Hello! I've recently been getting into the Exakta camera system (by far my favorite 35mm slr btw) and was wondering if anyone would happen to know if m42 to exakta mount adapters existed. i can find Exakta to M42 (putting an exakta lens on a m42 camera) but nothing the other way around. Is this a situation where the flange distance is too short so it wouldn't work, or is it one of those things that's uncommon enough to require a $200 adapter (like Contax rf mount to LTM)?
The first camera I used back in the early 1970s was an Exakta VXii (?). I used it for about six months before shifting to a Pentax SP500. I ordered a flange from some company out of the back of Shutterbug magazine which replaced the Exakta lens mount to accept M42 lenses. It worked fine and I used the Exakta as a second body until I moved to Olympus a few years later. I think the flange cost $15. Good luck finding one 50 years later, but never say never.
The first camera I used back in the early 1970s was an Exakta VXii (?). I used it for about six months before shifting to a Pentax SP500. I ordered a flange from some company out of the back of Shutterbug magazine which replaced the Exakta lens mount to accept M42 lenses. It worked fine and I used the Exakta as a second body until I moved to Olympus a few years later. I think the flange cost $15. Good luck finding one 50 years later, but never say never.
Exakta has a 44.7mm film-to-flange distance and is 46mm in diameter.
M42 has a 45.46mm film-to-flange distance and is 42mm in diameter.
So, an Exakta lens with its standard bayonet mount will not focus to infinity on an M42 body even if you could somehow make a <1mm-thick adapter.
In general, you can adapt a lens with a longer film-to-flange distance on a camera body with a shorter film-to-flange distance (such as an Olympus OM or Pen F lens to a Fujifilm X-mount body) if there is enough difference in the distances to allow for the thickness of the adapter. Where the distances are close, an additional problem is that the length of the lens behind the flange might be too great. I ran into that problem in trying to adapt a Robot lens to an Olympus Pen F -- the rear of the lens would hit the reflex mirror at the correct film-to-flange spacing.
(See www.graphics.cornell.edu/~westin/misc/mounts-by-register.html for a good table of different camera and lens film-to-flange distances.)
Yeah but I want to adapt m42 to an exakta body not the other way around
OK. Your adapter can be only 0.76mm thick (in front of the Exakta’s flange front) if you want to retain infinity focus. Also, the side walls of the adapter will be only 2m thick. That might be doable, but it will take some tight engineering.
unfortunate, i was hoping to be able to slap some weird lenses on the front of my Exakta haha.
That is super cool and exactly what I'm looking for! Now that I know they exist, my search is not in vain.I read this thread, then was going thru a bag of some old Exakta stuff in it, and in a fantastic coincidence, found these 2 adapters that go both ways between M42 and Exakta cameras. The first is an Exakta lens to M42 body adapter; the manufacturer dealt with the shallower flange focal distance of Exakta lenses by having the lens stick into the M42 body a bit. r a feldman is correct in his above comment-- the adapter threaded walls are very narrow, indeed light can be seen at a couple points (it wouldn't matter in use, as it would be buried in the female M42 thread). The 2nd is, AFAICT an M42 lens to Exakta body adapter, with (darn the luck) another smaller adapter screwed and stuck inside-- it's smaller than M42 but bigger than M39, so both M40.5 and M40 are possibilities (each was used for a hot minute on some camera system, but I'm damned if I remember the names). ETA: probably it's an M40 Praktiflex lens to M42 body adapter, and would be for close-up or macro work on M42 as it wouldn't make infinity; it would be closer on an Exakta body but the thickness of the adapter stack likely makes infinity impossible.
Yeah but I like Exaktas. I have a Pentax H3 and I've tested my friend's Spotmatic and they're nice cameras but just don't do it for me like the Exakta. I really like how the Exakta is left-handed, which is a huge benefit for me. I also prefer to use waist-level viewfinders. While Pentaxes are nice, I really like Exaktas and would prefer to invest in that system since I like it more.I replied to this thread already but I will chime in again. If you really want to have some fun using M42 lenses, buy a Pentax Spotmatic F and send it to Eric Hendrickson for an overhaul. Why the Spotmatic F? It was the last of the Spotmatic cameras with a mechanical shutter and takes a modern battery. With the SMC lenses you will have full aperture metering. With other lenses you will have stop down metering. I traded away my Exakta VX500 years ago because I just didn't like it. The 50/2 Pancolar lens was nice but I traded that away too. A few years ago I inherited an Exa, which I hope to have overhauled. It would certainly be a project to get M42 lenses to fit an Exakta with correct infinity focus. I just don't know whether it would be worth the effort.
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