Nikkormat FTn

dave lackey

dave lackey

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It took awhile but I am now up and running with my F2A and the 50 1.8 lens. This camera is addicting.

I love this beast and it now resides in an old Domke waist pack alongside the black Nikkormat FTN. So I thought I may as well check the meter and used the lens from the F2A and sure enough, the meter works perfectly. But.... The FTn doesn't have a lens of it's own. And the black body with chrome advance lever is too cool to let it sit in a bag! I need to find a lens or two!!!

I am a diehard 50mm shooter it seems but I love the 105 and even a wider lens like the 28 or 35. Any lens with character is desirable but of course I am limited by price.

Anyone have recommendations? :angel:
 
Everyone will point you to one of the excellent primes made by Nikon. Fast 35 or even the very nice 24. I'm going to suggest the most lowly of the low, the lens designed to be paired with all of the Nikkormats, the 43-86 zoom. It flares, there are abberations galore and best of all, a 3.5 maximum apature but it looks great on a Nikkormat and it really isn't (nearly) as bad as everyone says.
 
dave lackey said:
It took awhile but I am now up and running with my F2A and the 50 1.8 lens. This camera is addicting.

I love this beast and it now resides in an old Domke waist pack alongside the black Nikkormat FTN. So I thought I may as well check the meter and used the lens from the F2A and sure enough, the meter works perfectly. But.... The FTn doesn't have a lens of it's own. And the black body with chrome advance lever is too cool to let it sit in a bag! I need to find a lens or two!!!

I am a diehard 50mm shooter it seems but I love the 105 and even a wider lens like the 28 or 35. Any lens with character is desirable but of course I am limited by price.

Anyone have recommendations? :angel:
Click to expand...

Unless you're looking to stick with pre-AI models for the style ...

Nikkor 28mm f/2 AI (I prefer the AI over the AI-S in this case)
Nikkor 50mm f/1.2 AI-S
Nikkor 105mm f/2.5 AI-S

Go for it. ;-)

G
 
madNbad said:
Everyone will point you to one of the excellent primes made by Nikon. Fast 35 or even the very nice 24. I'm going to suggest the most lowly of the low, the lens designed to be paired with all of the Nikkormats, the 43-86 zoom. It flares, there are abberations galore and best of all, a 3.5 maximum apature but it looks great on a Nikkormat and it really isn't (nearly) as bad as everone says.
Click to expand...


Dave,
If you are a 50mm guy, I think he is really on to something here. 43>86.
That is the lens designed for the Nikkormat.
 
Here is my vote.

11863388106_9fec8f0455_z.jpg

Nikkormat FTn by P F McFarland, on Flickr

PF
 
Black Nikkormat, two options come to mine immediately.

Black metal barrel 35/1.4, no plastic, sharp and fast.
Any sonar 105/2.5.

The 105 is in your price range with realitive ease, the 35 will take some hunting but you will find it.

The 24/2.8 is legionary, another good option for matching looks, likes to distort a bit much for my preference these days but a fine lens in all other aspects (including price).

Those would be my recommendations.

B2
 
It might be that in the US the 43-86mm was the lens more often seen in a Nikkormat, but here it was the Nikkor-H 50mm /2.
And you can't go wrong with the Nikkor 28mm /3.5 Pre-Ai.

Most people weren't that rich to get the 35mm /1.4. More often you'll see the /2.8 as was pointed above.
 
Wow, such great suggestions and some I never thought about!

KR hates my favorite Nikon lens so I may just look for the 43-86 just because it has character and because he hates it! Lol...🙂
 
I think that you would benefit from a lens for portraiture. If you are a 50mm user, the wide angle stuff is not your piece of cake. As suggested above, the 105/2.5 any version you like and/or can afford would be good. This is from the 105/2.5 P

201213510 by marek fogiel, on Flickr
 
mfogiel said:
I think that you would benefit from a lens for portraiture. If you are a 50mm user, the wide angle stuff is not your piece of cake. As suggested above, the 105/2.5 any version you like and/or can afford would be good. This is from the 105/2.5 P

201213510 by marek fogiel, on Flickr
Click to expand...


Beautiful portrait! The 105 lens has to be on my list! Thanks for that...🙂
 
You are in luck there are so many good and sometimes great Nikon pre Ai lenses that can still be had cheaply. A few of my favourites: The 50mm f1.4 (of course), the 50mm f2 (superb), the 35mm f2 (a classic) the 105mm f2.5 (Sonnar version). These are all acknowledged as classics. You might also like to pick up a 135mm f3.5 which can be had very cheaply and is an under rated lens as is the f2.8 variant. I suspect the only reason these are underrated is that they are so common. I still use all of these lenses on my D700 (having converted some of them myself and bought others pre converted).

I have a Nikkormat Ftn in black and it is a beauty. Also built like the proverbial brick outhouse. One thing not many people know I suspect (I certainly did not know until I bought mine) is that this camera came in a late variant as well. It seems that when Nikon came out with the Nikkormat that superseded the FTn (I think it was the FT2) the later FTn bodies were sold with some of the parts from that later model camera.

I suppose they ran short of parts and it was an effective way of selling the remaining FTn bodies. In any event the shutter lever, self timer lever etc are tipped in black plastic just like on the FT2 on my camera, whereas the earlier FTn cameras had the older style full metal levers. I must admit to liking the look of mine which is very smooth. Of course it did not have the hotshoe which is the prime defining feature of the FT2 model. But other than this that late variant looks very like the camera that took its place.
 
peterm1 said:
...One thing not many people know I suspect (I certainly did not know until I bought mine) is that this camera came in a late variant as well. It seems that when Nikon came out with the Nikkormat that superseded the FTn (I think it was the FT2) the later FTn bodies were sold with some of the parts from that later model camera. ...
Click to expand...

Yes, the FT2 was a stop-gap model. It was basically a FT3 with the older meter coupling, marking time until the Ai coupling was introduced.

The differences between an FTn and the FT2 are small:
  • FT2 used Nikon's FRE (Functional Resisting Element) instead of a carbon resistor in the meter coupling reducing the wear and dirt issues.
  • FT2 dropped the FP-sync and had X-sync only.
  • FT2 had an integrated Hot Shoe replacing the old removable cold shoe
  • FT2 used the new "F2 style" Nikon flash cord socket (PC with threaded lock collar) replacing the old "F style" Nikon socket (PC with snap lock collar).
  • FT2 had the "Apollo" style wind lever and matching cosmetic change to the self timer lever.
  • FT2 had the newer "F2 style" strap lugs (brass with steel inserts).
The last two appeared on some later FTn samples.
 
Dwig said:
Yes, the FT2 was a stop-gap model. It was basically a FT3 with the older meter coupling, marking time until the Ai coupling was introduced.

The differences between an FTn and the FT2 are small:
  • FT2 used Nikon's FRE (Functional Resisting Element) instead of a carbon resistor in the meter coupling reducing the wear and dirt issues.
  • FT2 dropped the FP-sync and had X-sync only.
  • FT2 had an integrated Hot Shoe replacing the old removable cold shoe
  • FT2 used the new "F2 style" Nikon flash cord socket (PC with threaded lock collar) replacing the old "F style" Nikon socket (PC with snap lock collar).
  • FT2 had the "Apollo" style wind lever and matching cosmetic change to the self timer lever.
  • FT2 had the newer "F2 style" strap lugs (brass with steel inserts).
The last two appeared on some later FTn samples.
Click to expand...

The FT2 also used the 'new' 1.5V silver oxide cells which are available anywhere. That for me is the most important difference.
 
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