Rolleiflex spacing

[Melvin J Bramley]

My old Rolleiflex /3.5 Tessar misses the first three frames, the rest are spaced well.
Is this a spacing camera issue or a loading issue?

 

[John Wiegerink]

My old Rolleiflex /3.5 Tessar misses the first three frames, the rest are spaced well.
Is this a spacing camera issue or a loading issue?

What model? Automat or newer?

 

[Dan Daniel]

What is the counter doing? Does it wind on and finally get to 1 and stop a few frames into the roll? Do you not get the last three shots on the film? Or do you not get the first three shots on the film, and frame 12 on the counter is the last image on the film?

Put a spool in the top chamber. With back open, see if the spool moves the thin silver gear on the left side behind the spool when you wind. If not, apply light pressure to the spool at the left end and see if it turns the gear.

 

[John Wiegerink]

I was thinking the "auto-to first exposure feelers" might be gummed up, but it's really hard to tell unless you pull the side plate off.

 

[Melvin J Bramley]

What model? Automat or newer?

Model A; MX sync

 

[Melvin J Bramley]

I was thinking the "auto-to first exposure feelers" might be gummed up, but it's really hard to tell unless you pull the side plate off.

It was recently serviced.

 

[Melvin J Bramley]

What is the counter doing? Does it wind on and finally get to 1 and stop a few frames into the roll? Do you not get the last three shots on the film? Or do you not get the first three shots on the film, and frame 12 on the counter is the last image on the film?

Put a spool in the top chamber. With back open, see if the spool moves the thin silver gear on the left side behind the spool when you wind. If not, apply light pressure to the spool at the left end and see if it turns the gear.

It misses the first three frames, have not checked the frame counter when in use.

 

[Dan Daniel]

Melvin, you'll need to be more precise in your language.

It could be simply winding on and not stopping until about the fourth frame location, at which point it starts counting. This most likely also means that the last three shots are not on film but on backing paper.

It could stop at the right location, but the shutter is not firing so the first three images you think you are taking are not recorded, the film is blank.

There's at least two different scenarios to explain what might be going on.

Sounds like it needs to be gone over by the recent service tech.

 

[MattKing]

Or @Melvin J Bramley is not using the Start mark correctly.
I won't mention how I know how easy it is to make that sort of mistake on a camera I haven't been using regularly for a while .

 

[Melvin J Bramley]

Thanks for all the input.
I 'think' I had a sticky first frame feelers! were sticking.
I somewhat recall that when I loaded the film , after a service, I had to advance the film several rotations before I came to frame 1.
I have just re spooled a roll of film and ran it through the camera.
When I stopped winding when the arrow showed , I closed up the camera and one turn of the crank gave me frame one.
Further testing required but I'm thinking it was an anomaly.

 

[pbromaghin]

One turn of the crank isn’t enough to get to the start of the film. I want to say it should be more like 3. Google “120 backing paper” and you will see that the first number is almost as far from the arrow as the arrow is from the beginning.