Has Anyone Made an ElectroMechanically Operated Thornton-Pickard Shutter

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Qebs

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Hello,

Has anyone thought of or designed a Thorton-Pickard/focal plane shutter using an electric motor or fast servo motor
to move the cloth across the plane?

I guess with some of those fancy encoded motors you could easily control the "shutter speed."

I have some barrel lenses and I'm trying to figure out how to get a reliable shutter
ranging from 1/8th and slower to multiple seconds.

I did find some links regarding a DIY shutters....

One on Guillotine shutters


https://www.largeformatphotography.info/forum/archive/index.php/t-63147.html

I'm trying to understand, and it seems the slot/slit determines the exposure
but I wondering if an electric motor with a TP shutter would be easier to get consistent results and changing the shutter speed.


And here was a brief discussion:

https://www.photrio.com/forum/threads/diy-focal-plane-shutters.87066/


Thanks for viewing.
Cheers!
 

radiant

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I did a servo controlled guilliotine shutter for my large format camera.

It had to modes; one for "fixed" shutter speeds - just a correct sized hole in blade. The other mode for slower shutter speeds; two blades that were released with defined shutter speed.

I was wondering the same for full electric version; basically curtain shutter was in top of my mind. And then I got lens that has working shutter and suddenly I had no need for anything else :smile:

Guillitione shutter works fine when the camera is leveled horizontally. But if you tilt the lens up or down the shutter times change because of the increased friction.
 

Nicholas Lindan

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That's why Speed Graphics are so neat. Hmph, I suppose it is possible to mount a Speed Graphic to the lensboard of an 8x10 and mount the lens in the Speed.

If your 8x10 is a Sinar you are in luck as Sinar made a shutter for use with barrel lenses. I suppose you could mount a Sinar shutter to your Deardorf/2D/Shin Hao...

For such a low volume application the price for an electric behind/front shutter would be prohibitive. Cheaper to send your lens off to Grimes to be fitted with a shutter.
 

btaylor

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I have a shutter speed tester and a Packard shutter. With a little practice I can easily repeat a 1/20 sec exposure. Longer than that would is easier. On big lenses I front mount the shutter.
 
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Qebs

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Thanks for the reply vedostuu. Yeah, I might want to tilt the whole camera... hmm....

~~~

Hello Nicholas, interesting....it seems there are Sinar auto aperture shutters for sale on ebay. They might be too expensive for me, but do you know what the maximum diameter lenses they work with?
The front and rear diameters of my portrait lens is around 5 inches.
Thanks :smile:

~~~


Hey, btaylor, Hmm interesting. They too are quite expensive. I got some quotes for newly made ones but yep, a little expensive for me right now.
Thanks :smile:
 

btaylor

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Hey, btaylor, Hmm interesting. They too are quite expensive. I got some quotes for newly made ones but yep, a little expensive for me right now.
Thanks :smile:
I think I have about 3 of them, one I front mount on a big Kodak shutterless portrait lens, one is rear mounted in a Deardorff lens board (very convenient for barrel lenses) and a spare. I am pretty sure I didn’t pay more than $50-100 for any of them. I never bought a new one, just used ones from eBay or LFPF. There are a bunch on eBay right now for well under $100. If they need work some simple cleaning and a shot of black paint usually fixes them right up. Just a thought…
 

jimjm

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I've managed to restore and adapt several old Packard shutters to barrel lenses, or lenses without usable shutters. I can reliably get about 1/20 sec and B/T.
Plenty of old Packards available online that can be cleaned up and returned to working condition, as long as there is no significant damage to the housing or blades, and there are no missing parts. Some of the other parts like brass fittings or hoses can be found used, or brand-new from Packard-Ideal.
They're easy to service, most commonly the interior of the steel housings need to be cleaned of surface rust and the exterior can be repainted with black matte spray paint.
Get one with an opening at least as large as the closest lens element, to prevent any vignetting.

Here's a Packard #6 on an Ilex 12-inch lens, mounted to the back of an 8x10 Deardorff lens board.

Ilex_305_1.jpg Ilex_305_2.jpg

And a Packard #8, front-mounted to a large Wollensak 15.5 inch lens. The shutter's too large for the inside of my 8x10 Eastman View, so I cobbled together an adapter to slide onto the front of the lens.

Packard_shutter_sm.jpg
 
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Qebs

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Thanks btaylor and jimjm.

I would love a Packard Shutter as they are pretty simple in how they work (but still pretty advanced for me).

The issue is my shutter speed will be around 1/2 second to 1 second, and I need to accurately be able to adjust the shutter speed.
Sorry, I've never held a Packard Shutter, is there a way to adjust the shutter speed accurately? Google says it's a set speed (or B/T).

If not, I think I will gather some friends and hit some DIY forums to see if an electric/mechanical roller blind shutter could be made.

Thanks :smile: Have an awesome weekend!
 

Ian Grant

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Debs your question was about TP shutters which are rare in the US but very common here in the UK and copied in Europe.

They are way better than Packards and were made in a variety of sizes. and also higher speed versions. as well. Larger ones areless common but I have some to fit all my larger barrel lenses. They were still being made and serviced up until around 1960 even thought the Limited company ceased trading before WWII. A former employee continued making shutters and servicing TP cameras until finally retiring himself.

I've lost count of how many TP shutters I own but it's way over 50, morelikely 80 about half fully restored and maybe 30 just needing re-assembly with a new shutter curtain and cord.

There are many types of TP shutter from the Focal plane shutter backs, the silent Stdio shutters and then the more commom ones the Snapshot and the Time and Instant. The best are the Time and Instant preferably with a speed indicator. There are two verions Front mounting (the origibals) and the Between (or Behind) lens, the former push on to the front of a lens the later are screwd to the lens board and have removable front panels to allow the use of different lenses these were often sold with the camera and lens as a package but also sold seperately.

The largest TP shutters I own or have restores a have all been front mounting. Typically their shutters speed are 1/10 to 1/90 and usually use a pneumatic bulb release alas all long perished, I'm looking at getting some new bulbs made, TP sold a special valve for slower speeds and the shutter was set to T and the speed was controlled by how fast the air was released and the speed marked on the valves dial.

In later years TP shutter arms were tapped to take a cable release. I have a vague recollection that there was a slow speed clockwork controller that looked fairly similar to a self timer that screwed into a shutter release socket I remember thinking about getting one for my Zeit E while at school. They were definitely made before WWII by a few companies and fitted a cable release socket. A quick check and the most common were the Haka Autoknips made in Hamburg, the basic versions were just self timers but others had slow speed control of 1/2 to 9s, 10s.

Personally I'd look for a vavle release and use this with a modern pneumatic cable release, they tend to sell for more than I'd like to pay on Ebay :D An alteranive would be a solenoid and timer to trigger and release a cable release. I do have two time kits but ahven't go around to putting them together, I have 3 solenoid controlled leaf shutters.

I keep meaning to make a video of my various shutter, I have a High speed TP Focal Plane shutter 1/10 to 1/100s, all my other TP shutters, various front mounting leaf shutters including a large Gitzo, an Eyelid, a Le Mignon (very rare), oh and two Packard/Dallmeyer. But you can guess from my reply that the TP shutters are my favorites and I find the most versatile.

This on fits the 20" Rapid Rectilinear lens on my 12"x10" filed camera.with a smaller shutter and CF card for comparison:

upload_2021-7-24_8-58-25.png


Ian
 

Richard Man

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I 3-D printed guillotine shutters that work from 1/15 to 1/60. Major problem is that 1/15 or slower requires huge opening.

So now I just use the Sinar Copal shutters and 3-D printed an adapter for front mounting. Expensive but works great, although both of mine could use a CLA. Here's a blog I wrote on Packard vs, Guillotine
https://richardman.photo/2020/05/guillotine-vs-packard-shutters/
 
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Qebs

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Hey Ian, thanks for an awesome reply and detailed information!

Very interesting stuff, I'd love to see videos of your TP shutters!

~~~
Thanks for sharing your blog post Richard.

~~~
Someone I met in a chat room is now recommending dual-curtain focal-plane shutters.
Do you smart folks think it would be much better than TP shutter?

May I will look on ebay in Europe for TP shutters tho.

Thanks again everyone :smile:
 

Ian Grant

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Apologies Qebs for calling you Debs. TP did make a short lived Dual curtain small shutter that was self capping but I've never seen on I just have the Pantent and adverts where it's included.

Many companies made dual curtain focal plane shutters but these were usually buil into SLRs., I have 5 or 6 TP Ruby Reflex cameras, these used a Unit shutter which add the mirror box screwd to it, they actually come out of the camera in one piece. These are self capping so the curtains overlap as you reck the shutter one curtain stsfirts then the second advances to set the gap for the next exposure, the more it's advanced the great the gap util you reach the slowest usually 1/10 and the fastest 1/1000 there's also a T setting. You set the speed dial before re-cocking.

ruby-14sm.jpg


There were Press cameras with similar shutters. TP made a camera with the same shutter, Ihagee made a dual shutter press camera with a Focal plane and Compur shutter. A stanard TP shutter though give the ranges you want, don't pay over the odds for them as they almost all need restoration. Burke & James imported then into the US but seem to have preferred the Aluminium bodied versions and the alloy used doesn't last well.

I'm look for a large TP shutter for someone in France at the moment and they don't appear often on Ebay.

Ian
 
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Qebs

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Hello Ian,

No problem/no worries. I'm personally not great at spelling sometimes or miss type at times.

Thank you for all the names for me to research!

I've made a new contact yesterday and they want to help me/mentor me in trying to build a microcontroller operated focal plane shutter (TP style of dual curtain).

One of the questions they asked me today was, what are the mounting methods when mounting to the front of the lens?

I'm hoping to make one shutter for multiple lenses that all have different outer front diameters (if possible).

Would you, Ian, or anyone else have some photos of the mounting part?
Can you just use a collar that slips over the out diameter of the lens (at the front)?

Thanks again everyone!
Have a great weekend :smile:


Edit:


Oh, Ian,

I just think a custom focal plane shutter might be a good idea because, I will have so much latitude in choosing shutter speeds.

And hey, it will be fun to make :smile:

Thanks again
 
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