Fed Upski Downski Mountski

[Vido]

Is there anyone else experiencing the enchantment of having all their lenses mount upside down on a Fed?

I have a Fed 1 and a 2, (sounds like Liberace) 😛 and both mount my LTM's upside down. One Fed has an extra machined recess to turn it 90-degrees, but that just makes things worse to where I really can't remember or find the red dot. No mirror jokes, please.

I've resorted to having yet another recess machined (nail file, actually) so that I can make some sense of my work, as my images all appear to be upside down, too, when I look at them in printed form. 😱

 

[cmedin]

Have you considered that the Feds might be right, and all your lenses and other cameras wrong?

 

[Vido]

Such a nice forum and all I get are trolls.

 

[erikhaugsby]

My guess is that your cameras went through CLAs (or the guy who made it was very drunk) and had the lens mount put on upside down, causing the threads (and therefore mounted lenses) to be off by 180 degrees.
A simple fix would be to unscrew the mount on the body and just rotate it 180 degrees, making sure not to misplace the shims.

 

[FrankS]

Best thread title yet.

 

[acheyj]

Now I am learning a lot from this forum, I see the answers to this problem and it makes sense (didnt know u cud smoke purple drapes ! tried it, its GOOOD).
BUT
The finished print being upside down has been a common problem for view camera photographers for years. I tried mounting my view camera upside down to cure the problem, in the end I had to change all my mounted frames 180 deg. Thats why I changed to rangefinders.
Many thanks for the thread guys, great stuff.

ron

 

[ZorkiKat]

Unlike Leica, Canon and other non-FSU Leica derivations, the thread mounts on FED are not milled the same way. The starting and ending points are not in the same place- thus when you mount a Leica, Canon, or even some FSU Jupiters with the 'properly' oriented mounts, the lens will mount with what supposed to be on top stopping at the sides, or worse, at the bottom.

It also happens with Zorki. Some cameras in the late FED-1 range, as well as some Zorki happen to be consistent with their mounts' thread entry points. LTM lenses would mount right.

The worst offenders are the early FED cameras. Lenses other than the ones they came with would mount 'wrong'. An Industar-10 from another FED may mount on another FED with its focusing tab stopping right in front of the RF/VF ports.

Some more issues with early FED: aside from slightly different thread pitch (this can chew up the thread of other LTM lenses with the "correct" pitch), there is also the focus register issues. Many of the earlier FED left the factory calibrated only for the lens they were given. Often this lens would require that the rangefinder be coupled for it alone. Other lenses mounted on a camera calibrated this way would focus incorrectly.

Jay

 

[ZorkiKat]

My guess is that your cameras went through CLAs (or the guy who made it was very drunk) and had the lens mount put on upside down, causing the threads (and therefore mounted lenses) to be off by 180 degrees.
A simple fix would be to unscrew the mount on the body and just rotate it 180 degrees, making sure not to misplace the shims.

This may happen, but it's not usually the case. A misaligned or incorrectly attached mount flange would be easy to spot. When the mount is incorrectly attached, the top part would bulge slightly because a non-milled part will push against the top plate. Simply rotating the mount without modifying it would make things worse. I have a couple of FED-1 whose mount were re-oriented, but the back parts on these were milled to allow proper installation.


The mounts on the FED-1 for instance, may look perfectly round when seen from the front, but looks differently when viewed from behind. There are milled parts which would easily guide the repairist/tinkerer on the correct way that the mount should go on the camera.



It is just that the threads were not milled the same way. Threads not just on the mount flange, but on the lens mount as well.

Jay

 

[polaski]

My Fed 1 indeed mounts the CV lenses upside down. Do I care? At the price, it's a bargain.

Besides, I get to compose the picture in different ways.

 

[zhang xk]

Hi, Comrade Jay,

I just saw one of your photos on a big Chinese site. A girl image shot with a J-9. Very nice.😀 They say that professionals also use Jupiter-9s. It is a serious lens.

Cheers,

Zhang

 

[ZorkiKat]

Hi, Comrade Jay,

I just saw one of your photos on a big Chinese site. A girl image shot with a J-9. Very nice.😀 They say that professionals also use Jupiter-9s. It is a serious lens.

Cheers,

Zhang

Hi Comrade Zhang


Which site is this? Would you have the URL? I would like to see it. 🙂
Jay

 

[zhang xk]

Hi Comrade Zhang


Which site is this? Would you have the URL? I would like to see it. 🙂
Jay

Hi Jay,

Here is a link to the page. Stroll down you will see the image.😀

http://forum.xitek.com/showthread.php?threadid=42017

 

[dee]

Buy a Fed and get mounting problems ?

deemented as ever