Oh crap...

Yesterday, my new-to-me 210mm f/5.6 Rodenstock Sironar-N MC arrived. While I'm quite pleased that the glass is flawless and that the Copal #1 tests out fine at all speeds, there is a problem with the iris. It seems that 3 blades of the iris have fallen out of their track and the iris won't open all the way.

I haven't had many Copal shutters (I don't really like the build quality) as I prefer the Synchro Compur. Has anyone else experienced this? The shutter will be leaving for Carol Miller on Monday morning, might as well get a CLA "just to be sure", and she assures me that it's something that's an easy fix, but I do long for those nice, German shutters...

Oh well... Rant over...

Bob-

On the SK Grimes site there are pictures of a shutter being disassembled for repair. You can see there how the iris blades are attached to a shutter. Carol's right about this being an easy repair...no need to worry about it.

I've been fortunate in that the only shutter I've owned that had any problem at all (in this case, a few iris blades that had worked their way loose over the decades) was an extremely old Isbo air-piston shutter that I didn't care about (I bought the lens for the glass, not the shutter)...so I was willing to try fixing the iris blades myself. It turned out to be well within my limited abilities to open up the shutter and re-mount the iris blades. (Note to anyone who reads this: I do NOT recommend opening shutters unless you know what you're doing...I only did this because I didn't really care if I destroyed the shutter. I got lucky in that I didn't destroy it, but it was only luck and nothing more. If you do care about your equipment, send it to an expert like Carol.)

Like you, I'm a fan of the Compur shutters. I've been very fortunate to have had no problems at all with any Compur or Copal shutters I've owned...but the Compur shutters always impress me as being more of a precision instrument than the Copals.

Bob,

Carol just fixed a compound for me----great job! Your lens is in good hands! I've got a mongrel colection of compounds, compur, alphax, rapax, betax, acme, universal,and copal shutters and all of them strike me as being pretty amazing machines. If german shutters are your preference, you can always pick up prontor press shutters off of Polaroid copy cameras on eBay. FWIW, I find that using the cable lock to open the lens for focusing is a small price to pay for not having to manually cock the shutter. YMMV.

I don't know the specifics of the transaction but if the lens /shutter was represented by the seller as having no problems I would return it for a full refund or at least a partial for the cost of repair. If it was sold as is without the seller disclosing this problem I would still demand a refund. If it was an Ebay purchase contact the seller and make sure negative comments are given and file a complaint with Ebay if he does not rectify the problem.

Jim Chinn said:

I don't know the specifics of the transaction but if the lens /shutter was represented by the seller as having no problems I would return it for a full refund or at least a partial for the cost of repair. If it was sold as is without the seller disclosing this problem I would still demand a refund. If it was an Ebay purchase contact the seller and make sure negative comments are given and file a complaint with Ebay if he does not rectify the problem.

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It was an ebay transaction. I contacted the seller and informed him of the problem, and because his positive feedback is 2423 with 6 negatives (none recent), I don't believe the seller acted in a dishonest manner - this was something that may have happened in shipment, even though it was well packed, or may have been an honest oversight. I tend to get ALL new-to-me shutters serviced soon after I get them, and since the glass is perfect, I'm not THAT upset. My rant was more how I miss new lenses in those wonderful Synchro Compur shutters.

John Kasaian said:

If german shutters are your preference, you can always pick up prontor press shutters off of Polaroid copy cameras on eBay.

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I don't know if you've looked at some of those Polaroid Prontor Press shutters, but some of them in size 1 (most that I've seen), have smaller than standard iris openings! I really want my f/5.6 lens to BE an f/5.6, not limited to f/8 or 11 by a weird iris.

My hat is off to anybody who can fix a balky iris. I've had some success with shutter mechanisms but zero with iris'. If a customer contacts me with something similar that I've overlooked I always suck up and pay at least half the bill. I'll bet your seller would do likewise. Nice lens, and for me, I find the Copal's somewhat less fussy than Compur's.

If it did happen in shipping then i would wonder if anything else was about to go awry. It takes a hell of a pound to pop those loose. Unfortunately I know. I would take it to a repair shop for the once over, if you don't get a replay from the seller.

mark said:

If it did happen in shipping then i would wonder if anything else was about to go awry. It takes a hell of a pound to pop those loose. Unfortunately I know. I would take it to a repair shop for the once over, if you don't get a replay from the seller.

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It's already boxed and ready to go to the post office tomorrow (along with a bunch of other stuff). Carol has been alerted and stands at the ready!