Kamera Werkstaetten Patent Etui 9x12 trinar lens question

[fedupwithdigital]

Can someone with a 9x12 Patent Etui please post a photo of it with the back off and the bellows closed? How high up from the lens board does the rear lens sit?

And odd request, maybe, but I have a suspicion my rear lens element doesn't match my front!

Two things lead me to this.

First, when the bellows is extended to the infinity stop on the camera bed, the lens isn't focussed at infinity. I have to extend the bellows another centimetre or so. Maybe this is normal but I suspect not. There are a couple of screws on the distance scale which look like they allow it to be adjusted slightly. But there certainly isn't room to adjust it by a centimetre, only by a few mm.

Secondly, when the camera is closed, the rear lens sticks up some way, so that I can't easily remove the focussing back without it hitting the lens rim. I have to open the camera bed so that the lens moves forwards slightly. The back isn't original to the camera but I don't think that's why it hits the lens. And it has an old acrylic focussing screen which seems to rest, when the camera is closed, right up against the rear lens. I'm planning to fit a ground glass in there instead but worry the lens might crack it!

My lens is a Rodenstock Trinar 135mm, f4.5 in a Compur shutter. At least, the front element is labelled as a trinar. As I say, I'm suspicious of the rear element.

Seeing another KW may help resolve this (although if it is fitted with a different lens, it may not!). Seeing a different camera, but one fitted with this lens, might also help.

PS. - Another thought - could it be that the lens is fine (front and rear elements match) but that the lens/shutter combination isn't original to the camera?

 

[Rick A]

Just a thought, but maybe the infinity stop is off? I purposely set my infinity stop just short of infinity so I can fine tune my focus on the GG.

 

[Ian Grant]

Post some photos of your Patent Etui, that would help me with your questions. I have 2 one is here, the other came without a lens of back so no help to you. Neither have infinity stops.

However with no bellows extension and the front standard set at the front of the focus rail my 135mm f4.5 Tessar is focused at infinity.

The 9x12 cameras are so thin you shouldn't really be able to remove the focus screen when folded up.

I have a 135mm Trinar on a Rodenstock 9x12 camera, remember the lens is a Cooke type triplet so the rear cell is a single element, however looking at my Trinar the rear element does protrude further than the two Tessars I looked at, but I can't check the 135mm f4.5 all I have here in dial-set Compurs are 165mm f5.6 and f6.3 Tessars.

Ian

 

[fedupwithdigital]

Thanks for the helps so far - much appreciated. Very useful to know that it is normal for the back not to come off easliy when the camera is closed.

Here are some shots of the KW. Here's a general view.

The next lot show the black "distance scale" (I may be using the wrong label) with the position of the "stop" (silver triangle) at infinity, when the belows is extended to the end of the bed. Then the distance scale when the camera is actually focussed at infinity. The first one also shows the small screw in a slot that looks like it allows some adjustment of the distance scale. In order to focus closer than infinity, the distance scale is pressed down, which disengages the "stop" and allows the the bellows to be extended further.

Finally, here are two shots of the rear lens element. It certainly seems to be simple lens, concave on the inside and convex on the outer. You can hopefully see how much it sticks up when the camera is closed.

Something else I've noticed. The rear shutter "nut", although fully tightened, sits up about 1 mm from the back of the lens board. I've taken it off to have a look and, as it won't pass through the hole at the small end of the bellows, it won't tighten any more than this. In my other folders and plate camera, these nuts sit flush. If this nut is meant to sit flush too, then the fact it doesn't might be contributing to the infinity focus being off, in that whole shutter assembly is too far forward. May be barking up the wrong tree with this, however!

 

[Ian Grant]

The rear element looks about right, I think the lens isn't original though. The rear of the shutter will be flush with the plate regardless of the retaining ring not sitting flush however does it prevent the rear element screwing in fully.

It's probable that the Trinar has a slightly different flange focal distance to the Tessar or whatever lens was fitted originally and that's the cause of the focus difference. KW tended to use CZJ lenses. You can move the focus indicator to suit the lens, they were also sold with a 150mm

My bellow compress a bit flatter than yours with both cameras and combined with a slightly shorter real element mount there's more clearance for the back & GG screen.

Be aware if you were to look for a 135mm f4.5 Tessar you need one in a Dial set Compur.

Ian

 

[Ian Grant]

Just to confirm the rear elements of the 135mm f4.5 Tessar are in a very shallow mount compared to the Trinar.

Ian

 

[fedupwithdigital]

Thanks again for the help.

I think this lens/shutter must, as Ian says, be a replacement for whatever was there originally.

For the sake of completeness, in case anyone in the future has similar issues (I joined APUG recently after searching it many, many times and finding answers to questions I had), the rear element does screw in all the way even though the retaining ring sits high. The lens does focus - just not at infinity at the point the distance scale indicates. I have used it (with Fuji Instax wide film) as this shows

The reason the retaining ring won't go on any further is that it is stepped. The flat section isn't at the very bottom but about 1mm up. The extra length on the ring is too wide to pass through the end of the bellows. Having looked at it again, while I previously thought the shutter was sticking too far forward, I now agree the back of the shutter is flush with the lens board (and the front of the bellows is also flush with the rear of the lens board. So it holds the shutter tight and, as far as I can tell, in the right place.

On moving the distance scale or infinity stop so that it matches the lens, I'll investigate those screws, see what I can come up with and report back!

 

[Ian Grant]

The scale stays in the same place it's the indicator that moves, this would need moving more significantly if a 150mm Tessaar was used and probably a slightly different scale.

Ian

 

[fedupwithdigital]

A quick update. I haven't had time yet to see if the infinity stop can be moved. But I have tried something else.

The other plate camera I got (cheap) for the plate holders that came with it came with an Eurynar f4.5, 135mm lens in a dial-set compur shutter. The Eurynar is, as far as my understanding goes, a "better" lens than the Trinar. And the shutter it came in is sticky, particularly at the slower speeds, as well as having some rust spots on the shutter blades. So I swapped the front and rear elements of the Eurynar from the plate camera with the Trinar on the KW.

On checking focus, the infinity stop is still not quite right when the Eurynar is focussed at infinity but it is a lot closer to being right than with Trinar. I find that odd, given the focal length of both lenses is supposed to be the same.

I was also surprised this worked at all, as changing lenses between shutters is meant to be difficult. In fact, the two shutters, while being almost identical (same overall diameter, same aperture scales and the same range of speeds) are slightly different in one respect - the shutter that came with the Eurynar fitted has what looks like a slightly longer lens tube than the shutter on the KW that came with the Trinar fitted.

Here are some pictures of the shutters, after swapping the front elements but with the rear elements removed. The original KW/Trinar shutter is no. 388414 and it has the shorter lens tube. The shutter that originally came with the Eurynar is no. 751454 and has the longer tube. Missing is a shot of the rear elements. The Trinar has a thicker "collar" so sits quite far from the aperture blades and shutter - the lens basically sits above the shutter lens tube. The Eurynar has a shorter collar but is thicker overall and more of the lens goes into the lens tube. When the Eurynar rear element is fitted to the shutter with the shorter lens tube, it seems to go almost all the way in then can't go in any further, even though, if the lens tube were longer, it looks like it could.

What does all this amount to? As far as I can tell, despite the difference in the lens tubes, when the Eurynar is fitted in either shutter, the front and rear lens elements are the right distance apart. I haven't film tested this yet, so I could be wrong. And I haven't put the Trinar, in it's "new" shutter, on a camera to check if it still works - although I suspect it won't, on the basis the rear element will be too far from the front element.

Or am I just deluded and the Eurynar is going to be "wrong" for this shutter once I get around to actually trying to use it?

 

[Ian Grant]

I'd try and clean the sticky shutter. My Eurynar on a 9x12 Orionwerk camera is in quite a large Compur, but then it's a 150mm f3,5. The Eurynar is one of the sharpest 9x12 lenses but it's a Dialyte so has a lot of air/glass surfaces so more prone to flare than a triplet like a Trinar or a Tessar.

Focal length is often nominal so a 135mm lens may actually be 134mm or even 136mm, and as I said before the flange focal distance may differ slightly from the actual focal length. That's why your seing variations.

You've made me realise that I should put the 135mm f4.5 Ihagee-Goerz Dopp-Anastigmat I have on my second Patent Etui, it's also a Dialyte.

Ian

 

[fedupwithdigital]

Thanks again, Ian

I will try to clean the sticky shutter. I worked the different speeds while watching Australia v. Argentina yesterday and it's got a bit better. But still sticks on the very slow speeds (1s, 1/2s in particular).

Got some Fuji Instax Wide in the post this morning, so will be able to see if the Eurynar is focussing properly soon. The Instax fits nicely in my 9x12 film sheaths inside the two plate holders that I have. My ideal set-up would be to have 10 holders so that I can load a full 10 pack of Instax into them, shoot the 10, then unload them into an Instax film pack for processing through the rollers in my Instax 200. At the moment, I'm restricted to two shots at a time, which can be a little limiting, as it means going into the changing bag every two shots, which also means I'm stuck to the house if I want to take more than two photographs. The only real drawback with the Instax is that, while the overall dimensions are 86 x 108mm, the picture area is 62 x 99mm due to the chemical pod at the bottom. So I need to remember this when composing shots.

 

[fedupwithdigital]

Weather here has been terrible since I got film. But I did manage a couple of test shots, all of which came out reasonably well and as expected. So the Eurynar seems to be right, despite the differences in the shutters. None is worth posting here but will post an example when I can.

 

[fedupwithdigital]

Just an update.

Having acquired a broken KW with a Tessar lens, I fitted this to the working KW. It's not the easiest set up to use but I think, after a lot of trial and error (mainly error), it's worth persisting with. Here's a shot from today, taken on Fuji Instax Wide film (800ASA), with the bellows at pretty much full extension, shutter speed 1/200th and aperture f16.

 

[Ome Kees]

Thats a nice shot fedup. I have a few of those and they are my favorit lf camera's. They are very handy and because of their weight and size very pocketable.

Kees