Reattaching Leica Vulcanite

I have a Leica II and the vulcanite was lose. I was very careful when removing the body screws to not break it (which was a chore - normally those screws want to take a chunk out and I don't think this camera has ever been taken apart in it's 92 years).

I got the camera apart and decided I was going to reattach the vulcanite, which is original and is now brown with age. It was fully attached on about 30% of the camera. However, the very brittle vulcanite becomes very flexible once it gets a bit of heat from a heat gun. And the glue that holds it, while it doesn't quite release, becomes easy enough to slip a razor blade between the skin and the metal. So, after a few minutes, it was off. I used the heat gun to make it lay flat. Then I scraped the old glue off both the vulcanite and the metal (sanded the metal, actually). I put double-sided tape on the skin and reapplied it to the metal, applying heat to bend. One tiny crack in the back disappeared, a couple of tiny chips have since been touched up with a mix of paints.

I was going to use rubber cememt to reattach it. I thought that might be a good option if someone wanted to reattach it in another 90 years. The issue is the heat gun. It would evaporate the solvent in the rubber cement before the skin was attached. So I gave up on that idea.



I didn't take more pictures. You can see from the slight pull away from the screw holes that the material has shrunk. I think it's doing pretty well, considering.

If it is crumbling then I would replace it with something more modern.

But to each his own.

I'm in awe: I didn't think that was possible! I had assumed that once vulcanized, it could never be made flexible again, much less reused.

I am confused.

Vulcanite in the UK is the hard, solid black material used to make the mouth piece on a smokers briar pipe.

The very thin leather-like material on the case of a camera is either genuine leather or leatherette.

Are you referring to the flexible leather cover on the camera body?

If it is the latter, I use an old fashioned adhesive made from shellac flakes soaked overnight in methylated spirits.

It can be thickened by leaving the lid of the jar loose, allowing the alcohol to evaporate a little. Or thinned with more alcohol.

I believe shellac adhesive was originally used back in the day when a lot of the old vintage cameras were originally made.

Looks like a nice tidy job you have done.

4season said:

I'm in awe: I didn't think that was possible! I had assumed that once vulcanized, it could never be made flexible again, much less reused.

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Ditto here. If you can get it off and on again then go for it.

When my M3 vulcanite crumbled it was beyond help.

BobUK said:

I am confused.

Vulcanite in the UK is the hard, solid black material used to make the mouth piece on a smokers briar pipe.

The very thin leather-like material on the case of a camera is either genuine leather or leatherette.

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The hard solid black stuff used on pipes (and woodwind mouthpieces, fountain pens, and bowling balls) is a hard rubber typically called "ebonite" in the US and some other places.

"Vulcanite" in camera usage is a rubberized leatherette-like material. People seem to specifically use "vulcanite" when talking about Leicas. I am not sure if the Leica stuff is actually made from natural rubber or similar synthetic materials.

I think one could probably paint contact or rubber cement onto the body and covering, warm the vulcanite/leatherette for flexibility, and get it to stick (after all the usual way to use contact cement is to le it dry a little before sticking the parts together). However, shellac is a good suggestion. Shellac adhesive is also removable with moderate heat. It is commonly used for woodwind instrument pads.

The early Leica “vulcanite” is very different from the later type.
The early type is still brittle but can be removed with care as entire piece and can be reglued. The later type as used on IIIf etc will not.

Nicholas Lindan said:

If it is crumbling then I would replace it with something more modern.

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It's not crumbling. It's brittle. It's the nature of the material. It becomes as floppy as a cloth with just a bit of heat. My M3 had vulcanite that crumbled off, also, so I guess they moved on to a different material by then, as @Nitroplait says.

4season said:

I didn't think that was possible!

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I didn't think it was, either, but thought it was worth trying. When searching online about reattaching it, I saw on the Leica Facebook page a post that said "Vulcanite is attractive, dimensionally stable, and quite durable, especially when it’s heated to make it pliable, and an adhesive is applied before affixing it permanently to new body shells."

Eugen Mezei said:

What the OP presents is leatherette. Vulcanite is totally different.

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Incorrect. It's a kind of vulcanized rubber. That's well established. You can smell it when heated up.

reddesert said:

Shellac adhesive is also removable with moderate heat. It is commonly used for woodwind instrument pads.

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Also used for musical instruments, namely violins, is hide glue, which I considered using to attach the vulcanite, since it could be applied to it and then heated up with the skin itself. I just wanted to avoid a mess, though. But, ideally, something like that would be much better, since it would be easily repositionable.

Looking at Wiki. and some pipe makers catalogues, Vulcanite and Ebonite appear to be the same thing, but Vulcanite is also the name of a geological mineral.
Interesting to me though we shouldn't get side tracked away from the original posters query.

Thank you all.