Polaroid 355 Restoration

stevelmx5

stevelmx5

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Hi all,

I've been reading up on the conversion to shoot FP100C in my Polaroid 350/355 and most posts I've found have suggested removing the tensioning spring from the rear door that presses down on the film back due to the Fuji packs being plastic instead of metal. The original tension can apparently cause issues removing the shots because it's too tight so can cause rips.

However, I've also seen a post today suggesting that it's left in place but held away from the pack slightly with a Bobby pin so it still adds some tension to retain the focus plane?

Has anyone shot FP100C in these with success?

Cheers
Steve
 
I use FP-100c regularly in my 320 and it's fine. No modifications as far as I'm aware. I'm not sure how the 320 differs from the 350 though.
 
Thanks Gaz. I'll just give it a clean up and re-paint a few bit that have been tarnished and try it out.
 
It's alive :0)

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The 3xAAA holder fits nicely in the Battery section after removing the original plastic battery cage. Checked the shutter and it's responding well to light and covering the sensor on the front so now it's time to shrink wrap the solder joint and give the camera a clean.
 
Quite a bit of the interior metal was tarnished/surface rusted so it must have spent some of its life in a damp loft. Whilst everything functions ok now I've cleaned the rollers it looked pretty horrible so I've just used a Dremel/sandpaper to remove the surface rust and then re-painted the interior parts with black enamel paint.

Looks a lot nicer now although the exterior has some tarnishing too which I will need to sort out. I'm thinking about possibly wrapping the external body although I'm not sure what with yet, that's a job for after the Lakes meet :0)

ImageUploadedByTalk Photography Forums1444132021.988206.jpg

ImageUploadedByTalk Photography Forums1444132032.480964.jpg

Just need to fit a couple of seal strips to replace the dusty remnants I removed from behind the spring inside the main body and it's good to go.
 
Another humungous beast! I guess if you're effectively shooting the print, it's got to be large.

That's the coolest variant of a zone focusing system I've seen!
 
Yeah, it's not exactly tiny although it looks like a compact compared to the 110A! I couldn't figure out the focussing at first and had to resort to......a manual [emoji15] Turns outs it's pretty mechanical like most things Polaroid and you just push the metal tab with the three zones printed on it to the left for wide and push an alternate tab on the other side to the right for close focussing.
 
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.I had one of these for a while, could never get it to work well with the Fuji packs, probably operator error.:crying:
 
Spurred on by this I'm going to take the 320 out tomorrow instead of the Leica!
 
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I was happy with that. First shot of FP100C I've ever taken and also first with the 355. Could have done with being a stop lighter but I'll take some more tomorrow morning. We're all in the pub at the moment so too dark for the Fuji film :0)
 
I've got a 420 and the images I get are a bit soft - I think i just need to get use to the focusing and find its sweet spot.
 
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