Super Regent teardown

Hello all.

 

I have an Agfa/Ansco Super Regent with the Synchro Compur and f3.5

Solinar that I need to clean. It's going to have to be the works

since there is a little bit wrong with everything. Slow speeds stick,

focus stiff enough to peel the hide off my fingers and rangefinder

linkage sticks. Does anyone here know of a site with disassembly

instructions or drawings? I'm not too worried when I need to clean

the elements on a triplet, or free up a simple shutter on one of my

folders, but this is different, and I don't want to go into it without

some kind of reference.

 

Thanks

 

Dean

Vice grips on the focus ring. That'll save your fingers.

Until Rick or Winfred show up, I can get you started with the lens removal.

 

The front cell is easily removed with a modified Staedler drafting compass that has TWO metal needles installed. There are two pin holes on the front lens surround. One in between the little a in Agfa and the S in Solinar. The second pin holed should be near the start of the serial number. Rotate CCW and the front assembly should come out easily.

 

The rear doublet requires a lens spanner. I modified one so that the slots are now a little less than 1/8th inch wide. I do the removal of the rear doublet through the film gate, which is a tight fit.

 

Once the lens elements are safely put away. Then you can go ahead and remove the shutter assembly by loosening the retaining ring. Do note that this is even a tighter fit through the film gate.

 

You'll also probably need to clean up the viewfinder and adjust the RF before you are through.

 

Good luck on this.

Gene: Thanks. I was having a devil of a time keeping a pipe wrench on that thing. Vice grips sound like just the ticket.

 

Andrew: Thanks for writing about this. Does the rear element set need to come out before the shutter retaining ring is loosened? I just wonder because it looks like it will be eaiser to remove the rear elements once the shutter is removed and in hand. Also, there appear to be three spanner nuts (retaining rings) in there. The one for the rear elements, about 1/2 in across, a middle one which I assume is for the shutter, and one that appears to ride on the focusing threads, which is the larger of the three. Is this middle one actually for the shutter assy? I'm just being cautious, I don't want to foul this up.

To get things started, drip a SMALL amount of acetone (two drops should be plenty) just in front of the serrated focusing wheel. That will loosen the threads. Eventually, you'll want to disassemble the helicals entirely, remove all of the old crud and regrease.

 

Be careful with acetone, as it can permanently misshape certain types of plastic. Lay down several sheets of folded newspaper or some paper towels.

 

In the absence of a spanner wrench, the directions above work well to remove the face ring.

I have no experience with the Super-Isolette. You can check Dan Mitchell's fabulous site for fixing the Compur shutter:

 

www.daniel.mitchell.name

 

Compur shutters need several adjustments if you remove the speed gears. Leaving them in place and washing them there isn't a good alternative since the shutter bottom has large cutouts under the speed gears and the dissolved grease may easily get on the blades.

 

To loosen that old Agfa grease I am using a hot air gun. After hours of trying to move Isolette lenses I could unscrew the focussing helicoid after two minutes of warming them up with hot air.

 

All I can say about the rangefinder of the Super Isolette is that they obviously used the same grease for the rangefinder levers. I once found a Isolette III with a completely frozen rangefinder. Disassembled it completely, cleaned all bearings and threads and lubricated with gun oil. Works like a charm now.

Dean, you can leave the rear lens group in place, but what if the spanner slips when removing the CENTER RETAINING RING which holds the shutter in place?

 

Once you have the rear lens group removed, with the focus ring set to INFINITY put a scratch or two across the 3rd/outer slotted ring, which holds the shutter and the outer shell of the helicoid. You'll thank me later for those two scratches.

 

To clear up any confusion, the 35mm Super Regent was the Agfa Super Solinette that was sold in the US wearing an Ansco trademark. It was the 6x6 Agfa Super Isolette that was rebadged as the Super Speedex for distribution by Ansco.

I tried using a heat gun on my last isolette and thought I would

melt the lenses with no luck seperating them. I then took a small

reading lamp and used it to warm the Rosinol fluid. That causes the

fluid to circulate and pass into the threads and in an hour I could

see a collection of green grease in the bottom of my cleaning dish.

a couple hours later I was able to spin them apart. Dont use vise

grips or anything like that, it is too easy to damage the parts or

crack a lens...

I have ben working on a Regent with a stiff (frozen) focussing ring. I tried a small amount of force with waterpump pliers but was afraid of bending the lens support links and pivots. I am looking for or will make an open end wrench to grip the flats on either side of the depth of field scale so that no forces will be transmitted into the links.Now however I think I will try Mike Eleks acetone method first. I don't see any need so far in my case to remove individual lens elements. My Regent has a ring mark on the "made for Ansco - - -" plaque inside the bed, I think from the lens mount so I will always reset the focus to infinity before closing the bed. Good luck.

Mike: The acetone worked to get the focus ring free enough to turn without holding it in a death grip. I'll clean the threads properly once I get the shutter out. Thanks.

 

Winfried: The camera I have here is the American version of the Super Solinette 35mm rangefinder folder. I checked out Dan Mitchell's site last night. He has a lot of info there and it will come in handy when the time comes. Thanks.

 

Andrew: Thanks for clearing up which ring is which. I figure I can slip on either of the rings on the back of the shutter assy, scratching the glass. The first thing I did was to index the inner and outer helicoids to each other. I've made that mistake before. Good advice.

 

Rob: The vice grip thing wasn't serious. Gene was just pulling my leg...I think.

 

I really appreciate everyone for writing about this. Knowing there are folks here willing to help is a confidence builder.

 

Thanks again,

 

Dean