Kodak 130mm Anistigmat alternative shutter

[Daire Quinlan]

I borrowed a nice Kodak 130mm Anistigmat from an old folding model 3 and stuck it onto a lensboard to shoot with my Cambo 4x5. Covers the format, ish, with no movements. However, it's in a ball bearing shutter which I have my suspicions about, all the speeds seem the same, and besides 25/50/100 isn't a great range for a f/7.7, in Ireland, during the winter I'm looking for alternative, modern shutters that I can screw the cells into. Are there any ? I don't know how to size these things or what's suitable. Flash sync would also be good.

 

[Dan Fromm]

Daire, unscrew the cells from their ball bearing shutter, measure their threads' diameters and then use a thread gauge to measure the threads' pitch. After you've done that, look at the first post in this
https://www.largeformatphotography....to-look-for-information-on-LF-(mainly)-lenses
It has links to all sorts of interesting sites including some that give dimensions for nearly all of the shutters you're likely to find.

I have one lens in a useless ball bearing shutter. It lives in the drawer. I don't enjoy being negative, but I doubt you'll find a normal ordinary shutter that will accept your lens' cells and hold them the right distance apart. If you were in the US, you might be able to have skgrimes make threaded bushings that would hold the cells the right distance apart in a normal ordinary shutter. Every time I've looked into doing something silly like that with a gift lens, the project's cost exceeded the price of a decent used lens of the same focal length in a decent used shutter.

Another thing you might do if you have access to a nice oyster bed, sorry, flea market or boot sale that has Folding Pocket Kodaks, is open all the oysters, sorry, FPKs, you can to look for pearls, sorry, good usable lenses. I got a nice pre-WW I 130/6.3 CZJ Tessar in Compound that way.

 

[Arklatexian]

I borrowed a nice Kodak 130mm Anistigmat from an old folding model 3 and stuck it onto a lensboard to shoot with my Cambo 4x5. Covers the format, ish, with no movements. However, it's in a ball bearing shutter which I have my suspicions about, all the speeds seem the same, and besides 25/50/100 isn't a great range for a f/7.7, in Ireland, during the winter I'm looking for alternative, modern shutters that I can screw the cells into. Are there any ? I don't know how to size these things or what's suitable. Flash sync would also be good.

View attachment 230592 View attachment 230593

Many years ago, I did the same thing, except the lens was a Rapid Rectilinear, mounting the lens and shutter on a lens board that would fit a Kodak 4x5 Master View.(Calumet made the same camera later). I set the shutter on the fastest speed and made some test exposures at different f stops, using slow film. The result became my "shooting" f stop). That is as many details as I can remember except I do remember some of the pictures that I took with that rig were ok. Shortly after, I bought a used/new 135mm and shutter made to use on a view camera and never used the old lens/shutter again. On an old lens/shutter combination that works, why worry about the accuracy of the shutter?.......regards!

 

[shutterfinger]

Kodak used their own thread on their lens and shutters so adapters are likely needed to fit the cells into a different shutter. The only exception is some lens made/sold in Europe.
This 1917 service manual http://www.cameraeccentric.com/html/info/repair_1.html shows an early Ball Bearing Shutter, later versions are similar. The rear plate holds 5 or 6 1/16 ball bearings and arc shaped spacers in a grove that is part of the front cover plate.
I have done a CLA on one and the speeds came back good and on another all speeds were the same. The operation is levers and springs so wear and weak springs are the cause of singe speed at all settings.

You may find this useful: http://skgrimes.com/library/faq/how-to-measure-threads

 

[Daire Quinlan]

Ah, cool, thanks guys. I was hoping it was some sort of standard, or that there was some known sized compur shutter or something that could be just swapped in.
I did take a shot on 8x10 to test coverage and general lens quality, which I liked, which made me want to use the lens, but this is mounting it in front of a big Sinar shutter which is then jimmied onto the front of the cambo, and this is about as far away as I can actually focus using this combo

 

[shutterfinger]

Nice portrait.