Nikkormat controls are made for RF camera users!

[Bikerider]

Pity they dint use a leaf shutter, then they wouldn't be so clunky.

Then they would have been a lot more expensive to make and possibly not as reliable. Apart from that would it have been so easy to be able to use the then expanding series of Nikon lenses.

I have had a a couple of Nikkormat's and got on with them and they were fine. No problems at all

 

[Les Sarile]

Les, this is an often misinterpreted piece of Internet folklore. The linked article says that they based the Nikon F prototype on the body of the SP. There are a lot of similarities between the F body and the SP/S-series rangefinders, like the faceted appearance and the location of the wind lever, shutter dial, and release button. But the F body is about 1 cm wider than the S-series rangefinders (SP body width 136mm, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikon_SP ). It's not the same body casting.

Arguably the SLR that is most like a rangefinder is one of the utterly insane Alpa SLRs that has both SLR viewing and a rangefinder. I've never seen one in person. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpa-Reflex_Camera and https://www.mikeeckman.com/2019/06/alpa-alnea-model-7-1952/

Internet folklore? I referenced Nikon's own site - not wiki.

To the OP's point, the layout of the common controls are exactly the same on Nikons SP and F.

Although I've not disassembled either, there must obviously be a few internal mechanisms that are different that can account for the size difference. As I understand it, another thing that is common between the two is the shutter mechanism.

The Alpa is an interesting camera but I believe there were others that were in fact SLRs but with a rangefinder viewer like the Praktina FX. I wonder if it had anything to with the fact that pre Asahiflex, the viewfinders would blackout?

 

[hsandler]

Part of the reason for putting the shutter speeds around the lens mount may be due to the Nikkormat’s origins in the earlIer Nikkorex line. Some models had that control arrangement. Some even had a front shutter release. Perhaps Nikon were experimenting with what the consumer market wanted.