Thinking of buying a Bronica ETRS or ETRSI

What should I look for? I see that there seems to be two series of lenses the MC & the PE. What's the difference (other than age)?

Any Bronica advice is appreciated.

Steve

Actually three types of lenses at least.

IIRC

First came the MC.
Later some lens were "upgraded" to type II lenses. Some of these lenses are labeled II not all are. I think it's called II
Then last came the PE. The PE can be controlled more by the camera when in shutter priority mode with the AEIII finder. This I think lets the camera set the F/stop in between full stops. I never use this mode some I'm not 100% sure. Plus they were supposedly tweaked to be better. OTOH Late build IIs were supposedly the same lenses optically. In addition some lenses changed during production of the same series. For example the 150mm started out early on being a F/4 lens. Only the very early models are F/4. Later on they became F/3.5. Lenses not labelled MC are actually newer then the ones labelled MC. During the production run they dropped the MC.

Unless you get a great deal get the latest ETRSI over the previous models. You won't save much money going older but you'll give up features. The Tamron website under the archives lists the changes.

http://www.tamron.com/bronica/etr_guide.asp

Just saw this one, lost in the wrong category. You may want to look - seems like it will go at a decent price.

Truth that's actually already higher then you'd pay from say KEH. Go over to KEH and price the parts out. Looks to me not much over $300 for what's in that auction.

Go with the Bronica ETRSi and PE lenses they were Bronicas latest improvement. Purchase from Keh, I find their rating pretty accurate and sometimes better than what rate them.

KEH was the way I'm going.

Are there any particular lenses to avoid?

Steve

All the PE lenses are excellent. It will depend what the lens will be used for. Look for their zoom lenses on Keh. If I am correct they were made by Schneider

magic823 said:

What should I look for? Any Bronica advice
is appreciated.
Steve

Click to expand...

I've found Bronica's rotary finder to be superb.
I wouldn't be without it. I added an new screen.
That and the bright, sharp rotary make viewing a
pleasure. Now my flip-the-camera system works.

Of course a square format need not be flipped, can
be a lighter carry, and quicker to use. Dan

magic823 said:

What should I look for? I see that there seems to be two series of lenses the MC & the PE. What's the difference (other than age)?

Any Bronica advice is appreciated.

Steve

Click to expand...

Why not consider a Bronica GS-1? You'll be able to use 645 6x6 or 6x7 backs on it. You will probably come to appreciate the 6x7 negative size and the cost for a used GS-1 set-up is about the same as the ETRS.

I use my ETRS fully manual, never have got around to getting a metering prism. I do have a "simple" prism finder though - it makes it a lot easier to shoot in portrait mode. And since portraits is what I did with it for several years, it was great.

My 75 and 150mm are "E", the 40mm is "PE". The main difference is that the PE allows setting the aperture at half stops - in manual mode too. I actally bought th 40mm new, since the price difference (at that time) between new and used was so small that I decided a new lens was worth the little extra. All the lenses are excellent.