tell me about the RB67

[flatulent1]

This whole thread has been extremely instructive; I'm sold on the system. Now if I only had some money...

 

[Wayne]

Here is some more instruction: Dont assume if you take a loaded, half exposed cassette out of one back and put it inside another that your frame count will remain
unscathed. It won't, a I just found out. At least not in the early Pro backs. (I guess opening the back resets it??) Not a big deal for me as I only want to do a couple practice exposures to finish the roll anyway, and I can still do that by guessing.

And you don't need much money if you are patient. You should be able to pick up a working camera lens and back for a couple hundred or so.

 

[Wayne]

BTW, take a look at this link showing all the seals (from the page posted by CGW above).

http://aki-asahi.net/store/html/Mamiya-RB67/light-seal/001_b.html

The upper left photo shows two seals, one at the base of the hinged back and one just below the hinge on the other half of the back. There is no evidence that either of my backs ever had the latter seal, there is simply no foam and no residue of any having been there. Since these two would press against each other when the back is closed, that makes the second one completely unnecessary IMO. I'm curious what other people's backs look like. Maybe that is a later back version than mine?

 

[CGW]

BTW, take a look at this link showing all the seals (from the page posted by CGW above).

http://aki-asahi.net/store/html/Mamiya-RB67/light-seal/001_b.html

The upper left photo shows two seals, one at the base of the hinged back and one just below the hinge on the other half of the back. There is no evidence that either of my backs ever had the latter seal, there is simply no foam and no residue of any having been there. Since these two would press against each other when the back is closed, that makes the second one completely unnecessary IMO. I'm curious what other people's backs look like. Maybe that is a later back version than mine?

I have two Pro S backs and both had only a single seal. Suspect the back pictured, judging from the old-style RB surface and seals, is an early Pro back.

 

[Wayne]

I have 2 Pro backs. I think the person making the kit just thought one should go there, and was wrong. Not that it'll do any harm except maybe make the back harder to close.

Of course the deeper I get into this the more I realize how bad most of the seals are. I've now replaced everything in the backs, and where the back seats on the camera. Now I discover that the mirror foam is starting to fall apart too, the two long tapered strips. Fortunately the other one along the lower back edge looks good. That is a different kind of foam though. Has anyone used the same kind of foam as for the other seals, or must I get the right stuff to protect my mirror?
I've just got the craft store foam which has worked beautifully so far, but the mirror foam is fluffier and lighter.

 

[Wayne]

OK, found my answer. Jon Goodman says to use 1.5-2mm foam for the mirror, which is exactly what I already have. Presumably today's denser foam works as well as yesterday's fluffy foam. It may have been posted already in this thread but here's his instructions

http://www.kyphoto.com/classics/seal/RB67_FilmBack.pdf

 

[CGW]

Happy to hear you licked the "Fear Factor" and bulled ahead with the job. The backs and adapters are really very straightforward. The body innards are a bit trickier but--with some patience and online resources--still within the realm of DIY. They're great cameras that deserve a little TLC.

 

[Wayne]

Well I've still got leaks. I had removed the carrier and film while I sealed the shell and the back of the RB (unlike the one shown in Goodman's pictures, my revolving back has no seals except the two strips where the film back meets it). Then I shot the rest of the roll. The dark transverse line is now gone, but there is still fogging
from one end of the film to the other.



It's fogged from the lower edge of the film, below the image area, about 7/8 of the way up to the top edge. The top edge is clear, and it is less fogged outside the frame area even on the lower edge, which leads me to think its the dark slide seal. I took apart the dark slide part of the back and the fabric seal looked like it was worn unevenly, with a chance for leakage from the middle toward the top edge, which would be the bottom of the image area. I'm going to go look at sticky felt at the craft store but don't know if it will be suitable or not...

 

[CGW]

Well I've still got leaks. I had removed the carrier and film while I sealed the shell and the back of the RB (unlike the one shown in Goodman's pictures, my revolving back has no seals except the two strips where the film back meets it). Then I shot the rest of the roll. The dark transverse line is now gone, but there is still fogging
from one end of the film to the other.

View attachment 43507

It's fogged from the lower edge of the film, below the image area, about 7/8 of the way up to the top edge. The top edge is clear, and it is less fogged outside the frame area even on the lower edge, which leads me to think its the dark slide seal. I took apart the dark slide part of the back and the fabric seal looked like it was worn unevenly, with a chance for leakage from the middle toward the top edge, which would be the bottom of the image area. I'm going to go look at sticky felt at the craft store but don't know if it will be suitable or not...

Hold it. You can remove the whole back. You can't just pop open the back and remove a loaded film insert(the part with the rollers and advance crank) without fogging and/or lost frames--unless you're in total darkness. Is that what you did???

Adhesive backed felt would work--if it fits--since it will resist abrasion better than foam.

 

[Wayne]

Yeah, I removed the cassette/carrier in the dark and stored it inside my other back, which I had already replaced the perimeter seals on. Then when I had replaced the seals on the first back, I put the cassete and film back into it in the dark. I did this because it was the only roll I had and it was half explosed when I developed the first roll and discovered all the leaks. But I didn't want to waste the entire roll I figured I'd use it to test my initial sealing efforts. And it worked for that.


I'll let you know how the felt journey works out....there is the chance that the seals around the pressure plate on the casette are part of the problem, as those I could not replace while film was in there, and they are definitely bad...

 

[Wayne]

The film hasn't dried yet but it looks like success! So now you know what a bad dark slide seal looks like, and bad back hinge/lock seal looks too. Everything looks pretty clean now. Thanks! It cost me under $2.00 for the foam and felt. I cut the foam and felt on my paper cutter to get nice even slices. Time to test the other back now. And I still have to deal with the mirror, but its not leaking quite yet. Now I can take pictures!!

 

[Wayne]

Hmm. I've still got something going on. I don't see any fogging per se, no silver/gray/black, but there is still a faint purple density that goes from the bottom up to about 1/2 inch from the top edge. It looks much like the photo in post 208 above, but very faint, and only pinky-purple. Maybe it's a developing issue, but I'm not sure why it wouldn't go edge to edge if it was. I've been using a pre-rinse for 1-2 minutes and fixing in plain sulfite-hypo fix for 5-6 minutes, in a plastic Yankee tank. The tint doesn't bother me-the fact that it's not uniform across the film does...

 

[TheFlyingCamera]

The pink tint suggests insufficient fixing - maybe you didn't use enough fixer to completely immerse the film. Either that or else your agitation technique did not circulate the fixer enough.

 

[landscapepics]

I have an RZ67, which is a more battery-dependent successor to the RZ. I like it a lot, but if I already had a 4*5, I'd be more tempted to get a roll-film back for the 4*5 to combine the advantages of movements with the relative economy of 120 film.

 

[Wayne]

The pink tint suggests insufficient fixing - maybe you didn't use enough fixer to completely immerse the film. Either that or else your agitation technique did not circulate the fixer enough.

This has me thinking about the previous rolls I developed where there was obvious silver in the area that is now just pink. Those rolls also had a clear area with no silver or pink, which might be from uneven fixing at the bottom or top of the tank. When I went to develop my most recent roll that showed pink but no silver, I realized I had used only 50% of the correct amount of hypo in the fix. I used the correct amount (about 1:4 by volume) on that last roll. I don't usually use plain fix on film, but I'm too poor to buy rapid fix. I've been agitating for 30 seconds initially and 5 seconds every 30 seconds.

 

[Wayne]

I have an RZ67, which is a more battery-dependent successor to the RZ. I like it a lot, but if I already had a 4*5, I'd be more tempted to get a roll-film back for the 4*5 to combine the advantages of movements with the relative economy of 120 film.

I'm still in the early phases of learning where and when the RB can do what I want to do. You're onto something though, there have already been times when I wished I had movements of my LF cameras. I think its safe to say I've taken them for granted, because they have always been there for the last 30 years. But there may be a place for the RB, I just need to shoot more to find out what it is. I may end up going the way you suggest, way too early to say. Its a fun camera so far.

 

[Wayne]

are any RB67 shutters interchangeable with more than the exact focal length they come with, or is each shutter assembly unique to one and only one focal length?

 

[keithwms]

It's very difficult to remove the shutter from an RB lens. I tried. Very hard! You don't want to try interchanging Well.... I did think about trying that operation for the RZ 110 lens but never got around to it.

APUG member Erie Patsellis has done all manner of adaptations of RB lenses to 4x5 and so forth. I am low tech, I just slap an RB or RZ lens onto a lensboard and hand shutter it.

 

[Wayne]

Don't the front and rear lens elements just screw in to the shutter?

 

[keithwms]

No.

 

[mablo]

A very informative site about different RB models - rb67.helluin.org - has vanished from the internets. Not even the wayback machine can find it. Maybe it's sitting somewhere with a different URL address? Does someone here know where it might be found or is it gone forever?

 

[Wayne]

No.

My bad. I'm spoiled by Large Format.

A very informative site about different RB models - rb67.helluin.org - has vanished from the internets. Not even the wayback machine can find it. Maybe it's sitting somewhere with a different URL address? Does someone here know where it might be found or is it gone forever?

Google shows it in cache as of Feb 8, so it's probably just down temporarily. The wayback machine never finds anything I ask it to find...