1945 Kodak 35RF!!!

j-dogg · Aug 9, 2012

Found this poor thing sitting in a camera shop for display purposes.....traded them a busted-up Minolta XE7 with a jammed shutter for it. Winning.

So far I'm certain everything works, I think 1/10 and 1/25 are a bit fast I need to check the shutter speeds tomorrow. It's MINTY.....but the lens is cloudy, not sure if it's the front or inside. Can I use standard glass cleaner on it? Otherwise, I love it. Test roll going in tomorrow if the shutter speeds check out. How do you rewind the film on it once it's all shot up?

The camera on the right came from the same shop a few months back, it's off to Mark Hama for a CLA and parallax adjustment soon. Use it a lot for landscapes, so infinity focus is pretty easy to find. Love the 1.4

BMbikerider · Aug 9, 2012

For cleaning lenses, I always use either Isopropyl Alcohol straight out of the bottle onto a soft piece of tissue paper but this will also soak up the natural oils from you fingers and sometimes transfer them to the lens, making it worse than before, so use a surgical glove when using it this way. My preferred way is a concoction of Isopropyl Alcohol 10%, 2% photographic wetting agent (Kodak Fotoflo) and the remaining quantity to make the 100%, distilled water. This is put in a small pump action spectacle cleaner bottle and works every time.

brian d · Aug 9, 2012

Lift up on the wind knob, it should raise up perhaps 1/8" to 3/16" and latch in the up position (you might have to turn it slightly to get it to latch up) that should unlock the mechanism so that you can rewind the film. When your shooting you do have to push down on the little button beside the wind knob each time you start to advance the film to the next frame. Let go of the button once the knob starts turning or it might not stop when it has advanced one frame. Quirky little camera but fun
I have a couple of them, they can make some surprisingly sharp vibrant pictures.

E. von Hoegh · Aug 9, 2012

One thing to be careful of - the lens, if coated, may have a very fragile coating. Be very gentle cleaning it.

I had one of these in the early 70s, the Kodachromes I took with it are still around and pretty damn good, for coming from an odd little camera people like to laugh at.

MattKing · Aug 9, 2012

I don't know that I have ever seen one before where the arm on the front was black.

I had one of these too - it was my first 35mm camera. It was probably left with Kodak for repair, and never claimed.

I often wondered whether it was carved out of a single block of metal.

j-dogg · Aug 9, 2012

When I try to rewind it latches up and only turls like a half turn and doesnt rewind, im afraid to force it i've broken my fair share of stuff like that

E. von Hoegh · Aug 9, 2012

Are you using the black knob on the left to rewind with? I think the shutter has to be uncocked to rewind, too. Or maybe press the silver button next to the counter... It's been a long time since I handled one. Black knob turns clockwise to rewind.

MattKing · Aug 9, 2012

Have you checked the manual ?

Courtesy of Mr. Butkus: http://www.cameramanuals.org/kodak_pdf/kodak_35-2.pdf

E. von Hoegh · Aug 9, 2012

MattKing said:
Have you checked the manual ?

Courtesy of Mr. Butkus: http://www.cameramanuals.org/kodak_pdf/kodak_35-2.pdf

When all else fails, RTFMD!

j-dogg · Aug 9, 2012

MattKing said:
Have you checked the manual ?

Courtesy of Mr. Butkus: http://www.cameramanuals.org/kodak_pdf/kodak_35-2.pdf

Hurp a derp got it

Sirius Glass · Aug 9, 2012

j-dogg said:
It's MINTY.....but the lens is cloudy, not sure if it's the front or inside. Can I use standard glass cleaner on it?

The camera on the right came from the same shop a few months back, it's off to Mark Hama for a CLA and parallax adjustment soon.

Why risk messing it up. Let Mark take care of cleaning the lens.

Pumalite · Aug 9, 2012

The other camera is even better. I have one. It's a Yashica Lynx 14 e IC. Mine works perfectly. I use it for street photography all the time.

j-dogg · Aug 10, 2012

Yeah the 14e is the shizzle pizzle

Checked the shutter speeds, 50, 100 and 200 are spot on. 25 is iffy, enough to affect exposure and 10 is no-go. B and T are fine thats all I care about. I never shoot less than 50th anyway, anything less than that is on a tripod.

about to put in the test roll, should have results this weekend.

E. von Hoegh · Aug 10, 2012

I'll bet dollars to doughnuts you'll be pleasantly surprised.

brian d · Aug 10, 2012

Let us know how it works out. It might need a CLA if I recall correctly the film turning the sprocket wheel is what actually cocks the shutter and mine were very stiff and hard to turn until they had been worked over. It has been several years since I had messed with mine, guess now I'm going to have to run a few rolls through them when I did last use one was before I knew about the manual's sight (or APUG for that matter)

Photo Engineer · Aug 10, 2012

I have one of those 35 rangefinders with case. It is in mint condition and still works just fine. This thread prompted me to get it out and play around with it.

Thanks for the memory.

PE

Bill Burk · Aug 11, 2012

In case you ever remove the top deck... Leave the WIND knob on deck - the "one-way-wind" mechanism is a difficult re-assembly job that you can avoid, simply by leaving the knob on-deck as you lift the top deck.

Amazing how many heads got cut off on two rolls I just shot with this...

j-dogg · Aug 15, 2012

Test roll is in, I figured out how to cock the shutter, it needs film loaded in it.

Halfway through some Gold 200, couple of landscapes, couple of long exposures of Miami skyline at night, the time function is quite useful for this.

So far I'm in love. That Sunny-16 rule has been getting a lot of use though I've been checking it against my Canon 5D d*****l and I've been guessing the exposure correctly within a half-stop. Never had a fully-mechanical camera with no light meter.

2bits · Aug 16, 2012

Good one j-d!

thuggins · Aug 30, 2012

That black linkage cover is very unusual. Makes it look quite snazzy. It is a real conversation starter, but I find it a bit hard to use. That spiky little focus wheel really chews up the fingers.

BrianL · Sep 27, 2012

Kodak made or imported some really nice cameras. Interesting unorthodox designs seemed to be there thing. 1 of the nicer cameras I had early on was the Pony 135. Simple, very basic engineering with a very decent lens for its time. By today's standards a bit soft and not as contrasty as newer but, really yielded nice results. The lens retracted so it would fit in a pocket. In my home town the news photgraphers turned in their Speed Graphics and were using them.

rjbuzzclick · Sep 27, 2012

Ah, one of the good old battles for the American dollar!

j-dogg · Feb 9, 2013

Back from the dead!!!! Test roll came back, ALL cloudy. It's like someone was hotboxing inside my camera and I've got it narrowed down to the front lens element. Doing a lens CLA on it as we speak.

StoneNYC · Feb 10, 2013

BrianL said:
Kodak made or imported some really nice cameras. Interesting unorthodox designs seemed to be there thing. 1 of the nicer cameras I had early on was the Pony 135. Simple, very basic engineering with a very decent lens for its time. By today's standards a bit soft and not as contrasty as newer but, really yielded nice results. The lens retracted so it would fit in a pocket. In my home town the news photgraphers turned in their Speed Graphics and were using them.

Wait they went from 4x5's to 35mm's? That's quite a shift... Was this common?

~Stone

Mamiya: 7 II, RZ67 Pro II / Canon: 1V, AE-1, 5DmkII / Kodak: No 1 Pocket Autographic, No 1A Pocket Autographic | Sent w/ iPhone using Tapatalk

Paul Goutiere · Feb 10, 2013

The Kodak 35 RF is a neat little camera, but why did the Americans and the Soviets make such ugly looking cameras at that time?

1945 Kodak 35RF!!!

j-dogg

BMbikerider

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E. von Hoegh

MattKing

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j-dogg

E. von Hoegh

MattKing

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brian d

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Bill Burk

j-dogg

2bits

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rjbuzzclick

j-dogg

StoneNYC

Paul Goutiere

1945 Kodak 35RF!!!

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