Mounting old English lenses in shutters

[iangreenhalgh1]

The weather here has been abysmal so I've been doing some DIY instead of shooting.

First job was to put a Wray HR Lustrar f5.6 3.25" (82mm) barrel lens into an old 1930s Compur I removed from a basket case Kodak 616 folder. The original lens was a tessar type Kodak Anastigmat 4.5/124mm that was a dog. The shutter isn't a standard #0, the front thread was standard #0 but the rear was a couple of mm smaller. Luckily the Wray lens' cells just about matched, they wouldn't screw in, different threads, so I used some abrasive emery paper and ground out the threads from both front and rear making them smooth tubes, then used some epoxy putty to secure the cells in place, making sure to retain the correct spacing. It was a tight fit, the front cell just cleared the shutter blades and the rear cell just and so cleared the aperture blades, but it all fitted together nicely and shoots very well on my Century Graphic 23, it covers the format with room to spare. I rescaled the aperture by the simple expedient of sticking a sticker with new values on it over the old scale.





The lens board is DIY too, a sandwich of aluminium and beech wood from an old cigar box.

A test shot using some 30 year old Agfa Brovira Speed paper as film, the vignette is added in PP along with a sepia tint:

[iangreenhalgh1]

Next job was to mount a mystery Air Ministry f4.5/5" lens in shutter. I'm not sure exactly who made this lens, but I think it's a Ross Wide Angle Xpres. You can see it on the right in the pictures below next to the more common and well known Ross f4/5" WA Xpres.




Both of these lenses were fitted to the Vought-Solar Torpedo Training Camera that shot a 2x7" negative and both will cover 5x7" with room to spare.

I happened to have a spare Alphax #3 from an old oscilloscope camera. It is a standard Alphax apart from the maximum aperture opening being restricted. it originally held an Oscillo-Raptar 1.9/3" lens.

It just so happens that the maximum aperture opening is the same size as the glass of this 4./5" lens so they fit together perfectly. The cells had threads that were too large to screw into the shutter so I had to do a lot of filing to make them fit. I did it all with a hand file, took a few hours but in the end it worked out nicely. I had to file the threads and a lip off the front cell so the back was flat, then I attached it to the front of the shutter with some epoxy putty. The rear cell, that took a long time, I had to file down the diameter by about 10mm so that it fitted inside the rear tube of the shutter. Once it was a nice tight fit, I secured it in place with some epoxy putty, making sure to retain the correct cell spacing.




I'll mount this on a wooden lens board for my 5x7 camera and try it out soon, a 5" lens on 5x7 is pretty wide, about the same FOV as a 24mm lens on 35mm.

[philslizzy]

Great DIY, so this is what you wanted all the old shutters for. I have one kicking about somewhere. Small, taken off Kershaw a folder if its any good.

[Lloydy]

Great job Ian, looking forward to the results.

[iangreenhalgh1]

Cheers guys, gotta do something productive when the weather is too bad to shoot.

Any shutter that has a full range of speeds is useful, the ones with only 4 speeds like the Vario, Pronto, Dakon etc aren't, sadly because they lack the slow speeds.

Shutters are much, much harder to find (wthout paying hefty prices) than lenses so I have quite a few nice lenses that need shutters.

Next job is to put a 5 inch Kershaw petzval type projector lens in my other spare Alphax. That one is gonna be a tricky job, but should be possible, I want to use it for portraits.

[Attila]

Looks very promising project, congrats!

[Lloydy]

I've got a bag of rings here that I picked up at the last camera fair, just a bunch of old threaded filter rings, lens front rings, filter holders and all that crap. I got it for you but forgot about it, I thought you might find it useful. I'll bring it up when we come up next. I've also got a basic lathe, but there's no chance of screw cutting, if you need simple machining for your mod's let me know.

[iangreenhalgh1]

Cheers Dave, that sounds like a useful bag.

I'm trying to avoid jobs complicated enough to require extensive machine work, but if I do need something turning, I know who to ask, cheers!

Light was not bad today so I made 3 more test shots with the HR Lustrar, this was the pick of the bunch: