Compatibility with Vivitar non-AI with N70

I just received a gift of a Vivitar 85mm - 205mm Non AI with Nikon mount. I

currently have a Nikon N70 and was wondering what the compatibility would be

with this Vivitar. I am new to photography and don't want to damage the camera

body.

Thanks, Nathan

You obviously won't get autofocus and it probably won't work with the light meter, but it won't do any damage. Any Nikon lens made since the F mount was introduced in the late 1950s will mount and function on any Nikon body -- it's one of the great advantages of Nikon over Canon and other brands. (There are a few oddball super-wide lenses where this doesn't apply, not does it apply to Nikonos underwater lenses or lenses from the rangefinder Nikons of the 1950s.) Even if the metering won't function, it's a digital camera -- you guestimate the exposure, shoot, look at the LCD and fine tune if necessary.

<i>"... but it won't do any damage. Any Nikon lens made since the F mount was introduced in the late 1950s will mount and function on any Nikon body ..."</i><P>

 

Bad advice, and far from correct. If the Vivitar truly is a non-AI lens (many third party mounts are stamped N/AI - which means "Nikon AI", not Non-AI) then you risk damage to the N70 AI coupling tab on your N70 if you mount the lens.

Page 106 of your N70 instruction manual ...<div></div>

! DO NOT MOUNT ON N70 !

It's plain dumb, Craig, to give inaccurate advice hereabouts.I'm assuming your intentions were good but unless you know for certain, don't post.As Michael made clear, you don't know the Nikon system, so don't spread BS, OK?

Thank you all very much. I have definately learned alot by receiving this gift. Anyone looking for a good lens? LOL

You should be able to get the lens converted to AI very inexpensively. Two fellows who still do this are John White,

 

http://www.aiconversions.com/ ;

 

and William Sampson

 

http://hometown.aol.com/wdshpbiz/AImod.html

 

The lens would still not provide metering information when mounted on a D70, but otherwise it would be compatible with your camera.

If the title and original post is correct, Nathan is asking about compatibility with a <b><u>N</u></b>70 (film SLR). Once converted to AI, it would meter and function in A and M modes on the N70.

You are correct Michael. I may not have communicated clearly. I am trying to get the Vivitar lens to fit on a Nikon N70 (film). Thank you for the clarification.

Mea Culpa. I did not read the original post correctly; I guess I have digital SLR's on the brain. So I became the second person in the thread to provide "bad information." Yikes. But at least I provided some good information, too (i.e., the website of the people who can AI convert an older lens.)

 

I do wonder: Nathan terms his lens "Non-AI." Is there actually a metering prong on the lens, indicated it's non-AI, or is he reading a notation on the mount that says, "N/AI?" If it's the latter, his lens is indeed AI and will meter with his N70 without alteration.

Whether or not there is a "prong" for use on old pre-AI cameras

doesn't tell you if the lens is AI or not. Most AI lenses have

these prongs, for backwards compatibility. You need to look at

the ring around the lens mount. If it's complete, it's a non-AI

lens. If it has various indentations, it's AI. Also, an original

AI lens will have holes in the two halves of the prong (to let light

in so the f-stop can be viewed through the viewfinder). But a

non-AI lens that has been converted to AI might not have these holes.

 

Or you can carefully attempt to mount it, looking to see whether

it interferes with either of the two tabs on the camera, and not

exerting any force, of course.