M5 Light Leak

[hawkhanlumist]

Hi all,

I am having a recurring light leak with my M5. I searched the forums but couldn't find much previous information on this site. So I started a new thread to countenance opinions/ information.

Does anyone have a sense of what might be going here. I searched for a pinhole in the shutter last night, with no luck yet. This problem only started recently. It doesn't happen with every shot. Only occurs maybe 5-10 shots per roll.

Looking over the negs, it seems more commonly occurring in strong light, but it does happen in soft light too. Also, when I bracket a scene, i'll end up with multiple images with no visible sign of a leak and then one leaked image.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

HKL

 

[Erik van Straten]

Could be a leak in the film chamber. Do you have a 3 lug or a 2 lug M5? If you have a 3 lug, it can be a small leak around the third lug (left when seen from front) or a not perfect screw that holds this lug. The different places of the spot suggest this and also the fact that in fast series you have no problem.


Erik.

 

[davidnewtonguitars]

Start with the easy things. Load a roll of 400, and tape off the back door, on a bright day take a series of shots, note the exposures. Untape the back door in series, note the exposures for each. Tape off the lugs, note the exposures. Tape over the rangefinder window, a known source of leaks. I don't know what else on an M5, tape that off.

Develop the roll and note the exposures where the leak shows and compare it to your "tape log".

 

[Takkun]

Erik's guess seems reasonable. The hard edge on one side suggests its through an opening in the body, shaded off by something blocking its path. Different positions means its likely not the shutter.; i wonder if it's related to the angle of sunlight. Position in the lower left suggests its something in the upper left (seen from the front) of the camera--not much else there besides that third lug.
Wouldn't be the film door unless your baffles are really messed up.

On the other hand, I'm looking into the film chamber of mine, and can't entirely figure out how light could possibly reach from the lug to the film plane. Any screws missing anywhere on the body?

 

[nzeeman]

load color film and you will know if it leaks from front or back.. if its orange color - its back... but im pretty sure its from front and that is made while cocking shutter.. remove the lens and cock slowly and see if curtains stay tight closed or the make little gap.. it happened to me on some of my cameras and i solved by cocking with lens cap on...

 

[hawkhanlumist]

Thanks to everyone who provided suggestions. This was sort of my thinking, too.

I am teaching a workshop this weekend. But I will endeavour to run some test film through the camera as has been suggested, and see what comes back.

I will be sure to keep you all posted, and will likely need more advice/ feedback. 🙂

Thanks.

 

[hawkhanlumist]

load color film and you will know if it leaks from front or back.. if its orange color - its back... but im pretty sure its from front and that is made while cocking shutter.. remove the lens and cock slowly and see if curtains stay tight closed or the make little gap.. it happened to me on some of my cameras and i solved by cocking with lens cap on...

I will give this a shot. Thanks. That sounds frustrating - to cock the shutter with the cap on, that is.

 

[hawkhanlumist]

Could be a leak in the film chamber. Do you have a 3 lug or a 2 lug M5? If you have a 3 lug, it can be a small leak around the third lug (left when seen from front) or a not perfect screw that holds this lug. The different places of the spot suggest this and also the fact that in fast series you have no problem.

Erik.

Hi Erik - Thanks for the reply. It is the third lug version. When you say the third lug - you are referring to the lone lug on the film advance side of the camera (which is not on the 2 lug versions), right?

 

[hawkhanlumist]

Start with the easy things. Load a roll of 400, and tape off the back door, on a bright day take a series of shots, note the exposures. Untape the back door in series, note the exposures for each. Tape off the lugs, note the exposures. Tape over the rangefinder window, a known source of leaks. I don't know what else on an M5, tape that off.

Develop the roll and note the exposures where the leak shows and compare it to your "tape log".

Hi David - Thanks for the reply. Good Idea. Will do.

 

[bobkatz]

Please check if occurs only when the shutter is cocked, and some time passes before you take the photo.
A very, very smaaall pinhole in curtain needs long time for expose the film.
Apologise for my englsh🙁

Regards.

 

[Erik van Straten]

Hi Erik - Thanks for the reply. It is the third lug version. When you say the third lug - you are referring to the lone lug on the film advance side of the camera (which is not on the 2 lug versions), right?

Yeah, sure, on the left side seen from front. Good luck finding the hole.


Erik.

 

[hawkhanlumist]

Erik's guess seems reasonable. The hard edge on one side suggests its through an opening in the body, shaded off by something blocking its path. Different positions means its likely not the shutter.; i wonder if it's related to the angle of sunlight. Position in the lower left suggests its something in the upper left (seen from the front) of the camera--not much else there besides that third lug.
Wouldn't be the film door unless your baffles are really messed up.

On the other hand, I'm looking into the film chamber of mine, and can't entirely figure out how light could possibly reach from the lug to the film plane. Any screws missing anywhere on the body?

Thanks for the reply. As far as I can tell, I can only see one potential screw missing - when you take the base plate of, directly under the lens on the front, there is a screw, and then right next to it, a hole where it look like a screw should be.

Other issues are:

1) The frameline selector no longer clicks to the 35mm unless you pull it to the check battery function.

2) The camera jammed on me a couple of times. It just rewound the film and reloaded and the problem went away. Only happened maybe 5 times over six months.

Other than that, it looks in great condition.

What are the baffles?

HKL.

 

[hawkhanlumist]

Please check if occurs only when the shutter is cocked, and some time passes before you take the photo.
A very, very smaaall pinhole in curtain needs long time for expose the film.
Apologise for my englsh🙁

Regards.

Thanks for the message. And don't worry, I completely understood it.

I have had this thought. I am not sure though. Looking at the negatives, it seems to occur pretty inconsistently. Sometimes it is the first in a series, other times the last. It could be a factor though.

HKL.

 

[j.scooter]

This is the typical M5 light leak.
I had this same pattern with mine.

I sent mine in to Sherry Krauter, she looked for the light leak while she fixed my film finding issues. Not 100% sure she found it as I saw a triangle on 1 frame afterwards but have not seen it since.

If you google "Leica M5 light leak" you will see lots of triangular aberrations.😀

This is one of the top results from the Google search, hopefully there is some info that might be of use to you:
https://www.photo.net/discuss/threads/another-leica-m5-light-leak-puzzle-sorry.432887/

Good Luck and let us know if you figure it out.

 

[hawkhanlumist]

Hi James,

Thanks for the reply and posting an image. I had seen the post you referenced. It seems like it is a recurring issue with the M5, sadly. I have hope that it is fixed. Interestingly, I was in touch with Don today and he advised that he had a similar case a few years back that he couldn't fully fix. He did his best, and it improved to the point that it only showed up in bright light. But he couldn't find the source of it or get it to go away completely. I am going to do my best to try and diagnose the problem first before sending the camera away.

We'll see, I guess.

Thanks again.

 

[hawkhanlumist]

This is the typical M5 light leak.
I had this same pattern with mine.

I sent mine in to Sherry Krauter, she looked for the light leak while she fixed my film finding issues. Not 100% sure she found it as I saw a triangle on 1 frame afterwards but have not seen it since.

If you google "Leica M5 light leak" you will see lots of triangular aberrations.😀

This is one of the top results from the Google search, hopefully there is some info that might be of use to you:
https://www.photo.net/discuss/threads/another-leica-m5-light-leak-puzzle-sorry.432887/

Good Luck and let us know if you figure it out.

HI James -

I was just reading your post again. Did you mean 'film winding' and rather than 'film finding' issues? What were the issues that she was addressing for you? The reason I ask is that I had an issue where the shutter would jam occasionally.

Thanks for any information you might have.

best,

Cal

 

[j.scooter]

Hey Cal
It was supposed to be film winding issues. hahaha

There was a problem with the take-up spool that caused me problems loading film. There were some other issues with the high shutter speeds as well.

If you are also having issues with the shutter jamming, it is probably time to send it in for a CLA. Do you know if it has had service recently? Remember these cameras are coming up on 50 years old.

It is worth the $$ and time having a professional get it back to factory specs rather than chasing down issues and trying to fix them without really knowing what you are doing with the possibility of making things worse.

 

[hawkhanlumist]

Hey Cal
It was supposed to be film winding issues. hahaha

There was a problem with the take-up spool that caused me problems loading film. There were some other issues with the high shutter speeds as well.

If you are also having issues with the shutter jamming, it is probably time to send it in for a CLA. Do you know if it has had service recently? Remember these cameras are coming up on 50 years old.

It is worth the $$ and time having a professional get it back to factory specs rather than chasing down issues and trying to fix them without really knowing what you are doing with the possibility of making things worse.

Hi James

Thanks for the information. It sounds like you were 100% sure what the issue was, but that a general CLA did the trick. Ok. That is useful. Chances are you're right, and that I should put her in for a CLA. Thanks.

I have an inclination to try and get some sort of diagnosis if possible, but I might end up just pulling my hair out.

Thanks


HKL

 

[hawkhanlumist]

load color film and you will know if it leaks from front or back.. if its orange color - its back... but im pretty sure its from front and that is made while cocking shutter.. remove the lens and cock slowly and see if curtains stay tight closed or the make little gap.. it happened to me on some of my cameras and i solved by cocking with lens cap on...

I spent some time yesterday looking carefully at the shutter curtains. I have to say, I couldn't anything. In your experience, was this plainly visible? What exactly am I looking for?

Thanks in advance for any additional information you might have.

Best,

HKL

 

[hawkhanlumist]

Ok I am back.

So I ran a test roll yesterday where I taped up various possible intrusions points of light (ie, the back door, the viewfinder/ rangefinder windows, lugs, etc).

I am pretty confident the leak is in the curtains. I say this because I took a range of images with the lens cap on (no tape) and there was no leak. Then, I took a couple of blank images (ie, with the cap on) after leaving the lens cap off for a few minutes and got a leak.

Interestingly, I shot two blank frames in this manner (ie, with the lens cap on after allowing light to pass through the lens). One was with a delay before film advance/ Shutter Cocking, the second with the delay of after the film advance/ shutter cocking. It was the second frame that had the light leak.

I am sort of showing my ignorance here, but here is my question: Am I right in thinking that even if I waited until just before I was ready to shoot to advance, (thereby protecting that frame as the non leaked frame in the above set of two shots suggests I can) I would still have a light leak occur afterwards (post shooting on the same frame) because I didn't advance the frame? Does that makes sense?

Another way of asking would be to ask 'When the shutter is fired, but not cocked, do the curtains return to the same position as they are in when they are cocked?

I am happy to upload some images and the shoot log if this helps.

Any assistance and advice is always greatly appreciated. As always, thanks in advance.

Best,

HKL