Best m42 camera to use with soviet lenses?

[E. von Hoegh]

A common manual aperture preset mechanism. There also was a half-automatic german mechanism where one had to cock an auto-diaphragm spring after each release.

Japanese, too - my 55/2.2 Auto Takumar has a slider just in front of the mount.

 

[noeru]

noeru,

A bit of Karma You are welcome to have my CM3 for the cost of postage if it's any use. I've been gradually moving from M42 to Nikon so it's not getting used.
It will be a couple of weeks before I can pick it up though.

Thats's so kind, thank you so much! I actually managed to snatch a CE 3 on eBay for very little so that will hopefully sort me out!

 

[dmr]

There are some third party m42 to K adapters that have a flange and don't allow the lens to sit flush so they don't support infinity. Buy either the Pentax one, or the knock-offs of the pentax ones.

Infinity focus was my major concern. I posted this on another thread. This is a generic copy of the genuine Pentax one. This one came with a "key" tool to insert and remove, which is most definitely more handy than what some people reported in removing it from the camera.

 

[noeru]

I got my CE 3! It's quite nice as far as I can tell from a first inspection but you really can't have it all - the asa only goes up to 200. I see now that the CE 2 goes up to 3200. I didn't even think to check.

Also thanks guys for pointing out there are good and bad adaptors, I didn't know and unfortunately had the bad type. I have a knockoff pentax one with the key on the way so basically if I can use my m42 lenses on me ME Super with no focus range issues I don't even need the Chinon, though I'll probably keep it cause no doubt, the way this story has played so far, I'll run into more compatibility issues down the line. ;D

 

[Sewin]

I got my CE 3! It's quite nice as far as I can tell from a first inspection but you really can't have it all - the asa only goes up to 200. D

Are you sure, I thought it went up to 3200?

Even the CM3 goes up to 1600.

 

[noeru]

Wow you're right, it does! The dial was stuck, I nearly broke a nail trying to move that pin, but it does go up to 3200. Thank you!!!

 

[aoresteen]

Don't give up on the ES II ! I have 5 of them all recently serviced by Eric Hendrickson. https://pentaxs.com/

They use four 1.5v Silver Oxide batteries (Eveready S76E or Mallory MS-76H) - no 1.3v mercury battery issues to deal with.

To get full aperture auto operations you need "Super-Multi-Coated" Takumar m42 lenses (later ones were marked "SMC"). All others you use stop down metering as mentioned above.

Here's a link to the manual in case you don't have one:

http://www.cameramanuals.org/pentax_pdf/pentax_es_ii.pdf

Good luck!

 

[Magnus919]

The biggest problem afaik. is the batteries on these Pentax cameras which has a dedicated m42 mount as they use those 625 (px625 in EU) batteries. That was pretty much my decider as I would like to have the opertunity to use a lightmeter in some cases and do not want to rely on those old strange batteries.

For what it's worth, I use an Energizer 387S battery in my Pentax Spotmatic. It's a silver oxide battery, not mercury. The Spotmatics have a bridge circuit so it's safe to use the modern 1.5VDC battery in them.

If you like your cameras simple and mechanical, it's hard to beat a Spotmatic for M42 lenses.

 

[John51]

In the 70s, I went Zenit -> OM1 and bypassed the Spottie. I got an SP500 a few years ago and it feels even nicer in my hands than the OM1.

 

[dynachrome]

A camera which is often overlooked for using M42 lenses is the Mamiya Auto XTL (and later Auto X1000). There is a Mamiya P adapter which allows stop down metering, auto diaphragm operation and correct infinity focus for most M42 lenses with a single diaphragm pin. The P adapter came in two versions. One is wider than the other but they still work the same way. A similar adapter was made by Fuji for using M42 lenses on its 35mm bayonet mount (X) series SLR cameras. A search for these adapters often results in adapters to the current X series mirrorless digital Fuji cameras.