Sacrifice an Agfa 6x9 folder for a film back?

[medform-norm]

I wanted to save the bellows because it's in good shape. I'll wait before getting agressive.

I made a piece of ground glass today about 4"x12" to cut into pieces for focus checks on a few cameras. Seeing that glass got me thinking...'Pan-o-ra-ma, Pan-o-ra-ma, Pan-o-ra-ma'.

Yeah, Murray, I can see you starting to build a pan-o-ra-mic camera around a nice piece of home made ground glass - keep us posted if you do!

 

[Murray@uptowngallery]

'Starting', yes...that's the key word.

 

[Dan Fromm]

'Starting', yes...that's the key word.

No doubt about it. Nut case.

Keep it up, you're an inspiration. Perhaps bad influence would be a better description.

 

[Murray@uptowngallery]

How to filet a Ventura 69.

Success!

Continued drilling with Dremel (actually, 'Sears Rotary Tool') until 4 screw shafts pushed thru (2 on each side (L,R) of film gate.

The whole film gate is formed with 'dimples' and bent so that it tightly snaps over the bellows. I took a 1/4" x 1" piece of steel and pried gently up on the L & R sides where the screws were removed and the bottom side came out, revealing the formed shape. A little more pressure on the sides closer to the top and the top rail lifted out. The top and bottom are tightly snapped between the other body shell layers. I thought it was one piece until I got it apart.

The whole gate and roller ass'y lifted out apparently unharmed revealing 4 folded over bellows flaps, barely glued down. I was able to pry bellows loose with fingernails.

I switched from the spherical cutting tool which was hard to steer and removed material very slowly to a cylindrical coarser looking cutting tool. The folding arm pivots were anchored mid-body, top & bottom with large head nickeled brass pins. Ground those off and the 4 rivets holding the folding hinge and it all came apart leaving the back. Cut-off wheel removed the shutter release button.

Free and clear now.

 

[medform-norm]

How to filet a Ventura 69.

Success!

Continued drilling with Dremel (actually, 'Sears Rotary Tool') until 4 screw shafts pushed thru (2 on each side (L,R) of film gate.

The whole film gate is formed with 'dimples' and bent so that it tightly snaps over the bellows. I took a 1/4" x 1" piece of steel and pried gently up on the L & R sides where the screws were removed and the bottom side came out, revealing the formed shape. A little more pressure on the sides closer to the top and the top rail lifted out. The top and bottom are tightly snapped between the other body shell layers. I thought it was one piece until I got it apart.

The whole gate and roller ass'y lifted out apparently unharmed revealing 4 folded over bellows flaps, barely glued down. I was able to pry bellows loose with fingernails.

I switched from the spherical cutting tool which was hard to steer and removed material very slowly to a cylindrical coarser looking cutting tool. The folding arm pivots were anchored mid-body, top & bottom with large head nickeled brass pins. Ground those off and the 4 rivets holding the folding hinge and it all came apart leaving the back. Cut-off wheel removed the shutter release button.

Free and clear now.

Congratulations, Murray! As we say over here "de aanhouder wint" (he who keeps at it, wins). And thanks for sharing all the technical info on the process. One never knows to whose advantage that might be in the future. It's too bad you couldn't upload pics of the whole process (for non-English speaking crowds).
Regards, Norm

 

[Murray@uptowngallery]

I might re-visit the parts to show visually how it all happened.

 

[Murray@uptowngallery]

Today, I realized the power of the 100 monkey theory of camera hacking.

Put 100 monkeys in a room with old cameras, parts, etc, and eventually one will build a Hasselblad.

By having 100 projects in flow simultaneously, the ideas feed off each other, creating a perpetual idea machine. None ever get completed, and thus never die.

Alternately, one could call this parallel processing!

I did net a 'deal' on a 120 back too, so I may allow for both options on this project.

 

[Murray@uptowngallery]

OK, I was asked to go back & document the surgery. I tried to recreate it positioning pieces roughly together. I didn't want to snap the film gate back over the bellows as I didn't want to stress either one further taking them apart again.

http://uptowngallery.org/Murray/AgfaFilet/

I used a Sears Craftsman Dremel equivalent. A round spiral cutting tool was too difficult to remove material with and control (hence the wild scratches away from the intended area). A coarser cylindrical spiral cutter was faster and so aggressive I seriously contemplated stopping to get safety glasses, which I probably should have done regardless.

The unfortunate choice of "#1" -"#14" for the photo names interferes with the 'Next' feature in the HTML...10 comes after 1...sorry...a quirk of computers.

Murray

 

[Murray@uptowngallery]

Speaking of those darn monkeys above, one of them boogered up a shutter for me this weekend :O(

 

[DavidV]

If you're gonna do a panoramic, Doug Bardell's got some neat ideas:

http://www.cyberbeach.net/~dbardell/panorama.html

I like his rollfilm back. Simple design, cheap to build and no guilt about hacking up old camera bodies.

 

[Murray@uptowngallery]

Thanks for the DB reminder.

That Agfa back got epoxied to a 4x5 holder so I can use a darkslide. The ground glass spacer had to be 1.697", however! A friendly machinist (I'll call him 'Chip' to protect his identity) insisted on 'hogging it out' of a solid block of aluminum instead of 4 separate sides.

The back of that beast is done but I'm still messing with the front.

 

[Kevin Roach]

Murray

Save that viewfinder!!!!

Most of the Agfa Billy Records use a flip up finder. The finder from the ventura will replace it perfectly and add an accessorary shoe.

 

[Murray@uptowngallery]

I looked inside the viewfinder. Man, you couldn't build something yourself that nice! Stepped sides, flat black, masked holes, nice...

Another nice thing to hang on to is the flip-up rangefinders from the now-cheap 100-200-300 series Polaroid packfilm cameras. I saw a mod with a bolt, two nuts & a calibrated scale glued on...the screw moves the external actuator & you get your indication on the scale aligned with the actuator arm. Not sure how well it mounts on anything, but can be a hand-held accessory.

Murray