My family wants a walk in the woods. Apparently, so does my Nikkormat Ft, so it too will come along. Darkroom work will follow.
I bought that Ft years ago in decent condition. I cleaned it up, redid the foam, added an MR9 battery adapter, and have used it, on- and off, since. Even the meter works fairly respectably.
The Ft was the first Nikkormat and requires a manual resetting of the meter configuration when the lens you mount has a different max f/stop than the last used. For this reason, I try to mostly carry f/1.4s Nikkor AIS lenses to minimize the fiddling.
A couple years ago, it developed a bit of an issue with the film advance lever. Since I had so little money invested in it, I though I'd take a shot a remedying the problem. After a false start and a second exploration of the internal mechanicals, it's now back to full normal operation. Just astonishing for a camera that is the better part of 60 years old. My look into the guts of this camera reminded me of just how very, very well built these old Nikon mechanical cameras were. You likely couldn't produce a new Nikkormat to the same standard for sale much below $3000 or so these days.
What are you all up to this weekend?
