Olympus OM 30 Help (Pics Added 10/02/10)

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cosmix3

David Sullivan
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EDIT: Pics of the camera and lenses added further down.

Hi,

Following on from this thread Linky the same college brought some more toys in for me today the main being an Olympus OM 30 with auto winder and 3 lenses, and lots of other stuff to go through including a massive Sunpak flash (and I mean BIG),

Have a question on the Olympus though, I see there is a slot for some watch type batteries, obviously these are dead, do I need to replace these for the shutter to work, as at the moment it will not even wind on manually (auto winder removed), and the mirror will not go all the way up, or should the shutter/mirror operate correctly without them, from the outside the camera looks great and so want to have a play with it running some film through, any help advise gratefully received.
 
Yes you will require batteries for this camera to work. I'm fairly positive they take 2 LR-44 (1.5 v) type batteries. The camera won't wind on because the shutter is already cocked ready to fire, so once you replace the dead batteries it will fire and the mirror will return to its original position.
 
Carl V said:
Yes you will require batteries for this camera to work. I'm fairly positive they take 2 LR-44 (1.5 v) type batteries. The camera won't wind on because the shutter is already cocked ready to fire, so once you replace the dead batteries it will fire and the mirror will return to its original position.
Click to expand...

Thanks, makes me feel better, means I should be able to play :D

pepper said:
I thought the OM-30 took five batteries?
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From what I see there are about five in the little compartment at the front.
 
If I remember rightly, the OM-30 is the one which had LED's to confirm a subject was in focus. Apart from that I'm sure it was similar to an OM-20, but I must admit it's been well over twenty years ago since I last saw one. I've always been particularly fond of the OM-1 and OM-2, with the former being a mechanical camera.

The Olympus/Zuiko lenses are excellent and have always had a good reputation. Good luck with it, and I hope you enjoy using your camera.
 
I recall that the OM30 took 5x 10L14 batteries, like it's predessors the OM10 and 20 , the 30 had an electronic shutter whitch would not operate unless you put the battries in.

If you turn the dial an the left hand side of the camera, as you look through the viewfinder to the manual setting the camera shutter should 'cock' and fire the maual shutter soeed is 1/60th of a second if I remeber.

The oter news which you might not want to hear is the the 30's had a massive faliure rate due to the design of the shutter which used magnets to release the shutter mecanism.

All of the 10-20-30 family suffered the same difficutties , however a resonably cheap upgrade sorted them out, and it is posible that this service has been done prior to you buying the camera
 
Carl V said:
If I remember rightly, the OM-30 is the one which had LED's to confirm a subject was in focus. Apart from that I'm sure it was similar to an OM-20, but I must admit it's been well over twenty years ago since I last saw one. I've always been particularly fond of the OM-1 and OM-2, with the former being a mechanical camera.

The Olympus/Zuiko lenses are excellent and have always had a good reputation. Good luck with it, and I hope you enjoy using your camera.
Click to expand...

Thanks, looking forward to giving it a play (all being well :D )

Holden Caulfield said:
I recall that the OM30 took 5x 10L14 batteries, like it's predessors the OM10 and 20 , the 30 had an electronic shutter whitch would not operate unless you put the battries in.

If you turn the dial an the left hand side of the camera, as you look through the viewfinder to the manual setting the camera shutter should 'cock' and fire the maual shutter soeed is 1/60th of a second if I remeber.

The oter news which you might not want to hear is the the 30's had a massive faliure rate due to the design of the shutter which used magnets to release the shutter mecanism.

All of the 10-20-30 family suffered the same difficutties , however a resonably cheap upgrade sorted them out, and it is posible that this service has been done prior to you buying the camera
Click to expand...

Thanks, will have a look at that, didnt buy it, was given to me by someone , it belonged to there mothers partner, and when they passed away it came to him and he wanted rid. :)
 
I use an OM10 as my main film SLR, I love the fact that you can buy what was relatively expensive equipment in its day for pennies off ebay.
I bought an OM40 kit the other day just for the lenses motor drive and T32 Flash, it cost me £75 all in, but the only other zoom lens I had seen on the whole of ebay had been £75 on its own. The 50mm standard lens was in far better condition than my own rather used example, so I'll pop that back on ebay and recover some of the money from the sale.

I've now passed my T20 flash down to my son and he's using it on an old OM101. I have an OM1n but it uses the older style mercury batteries and is far too nice to be using every day.


I think Holden's nearly right about the shutter firing, it will wind on and it will lift the mirror but they won't fire the actual shutter without there being batteries in there!

Annoyingly I gave my OM30 away to a friend so I can't check for you, so I only have the OM40 here to check. Without any batteries in it will not fire the shutter at all even on manual.
 
Thanks, doesn't wind at the moment, hoping that is because it is cocked (so to speak) have just given it a quick clean, and am looking to get the bats on Monday if I can, so hope it works, as looking forward to running a roll through it :)

pepper said:
I use an OM10 as my main film SLR, I love the fact that you can buy what was relatively expensive equipment in its day for pennies off ebay.
I bought an OM40 kit the other day just for the lenses motor drive and T32 Flash, it cost me £75 all in, but the only other zoom lens I had seen on the whole of ebay had been £75 on its own. The 50mm standard lens was in far better condition than my own rather used example, so I'll pop that back on ebay and recover some of the money from the sale.

I've now passed my T20 flash down to my son and he's using it on an old OM101. I have an OM1n but it uses the older style mercury batteries and is far too nice to be using every day.


I think Holden's nearly right about the shutter firing, it will wind on and it will lift the mirror but they won't fire the actual shutter without there being batteries in there!

Annoyingly I gave my OM30 away to a friend so I can't check for you, so I only have the OM40 here to check. Without any batteries in it will not fire the shutter at all even on manual.
Click to expand...
 
Well got some Batteries for it today.............








And...................









Shutter fires and it will wind manually, next step, check the auto winder, though not to worried about using that at the moment, then find some time to run some Ilford B&W through it :D

Will get some pics up of it soon, and hopefully some from it.
 
I'm glad to hear the camera is firing OK. Indeed, a nice roll of Ilford film is just what's required. ;)
 
Carl V said:
I'm glad to hear the camera is firing OK. Indeed, a nice roll of Ilford film is just what's required. ;)
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Hoping to find time this week if I can. :D, may run some colour through it as that I could get developed local on an hour service, will tell me if all is OK.

pepper said:
Sounds great, is the meter working fine too?

Can't wait to see the pictures!
Click to expand...


It looks to work, it lights up in the view finder, how acurate I am yet to find out, plan on checking it against the DSLR to see how close they are to each other, then it will be a case of seeing how it comes out.
 
Pics of the new toys :D

IMG_2762.jpg


IMG_2764.jpg


IMG_2766.jpg


IMG_2767.jpg
 
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