Any Argus 40 Owners Here?

After seeing the results from my Argoflex TLR, and looking at the shots Rick Drawbridge took w/ his even simpler Argus 40 over at p.net, I decided to get myself my very own Argus 40. Unlike my Argoflex, there is no chance of getting a 120 spool into it, so I'll have to respool 120 film onto the camera's 620 spool, or clip the ends of the 120.

One thing has me puzzled though. There's a lot of space on one end of the take up spool, making me think that possibly something is missing, like possibly a metal clip? I know this is a long shot, but does anyone own this model, and could you tell me if I actually do have something missing? I downloaded the manual, but could tell nothing from that. Thanks.




Here's a link to show what the camera looks like, and there's a link to some surprisingly good sample photos. Quite the chick magnet. Not as good as a puppy or a baby, but quieter and not as messy.

http://mconnealy.com/vintagecameras/argoflex40/index.html

Hey Momus, it's great to find another Argus 40 user! Well, technically mine is labeled "Argoflex Forty", but it is the same camera.

Believe it or not, I know exactly what you are talking about with the extra space on the end of the take up spool since mine is like that too. The gap isn't especially large, but as maybe you discovered too, it is enough that the film will drift over towards that side when it is wound on, and that results in the exposed frames being shifted over close to the one edge of the film. As far as I know, this is not due to any missing piece, but rather is just the camera design.

Anyway, the spacing issue bothered me enough that I decided to make a simple fix. Basically, I just cut a small piece of plastic to use as a spacer, and glued it in place over the slanted rib on that side. Here is what it looked like before the mod:


This is a shot of the piece I made:

It is about 1mm thick if I remember right, and was cut from a sheet of black styrene (I'm sure there are a variety of other materials that would work just as well). For glue I think I decided on Super Glue (cyoanacrylate). You might notice that I beveled the leading edge with a file so that the spool could still be inserted smoothly without catching on the edge when inserted.

And, here this is the modified result:

I've tested this now and it seems to work just fine!

By the way, you might also know me as Jeff Applegate over on the Photo.net forums, or on the Yahoo Argus group too, where I recently joined.

Jeff

Reviving an old post from last fall. I picked up one of these at a garage sale for a few bucks. When ever I get one of these 6x6 boxes, I open the shutter, and put the ground glass on the film plane to check the focus. Being that this one has a focus ring, unlike it's little brother the Argus 75, I want to see that it's 'calibrated' Well, the focus was terribly bad, to the point where I had to pull the glass back 3/16" to make it sharp.
I took off the focus ring so I could manually turn the front element, and there was no position that would bring it into focus, either all the way in, or all the way out. It doesn't look like the shutter mechanism is mounted wrong... I've seen shims used to calibrate the lens on other cameras. Looking online at other photos of similar cameras, the front looks positioned right.

Here's the question... is it possible that someone else might have taken the rear lens out and maybe put it back in backwards? Would that cause such a change in focal length? It's a triplet lens, two movable in front and one fixed. How is focal length set with triplet lenses, or is it dictated by the geometry of the glass?
It's a cheap camera and only cost me a few dollars, but now I'm on a quest to understand how this could happen. HELP!