Space Pilot

 Well, I ran a film through the old FED 5V and got to know it a lot better. The film of choice was Kosmo Foto Mono, a nice 100 ISO black and white film with an appropriate Soviet aesthetic. I developed this with Ultrafin at 20°C, with a 10+1 dilution for 6 minutes. I add this detail because Kosmo Foto films aren't listed on the  Massive Dev Chart Film Development  pages. So what were the results? Well I had some difficulty actually passing the film through the camera. At first there was no movement on the film counter and the odd fairly chunky film advance but this got easier with use. I think this camera has been in a drawer or an attic for a couple of decades and it is needing to work out some solidifying lubricants. I think sitting and winding and firing this for a few hours before I put in another film will be a good idea. The pictures aren't bad. There were some misfires where the exposure is clearly not good enough but they may reduce after I've worked the stiffness o

 I managed to find another vintage rangefinder, or is it? This one is a FED-5V designed in the 1970s. However it has a very late serial number and may well be one of the last models built in the mid-1990s. Anyway, it all works mechanically and the rangefinder appears to be accurate. So I'm running a film through it to see whether it is light tight and whether the lens is functioning well. I'll post my progress here.

 Oops - looks like I missed posting for the past month. That's because I've been out and about testing and setting up an old 1960s Minolta A5 rangefinder camera. I've had mixed results with rangefinders; a lot of these mid-60s Japanese cameras come with some electronics which means finding replacement batteries and then dealing with shutter mechanisms that are intimately involved with the light meter. No such problems with the Minolta A5 as it has no light meter and no electronics. There isn't a lot of info on this camera online as regards making adjustments to get it ready for photography and there were some issues with aligning the rangefinder mechanism on this one. However the top shell comes off fairly easily (once you remove the film winders and a small screw; make sure you don't lose the shutter button which drops out) and then there is a mini optics bench clearly exposed which holds the main mirror of the rangefinder. There are five screws to play with; two a