stephen_mcateer

That's what's happening here in the UK. Prescient. I sold off all my stuff and went digital, then re-bought it all at inflated prices. I find that I buy stuff, get bored with it and decide to sell it. Usually I break even or make a small profit. Just not so sure about that being the case in future.

@c_watson1 I have a few film cameras in good condition,but I only really need two. The others are useful now and again but I don't often use them. Just wondering whether or not to hang onto them. On the one hand, they're not making them any more, so you would expect prices to go up. On the other, there's an ever-diminishing number of people to repair and service them, so maybe there'll be decreasing demand…

I think the vendor said it had come out of a storage unit, so anything's possible.

I see that Newton Ellis in Liverpool are shutting shop this summer. They are perhaps the best-known repairers of analogue cameras in the UK. As the number of service and repair shops dwindles over the coming years, I wonder if the value of medium-format film cameras will go up or down? And what do we do with cameras that need repair?

@orsetto Thanks for that information. I decided to pass on this finder, and instead bought a Mamiya 330 F in poor condition, but which was bundled with a prism in nice condition. [I re-sold the 330 F the following day.] So I now have a proper prism finder for my 330 Pro. The cost, all-told, was very reasonable. I saw lots of Porro finders, which are much cheaper but I did some research and found out what you describe here: the image is smaller and dimmer than the prism. Cheers.

@John Seaman Thanks John. I decided to pass on this one as it looks to be beyond repair. (I see another on elsewhere that I may bid on though...)

I'm looking at a Mamiya prism on eBay. The prism looks to have suffered some sort of degradation but I'm not sure what kind. [See pic.] Just wondering if I could dismantle it and clean it? Thanks for any advice.

@kmac Thanks for those suggestions. There was an increase in resistance at the wind-on lever with the last film I put through it, which was TRI-X. However it was not anything like as bad as the PORTRA 400 that I put through it when I got it back from the repairer. I have another roll of PORTRA 400 in it at the moment, so I think I'll wind this one to just beyond the last frame and see what happens. I can also then remove the film in my dark tent and see how it fares without any film in it at that point, as you suggest. (So two tests for the price of one.) I'll update this thread once I have this information. Cheers.

Thanks for those suggestions KMAC. The repairer is in Liverpool, about 200 miles away, so it's not really practical to drive there. You could be right in saying that they might have damaged something while they were repairing the previously 'Lumpy' wind-on. I don't know. "the handle free wheels, but pulls the tail of the backing paper through, with no other mechanism coming into play," — if that's the case, then there is definitely something amiss here. "Can you remember if there was tension on the handle when no film was in the camera" — When the camera is empty, the wind-on lever has almost zero resistance. "check the handle tension after 12," — Good suggestion. It takes me a while to get through a roll, so might be a couple of weeks before I can try this. Cheers.

Thanks Niels. I agree that 0.5mm probably isn't going to make much difference. The roll of TRI-X I test-loaded wasn't too bad as regards the wind-on at the end of the roll. I don't remember how much tension I put on the leader during loading, but I can see that his might affect roll thickness on the take-up side, as you say. I don't know about thickness of the backing paper being different. SInce they're both Kodak films, I would guess they use the same paper stock. I don't know though. I now have some Portra in it. I expect it'll take me a couple of weeks to get through it — I'll update this thread once it's finished. (I was thinking about sending it off to be fixed, but I'm only going to do that i the problem re-appears with this roll.) Cheers.

UPDATE: A roll of TRI-X measures 22.5mm / PORTRA is 23mm.

@kmac Yes — it had occurred to me to put my Vernier caliper on a roll of Tri-X and one of Portra and do a comparison. In fact, I'll do that today and post my findings on here. Cheers.

@Niels - NHSN Thanks Niels. Useful suggestion about keeping / using a test roll. The recent service on this camera was carried out by Newton Ellis in Liverpool. I saw a notice a couple of days ago that they are closing the shop in summer this year, which is a bit of a loss. (They're one of the main analog camera repairers in the UK.) I'll see how this roll of Portra goes through the Rollei and maybe ping them if there's a problem again. I've kept the roll of Tri-X for use to re-test the camera in future. Cheers.

MORE: I put a roll of TRI-X through it and there was slightly more resistance at the end of the roll than there was during shooting, but not as bad as what I experienced with the roll of PORTRA 400. The wind-on was quite acceptable with the TRI-X. I'm going to put another roll of PORTRA in it tomorrow & See how it fares this time.

UPDATE: I spoke to Linhof support and they said expanding the back to 25mm can stress and possibly break the retaining springs. So I think I'll just use the Vario back in Graflok fashion.