AP plastic reloadable film cassettes quality (or lack). Any experience?

The cassettes from the 1960's when I started out were very little like those. They were pressed tin with either metal or plastic centre cores and the end caps pushed on over the ends of the cassette by perhaps 10mm, possibly a little less. They were held in place with the printed lable glued over the join so the ends could not come off. They were great for re-loads because all you had to do was slit the paper and remove one end. to reload. Wind the film onto the reel, push the end cap on again and fix with a piece of parcel tape.

They were replaced by the 'snap-on' type of cap which proved to be unpopular with the press because apparently if they were dropped there was a risk of the film popping out of the cassette. Subsequently from then (around 1968 -70) the crimped on type were introduced which is what we have today.

The metal ones I bought are identical to the snap on end cap type, obviously newer because of the DX coding that they have now which was not used back in the 'good old days'.

I can remember, back in the 60's, and earlier, when I started taking photos, that you could buy refills from Kodak and Ilford, and others around then, so that you could take off thebtop of the cassette, very easy in those days, remove the center spool, which had a slit in it to take the fikm, slip the film into the cassette and put the top on and away, you coukd do this an infinate number of times and the film bought this way worked out at around half the price of the ready to use film, a great help for a schoolboy with limited money for film

I remember in the late fifties/e sixties that you could buy film refills from Kodak and Ilford, and others around at the time, for around half the price of a ready to load film,all you needed was some cassettes of the time, before the crimped ends of today, you pressed the sides of the cassette, the top popped off, then in the darkroom, you attached the end of the film to a slit in the center of the spool,put it all back together and away you went, a boon for cash strapped school kids,no DX coding, no problems, \oh for the good old days

Refills were standard in Europe, either as precut-type135 lengths on a bulk roll, or as precut strip or as loaded spool.
In the Eastrern Block they lasted longest.

Anon Ymous said:

I have no idea what Adox film cassettes looked like in the 1960s, wasn't even born back then. But the funny thing is that all current Adox films seem to come in cassettes that really look like the ones I bought. Here's what I bought, and here's what the factory loaded ones look like: Adox Scala 160, Silvermax, CHS 100. Has anyone used any of these films? Does the top open by twisting it?

Click to expand...

the curent adox firm has little to do with the "old Adox Photowerke ." - that was owned by Dupont, and they sold their still film business to the Yugoslavians. That lasted till relatively recently as EFKE. Photo Impex imported the EFKE film and discovered that they could register the ADOX trademark, so they sold EKFE film as "adox" Whne EFKE went out of business Photoimpex started to build their film business.

for years EFKE used a spin off end cap Plastic Cassette which was simalar to the old ADOX cassette but was not the same, presumably because of the Iron Curtain. they then went to a Metal cassete.

cmacd123 said:

the curent adox firm has little to do with the "old Adox Photowerke ." ...

Click to expand...

Yes, I'm aware of that, but I was quite surprised by the, at least superficial, simmilarity of the cassettes used by Adox and AP reloadables.