My new toy

[Dudie]

Just finished resurrecting my Dad's old Canonet QL25 rangefinder. He acquired this during the late 60's when he took his Ilford something-or-other in for repair at a local shop and they gave him this to tide him over. The shop then promptly closed down leaving my dad with a slightly better camera than he started with . After seeing active service during the 70's, while my sister and I were kids, it was put away in a cupboard where it remained until last week. I have spent the last week freeing up the shutter and aperture blades, as well as repairing the shutter cocking mechanism and replacing the aperture return spring with a beafier one modified from a floppy disk! Viewfinder has been cleaned and is nice and bright, a new battery has been ordered for the meter and a film has just been loaded! Dunno what state the lights seals are in though. They appear to be OK, but time will tell.

Should be fun.

 

[slightlytriangle]

Nice!

I know much less than I'd like to know about older cameras at the moment, so have to content myself by viewing them from a novice point of view, hehe.

 

[Dudie]

Tell me about it! I've learnt a lot this last week. Particularly in regards to how a Canonet QL25 lens is disassembled and reassembled. I reckon I could do it blindfold now

 

[feeb]

mmmmm classic camera porn

 

[onefunkypenguin]

that's a good looking camera, get some film in it pronto!

 

[Dudie]

Film was loaded this morning. Various no doubt badly exposed shots already taken, using an approximation of the sunny 16 rule to set exposure. I was too impatient to wait for the battery to turn up to fire up the metering. Should be here tomorrow though, so then I can b****r up my shots properly instead of just guessing. Feels great to use - reassuringly solid and mechanical. Just hoping that the aperture blades stay freed up as it took 4 nights of repeated gentle swabbing to get them moving consistently smoothly. Otherwise it will be my experiment into the world of fixed f16 photography......

 

[Blapto]

Looks like you've done an impressive job of cleaning it up!

Have fun with it.