posts: 2726 Location: Kiel, Germany.

I also have such a copy. Seems to be not very uncommon.

I also had several Jupiters (-8,-3) which wrong aperture value problems (F5.6=F11; F8=F16 etc.) but Helios 44-2 was the only one with fully reversed aperture numbers (F2=F16; F16=F2)

Retrography · Joined: 01 Oct 2012 Posts: 8

People, read the post Aanything is referring to. It is not a production defect, it is a feature. It is actually the preset mechanism of the lens. If your preset ring is stuck, open the lens and get it fixed. very useful mechanism indeed.

RAART · Posted: Wed Oct 31, 2012 3:03 pm Post subject:

and not only Russians have this feature. Pentax has it too!

Bellows-Takumar 100mm F4

which I have mounted on my Pentax Bellows II...