OT: Help needed to identify a Robot and a Contax RF

[wolfgang_gressmann]

Two old cameras came into my posession through a friend who

inherited the two from an unfortunately diseased elderly family

member:

 

Contax Rangefinder, Serial No. F 41080

with a Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar 1:2 f=5 cm, Serial No. 1862617 and a

brown leather eveready case, black leather lens cup.

 

Conditon: Looks nice, but shutter won't release (was laying for over

20 years in a bedroom drawer), light meter not working. Lens has

micro cleaning scratches on the front.

 

Link: http://www.photo.net/photodb/folder?folder_id=351184

 

Robot Rangefinder, Serial No. B 43 908-5

with a Carl Zeiss Jena Biotar 1:2 f=4 cm with a brown leather

eveready case, and the two film spools. Lens has minor cleaning

scratches on the front.

 

Condition:

Nice condition, everything seems to work, incl. motor, viewfinder

bright and clear.

 

Link: http://www.photo.net/photodb/folder?folder_id=351196

 

Can anyone of you help me to establish the production date, and the

approximate value of these cameras?

 

Thank you very much in advance for any help!

[derek_stanton2]

Contax III

http://www.ozdoba.net/contax/contax_hist_e.html

[derek_stanton2]

Unfortunately, it's in German, but you might try an online translation:

 

http://www.robot-camera.de/ROBOT_Kameras/robot_kameras.html

 

 

translation:

http://www.freetranslation.com/

 

And, one in English:

http://www16.big.or.jp/~haluox/ROBOT/robot_empire.html

[gary_ferguson1]

The Contax is a pre-war model III, which is less valuable than the post war IIIa. Furthermore the lens is an East German "Jena" which also reduces the price. In the UK there is a trade price guide called "Monark", it quotes a trade purchase price of £70.00 for this camera and a trade retail price (including of course a guarantee) of £160.00. The Ebay price is often somewhere between these two prices, but given the lens scratches and faulty shutter and meter I'd estimate a value of perhaps £50 to £70.

[gary_ferguson1]

I'm no expert on Robots but this looks like it's an early 50's model, either a Robot "Star" (intoduced in 1952) or a Robot "IIa" (introduced in 1951). The other similar model is the "Junior" but that doesn't take the special cassettes you mention. Both are fairly unique in that they produce 24mm x 24mm square negatives. If there's a second, right-angled viewfinder on the side and a rewind lever then it's a Star. Both the Star and the IIa have a trade buying price of £55.00 and a selling price of £100.00.

[furcafe]

Wolfgang:

 

For more information regarding the Contax, you should post your

query to the Zeiss Ikon Collectors Group:

 

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ZICG/

 

For a good summary of the pre-WWII Contaces, take a look @

Stephen Gandy's Cameraquest site:

 

http://cameraquest.com/zconrf2.htm

[connealy]

Might be worth posting this in the Photo.Net <a href="http://www.photo.net/bboard/forum?topic_id=1903">Classic Cameras Forum</a>.

[skip_williams]

The Robot wih the 43xxx Ser# is a Robot II, made in 1942 or 1943. The 1950's IIa's had a double sync plug on the front and the Robot Star was very clearly marked on the front of the camera. It's good to see that you have the cassettes, as without them the camera is pretty much useless. It has no provision for rewinding, as the film is exposed and transferred from one cassette to another. The lens is the standard Biotar that was offered with the camera.

 

Value? Maybe $75-125, if you're lucky. They don't sell to well because they're not very usable, being scale focusers, and requiring hand-loading and developing of the films.

 

Skip

[wolfgang_gressmann]

Thank you all for your most helpful replies!

[edward_zimmermann]

On the Robot II: "<cite>It has no provision for rewinding, as the film is exposed and transferred from one cassette to another.<cite>"

<P>

They actually do have a provision. Its, however, an external box. Its actually quite usable. One has pairs as feed and take-up and when the roll is finished one removes both pairs and installs a new pair (sort of like an Instamatic cartridge without the middle bits). Later (at leisure) one can rewind the film into a standard cassette for drugstore processing (with self-processing one can just load onto a developing spool without even rewinding). Negative format is 24x24mm and that yields a good 50 photos on a typical 36 exposure rolls. Most of the large drugstore film processors with their highly automatic processing streets (in Germany, for example, CeWe) have no trouble printing the format.

<P>

"<cite>They don't sell to well because they're not very usable, being scale focusers,</cite>"

<P>

Zone focusing works well. A lot of wonderful shooters use zone focusing.