Topic: Any RF Gurus in the house?

[SLVR]

Sorry to be making so many threads lately. Heres my predicament. I got my Yashica Electro 35 GT with a bunch of other cameras in my "big score" thread. I was weary about picking up this yashica though as the RF didnt line up at infinity. Actually, none of the yashicas this guy had (about 5) lined up at infinity. I took the best one and thought maybe i could adjust the rangefinder and without shooting wide open i should be ok. I recently took the yashica out for a test roll yesterday right after i brought it home and cleaned it up. Here were some of the results.


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basically, i was testing for focus especially at infinity. It looked soft in some but sharp in others. Overall though, focus seemed a bit off. I tested the focus by putting some satin scotch tape on the film plane and opening up and camera at bulb and setting it to something at infinity. It looked soft. So i adjusted focus until it looked sharp. I was at around 3m for infinity to be sharp. I took it one step further and cycled through the focus and it looks like the focus at infinity will go out of focus when focussed close, progressively get sharper, hit 3m, then start getting soft again before the lens stops at its mechanical infinity.

Does anyone have any thoughts on this? Is it just that i need to adjust the rangefinder? I have a hard time thinking that will solve the problem. Perhaps the lens was dissasembled and not reassembled correctly? Im at a loss, i really want to shoot with this camera!

[Pete_R]

And the problem is???

Maybe the images aren't big enough but focus looks OK.

If you want help to adjust the focus send me a PM and I'll see if I have some photos showing the adjustment points.

[SLVR]

sorry peter, i accidently hit post rather than preview! i was trying to get the links to my originals posted. You should check the originals. You can clearly see that the focus at infinity is soft. It doesnt help that shrinking the images sharpens them up.

[DS]

I tested the focus by putting some satin scotch tape on the film plane and opening up and camera at bulb and setting it to something at infinity. It looked soft. So i adjusted focus until it looked sharp. I was at around 3m for infinity to be sharp. I took it one step further and cycled through the focus and it looks like the focus at infinity will go out of focus when focussed close, progressively get sharper, hit 3m, then start getting soft again before the lens stops at its mechanical infinity.

Yup- Not familiar with Yashicas- but from my partially successful experience of camera butchery (Konicas and Zorkis yes, Olympuses still in little tiny pieces) in general it sounds to me like it's focusing beyond infinity- someone's missed a shim or re-threaded the helicoid at the wrong point, put the lens elements in wrong etc. You may be able to fiddle with the set screw that sets the infinity stop- (don't know if Yashicas work like this...). The good news is it's not out by much. If you adjust anything regarding the lens you'll need to do the RF too. This is helpful for setting infinity etc: http://elekm.net/zeiss-ikon/repair/collimate/

[Francois]

Here's another page on how to do a collimation test
http://www.kyphoto.com/classics/collimator.html

[SLVR]

Well I feel rather foolish. I posted the same question on RangefinderForum and a member suggested i retest with ground glass. Sure enough, everything tested properly as far as the focussing past infinity. All that was needed was to adjust the rangefinder. I did so, so hopefully focus is more correct! Will post up results.

It looks like the vertical offset is a little off though.

[SLVR]

Hey all, not sure whos still checking in on this thread but id love to proudly annouce that ive fixed the problem! Pictures are sharp and focus is spot on! I cant wait to get a serious roll of film through this camera. (up until now its just been freebie kodak gold and superia).

I ended up having to readjust the rangefinder. I got told on rangefinderforum that its very rare that the lens actually goes out of wack how i described. Sure enough with my glass test it's true. I tweaked the rangefinder a la yashica guy's instructions and viola! Everything lines up perfectly now! Will post up some of the test shots i took!

[SLVR]

Infinity looks good now!