What is the least that can burn hole in shutter?

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Asim

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Of course if a Leica is laying still, uncapped, and pointing straight at a bright sun it will burn a hole in the shutter.

1. But does the sun have to be directly in the center of the view or could it be slightly off to the side and still burn a hole?

2. Could it burn a hole if it were a very bright day but the sun were out of view of the lens?

3. Could a hole be burned into the shutter on a bright but cloudy day?

4. I guess I'd like to know what is the MINIMUM brightness that will cause a hole in the shutter.
 
The sun doesn't have to be in the center, only visible. Biggest impact is if the lens is set to closer than infinity.

Why do you ask ?
 
I keep on hearing about this, but did anyone here ever get this problem. I shot several times with the M6 with the sun in the picture and the shutter is intact.
 
Direct sun is what causes it, not overcast sky, and if the lens is wide open and the camera is still on a table with the lens aiming up (to the sun) and without cap, some experienced photographers say it can take seconds, not minutes...

Cheers,

Juan
 
Juan Valdenebro said:
Direct sun is what causes it, not overcast sky, and if the lens is wide open and the camera is still on a table with the lens aiming up (to the sun) and without cap, some experienced photographers say it can take seconds, not minutes...

Cheers,

Juan
Click to expand...

Dear Juan,

Exactly. But by f/8 you'd need to be VERY unlucky indeed.

Cheers,

R.
 
I've had a Leica IIIc under direct sun with the lens on and nothing ever happened.

Optics are funny this way: you have to have it done right. Or wrong, of course, depending on your point of view.
 
The best way to find out is to take the lens of your camera and take it outside on a sunny day. Get some dry paper and put it under the lens. Then point the lens at the sun and focus the light on the paper to a fine point. It will catch on fire! This is fun and will bring out the pyromania in you!

http://robbiebedell.photoshelter.com
 
Are the shutters of the Zeiss Ikon and M9 immune to this? Even if they are metallic, I would guess this if it can burn a hole in a cloth shutter, it wouldn't do any good to the thin metal either.
 
Hmmm, but think of the odd angle the camera would have to be and I doubt if anyone would be holding it still for long enough and at the widest aperture. I shall be out with the Elmar and some black paper soon and timing it...

My cameras are mostly still when not in use so the lens would either be pointing up and no sun there at this latitude or standing normally and I seldom see the sun on the horizon for long enough. And, more important, when not in us e the lens cap is one them.

BTW, Leica's patents were the main reason, imo, for the design of the Zeiss. I can't think of any other reason for such over complication, especially when you look at the simplicity of the Leica.

Regards, David

PS And I reckon that 75 or 80 years after leaving the factory the pin holes might just be caused by the blind becoming brittle and cracking. I've had one or two with pin holes and couldn't see burn marks on the blinds. I reckon its a myth and will do until I see one burst into flames or smoking and smelling of burning rubber, yuk.
 
This sounds like a myth to me, thought up by the same type who worry about leaving the shutter cocked, or say that you must tape your red dot or get robbed.

Edit: Now that the sun is up I took a V5 Summicron 50mm, opened it to f/2.0 and held it in front of my hand. Within 5 seconds my hand was hurting and actually still hurts as I type this. The dot beam of light on my hand was similar to that produced by a magnifying glass.

I have changed my mind. It sounds very possible.
 
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While I don't have direct evidence of it happening, I'm not too old to remember playing with magnifying glasses and it never took too long for a bit of white paper to get scorched. I would venture a guess that it's a good deal quicker still with black silk/rubber.

One scenario I've heard of involves the camera in a display cabinet and the one day of the year that the rising, or setting, sun hits it at just the right angle. (Two days every year for most angles, in fact.)

Again, I cannot vouch for this, but it does seem more plausible to me than with the camera on the table pointing vertically up.
 
Burned shutter

Burned shutter

Had my cloth shutter burned by a camera tech while laying on the instrument for a shutter check He was momentarly distracted and I saw the smoke curls starting to rise from the open back.This created a small brown spot in the first curtian.
 
David, I've always wondered about the patent infringement aspect. Not enough to go in search of hard facts, mind you 🙂 I think there must have been more than that at play with Zeiss. Certainly other German makers (I can think of Exakta and Foth) used horizontal cloth curtains without trouble from Leica's lawyers.

From the Zeiss point of view, Leitz was an upstart in the camera business, and Barnack was a mechanic, not an engineer. As such, this simply couldn't be the proper way to do things. (Which, in some ways, is true. IMO the Leica design gets away with a number of fundamental flaws that result from its sheer simplicity, such as the rotating dial.) So my feeling is the Zeiss solution was as much about demonstrating technological superiority.

But this is firmly OT now. Sorry.
 
I posted about this some time back. I once carried out an experiment using some shutter cloth I had left after re-shuttering a camera. In summer sun, using a 50mm lens, I could burn a hole almost instantly at f/2; it took progressively longer and needed more care up to about f/5.6. By f/8 you'd need a sustained effort and probably only scorch it.

Bearing in mind that I made sure the sun was focussed accurately and stationary on the cloth, I did prove it can be done. The "but" of course is that the lens usually focusses on the film and the cloth is in front of that, so it's not focussed accurately. In addition, you need to keep it still for a second or so, absolute minimum, to burn through and that's at f/2.

My conclusion was that yes, it's possible and not a myth. However, it does need a combination of circumstances that aren't that common without serious carelessness or outright bad luck. Don't put your camera down, with the lens wide open, somewhere where it's facing straight into summer sun.
 
I left a Canon 7 on the seat of my car while driving up the coast a few years ago. When I got the film back there was evidence of about 7 or 8 holes burned in the shutter!
Conversely, I tried to burn holes in an M4 I was sending off for overhaul and it could not be done! I left it wide open on a tripod, focused at infinity, for about 15 minutes pointing directly into the sun at around noon in the middle of winter.

Bob
 
I've tried it with black paper and card (hence my comment that by f/8 you'd need to be VERY unlucky) but I have been assured that shutter fabric burns faster. I have not verified this. The results of the experiment carried out by wolves3012 are very similar to my experiences with paper and card: a very few seconds wide open, next to impossible at f/8.

Cheers,

R.
 
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