Which Leica LTM's have ball bearing shutters?

[wdavidprice]

I've read some conflicting references about which LTM's have ball

bearing shutters. Some clarification would be appreciated. Also, are

the ball bearing shutters that much quieter that the regular ones?

What are the other advantages?

[jerry_lehrer]

W.-- TTBOMK, ball bearing shutters were introduced during WW2. Cameras with that feature had their serial number suffixed with a "K". After the war, all Leica thread mount cameras had partial ball bearing shutters.

[al_kaplan1]

They're less dependant on lubricants than those without the ball bearings for accurate speeds. I've read that the "K" meant "kalt", German for cold. The IIIC-K was made for the Luftwaffe, the German air force, during WW-II and had grey enamel and grey vulcanite. Planes in those days were mostly unheated and not pressurized. The F and G series, made after the war, all had ball bearings.

[wdavidprice]

Al...did the post war C's have the ball bearings?

[al_kaplan1]

David, somebody else is going to have to chime in with the answer to that one. I'm not sure what the answer is. In reallty it shouldn't matter all that much unless you're out in some real cold, and today's lubricants are much less likely to thicken in the cold, no different than today's multi-viscosity motor oil for your car's engine.

[Rob F.]

According to what I've read, the "K" stands for "Kugellager" (I may not have spelled it right). While this may sound like a brand of German beer, it refers to the ball-bearing equipped IIIc. There should be a "K" stamped on the shutter curtain.

[jerry_lehrer]

W.David,-- The post-war IIIc cameras and on had a "half-ball" bearing shutter.

[eliot_rosen1]

The most popular theory is that the K stands for "Kugellager" (ball bearing) as noted above. During WWII, the IIIcK cameras had ball-bearing shutters that could withstand colder temperatures than the non-K models, as Al states. These cameras had "K" right after the serial number. They also had "K" stamped in white (occasionally in red) on the shutter curtain. Occasionally, there was the "K" on the shutter but not after the serial number.

 

These shutters sounded a little different from the non-K shutters. But if there is any doubt (eg., if the original shutter curtain with the K was replaced), any competent repair person could tell if the camera has a K-type shutter.

 

Most of these cameras were sent to the military. However, there were some civilian IIIcK gray paint or chrome cameras that turn up from time to time.

[shah_vittapuras]

I know there was a significant (at least to us minutae men)shutter change involving a ball-bearing with the IIIf Red Dial. In my experience I haven't seen any difference in precision, reliability or accuracy between the III, IIIc, IIIf-BD and IIIf-RD shutters, although paradoxically the pre-war shutter curtains seem to have held up better in general than the post-war, yet interestingly the M3 and M2 curtains seem to have held up better than the IIIf-RD and IIIg which was produced during the same period.

[alex_lofquist]

I believe that any Leica with a slow speed dial that begins at 30 (1/30th sec) has ball bearing shutter curtains. This would be IIIc and up.

[dan flanders]

Despite the fact that there are two versions of the IIIc, they appear to be in reality two different designs. The first and wartime version had the extra step under the rewind lever (as did the rare IIId) and according to some authorities all had "K" type shutters irrespective of their serial # or other markings. The later IIIc's without the step are supposed to have the "half" ball bearing shutters as did its successors. Of course, just about everyone who has disassembled a IIIc and managed to get it back to gether successfully is prone to consider himself an "authority"! I would be inclined to accept Jim Lager's analysis if I knew what it was.

[eliot_rosen1]

"and according to some authorities all had "K" type shutters irrespective of their serial # or other markings."

 

I'm not aware of this. According to Lager, the IIIcK were different from the other wartime IIIc's in the manner I described. He classifies them as a separate and distinct type of IIIc. If not why the designation "K"? Who is it that says all wartime IIIc's have K-type shutters?

[adrian bastin]

Did the 'K' cameras not have all ball shutter bearings? But it was found to be sufficient to have a mixture of ball and needle bearings, which all models had thereafter. I've only read this. What did pre war Cs have, plain bearings ?

 

Adrian.

[adrian bastin]

Oh, I suppose, needle bearings.

[dan flanders]

Eliot: I am in no position to cite "authorities", and even those that are accepted among the collecting fraternity are not generally known to the miriads of users. The only early IIIc's I have owned all had the step under the rewind lever as well as the "K" on the shutter curtain. That was many years ago and though I feel my memory is correct I am not positive regarding the markings adjacent to the serial nos. I was trading a lot then and many cameras I kept only long enough to sell at a profit and none were the grey paint variety which were then generally referred to as "Luftwaffe" models, a distinction which has since been discredited. However, it was also generally believed that the reason for the lengthening of the body of the IIIc was that it was necessitated by the ball bearing shutter and the self timer that distinguished the IIId. Most of the IIIc's in circulation then were war wearies and I doubt that we saw any authentic "pre-war" models, and it was only in the seventies that many of us began to realize there were two distinct configurations of the IIIc. Remember, in those days before the collecting mania began to accellerate there was very little solid data until Lager and Van Haesbrook(?) came along. Much of what is now accepted as fact has only come to light in the past twenty or so years due to Lager's persistence. My previous post was typed rather cursorily and possibly reflects assumptions gathered over the years rather than any currently accepted fact.

[tod_hart]

Without claiming any expert status, I can only relate what I've seen and held in my own hands. An Aunt had a very late war-time IIIc, with a serial number just over 391,000, which I think would mean it was made in 1944 or 1945. It had no "K" in the serial number, no special engravings and outwardly appeared to be a normal chrome IIIc of war-time/pre-war vintage. But when you removed the lens, there was a white "K" on the shutter curtain. Maybe it was one that was meant for military use but never got into the right batch. Maybe it was one that they just grabbed an available K shutter when they were assembling it.

 

I'd not be surprised that in the immediate post war cameras you might find individual cameras with lots of little oddities as they were trying to resume normal production and due to shortages had to use left over war time parts.

[jtk]

OT, sort of...I had a pair of IIF and IIIF "winterized" years ago by Adolph Gasser in San Francisco...they'd stopped functioning in the Sierras the winter before and I didn't want that to happen again. I was given three choices: original whale oil (yes), a new Dow synthetic sample they'd obtained, or no lube at all. I opted for no lube (included excellent shutter timing etc). Unlubed, they were noisy (for Leicas, anyway).

 

Then I decided to screw up: I put each camera in a plastic bag in the freezer of my refrigerator, left them 24 hrs, removed them and immediately shot film. Beautiful! I felt confident. A week later, in the middle of New Mexico desert somewhere, sub freezing, neither camera operated. I got a motel room, opened them up (using pocket knife blade as a screwdriver)...rust! Rust from the refrigerator's condensation! So I brushed them down with a toothbrush, reassembled them, operated them 500 times each (drank a little Early Times in the process): the speeds came back nicely, proven by a bunch of Kodachrome. Wish I still had those cameras.