Where to find a roughly used m6

[Gregm61]

I am a Leica owner but..
here in Toronto and Canada, no official service anymore and NJ .NY does NOT get good ratings, plus excessive penalties dealing with USA..
My M6TTL is a good camera but personally using less and less..
The framing in one word "Sucks".
For price of a coffee a SLR, Canon, Pentax, Nikon and Minolta can be found for price of a few coffees..
Lenses easy and I defy anyone to see difference in sharpness..
All cameras are good, only lousy photographers..

Circuit boards for the M6TTL are no longer being made and no doubt, available stocks are drying up, if not dried up already, making the TTL's (at least their electronic portion) a future liability.

M6 frame lines, as the manuals point out, are only valid at closest focus distance (why Leica did that I'll never know). It takes me a week to see my images from the day I mail the exposed film off and I wind up leveling, cropping, etc so much the original compositions are at best, even if I could see exactly what was being captured, approximations of the final image.

Frame lines in my M4 are much more accurate but again, by the time I start working the digital files I forgot half or more of the compositions as I was framing them in the finder.

Accurate framing is not a reason for using any rangefinder.

 

[Deleted member 65559]

Just curious...what is the turn-around time for Leica M6 TTL and M7? When the repaired cameras come back to you in Canada, no tax and importation issues? Thanks for your feedback, Peter

Peter, I have no idea on M6 & M7. I sent Don a black paint M4 I had just acquired that needed a CLA. I also wanted it adapted to take a Leicavit. I called Horst Wenzel in Vancouver (still doing repairs), Leica Kinderman Canada (spoke w/ Gerry Smith who was just retiring), Youxin Ye..... no one had the parts. Don's turnaround was 3 weeks or so. No issues on repairs coming back to Canada. A few weeks ago i got a Leica CL 50 anniversary. I sent Don an email in the evening and had an answer back in the morning. He had parts & opined that the CL was a pretty sturdy camera, but when i got the camera the shutter speeds were on. I plugged in a Wein cell and the meter works....so no need to send it. Don is my Leica go-to.

 

[vandal138]

So what happens when all these repair people are retired and there is no one left to service the cameras? Will they become obsolete?
Is buying a Leica camera less of an investment these days as they become more useless?

 

[Deleted member 65559]

So what happens when all these repair people are retired and there is no one left to service the cameras? Will they become obsolete?
Is buying a Leica camera less of an investment these days as they become more useless?

Vandal, Since i'm working on my long first coffe, i'll sit back and give you my opinion. There are fewer people out there doing the work...but i'd suggest that now, we just have to send them further, to a smaller pool of people. Pretty much all my film and paper comes from B&H in New York, who ship it free to Canada. My chemistry comes from a couple of suppliers in the USA. I don't think in the short term that Leicas will become obsolete. Two winters ago i was skiing in Japan and bought a 1934 Leica iii in working condition. I just sold a working 1971 Nikon F. My 2 35mm users are a '67 M4 and a '75 CL. None of these were serviced regularly. They all worked long periods of time. As a matter of fact I've used Leicas both new and used since the late '60s and the M4 was the first Leica I ever had serviced. I'm not saying they work flawlessly, but buy one in good mechanical shape and they'll serve you reliably

The same cannot be said of electronic (film) cameras as good as they are, for which unfortunately, repair parts have become unavailable.

 

[Veggies]

So what happens when all these repair people are retired and there is no one left to service the cameras? Will they become obsolete?
Is buying a Leica camera less of an investment these days as they become more useless?

No, because there's people who are stepping into the space.

 

[CharlesDAMorgan]

No shortage of people who can service mechanical cameras, they aren't rocket science. Electronic parts availability will dictate if any camera with electronics integral to functionality will be serviceable.

I am very comfortable with owning an M3 and an M2 long term. You could always replace an integral meter with an external one, given the price difference I'd buy any of the M2-M4 rather than an M6 and enjoy better metering from a handheld or shoe mounted one.

Tatty cameras are not an investment, they will not be on people's shelves absent a history if these things become bricks or unfashionable again.

 

[Gregm61]

So what happens when all these repair people are retired and there is no one left to service the cameras? Will they become obsolete?
Is buying a Leica camera less of an investment these days as they become more useless?

You and I are most likely more “short term” than any Leica M one could purchase today. Once our time is up, that’s someone else’s worry.

 

[mpaniagua]

I think it mostly depends on demand. I enough demand, circuits could be made that would mimic original ones. Also, mechanical parts could be 3d printed. Today plastic/nylon is pretty durable so I think it would be a suitable replacement.


Marcelo

 

[mpaniagua]

No, because there's people who are stepping into the space.

It depends. Example, Olympus Pen F, Leica M5, Rolleiflex SL66, etc. Fewer people services/fix them now, which in turn they became a dead end. Rolleiflex SL66 became that way with me, with few repairing them and the few of them that are doing it are not doing a great job.

I believe this in part if driving the price up (not entirely but one of the factors nonetheless) for popular cameras, since people is becoming aware certain cameras may be non fixable on the future. On the other hand, camera that no longer are serviced are scorned by user so there is a chance to get great cameras for cheap. Got 3 fully working/near mint Rolleiflex sl35e for less that $50 recently. They are one of my favorite cameras so I'm stocked for while on my SLR side.

Marcelo

 

[traveler_101]

I think it mostly depends on demand. I enough demand, circuits could be made that would mimic original ones. Also, mechanical parts could be 3d printed. Today plastic/nylon is pretty durable so I think it would be a suitable replacement.


Marcelo

Yes they managed to keep 1950s American cars going in Cuba to this day by fabricating replacement parts. But don't you think if demand remains high over the next say twenty years a manufacturer will step into the breach with new film cameras?

 

[traveler_101]

I think it mostly depends on demand. I enough demand, circuits could be made that would mimic original ones. Also, mechanical parts could be 3d printed. Today plastic/nylon is pretty durable so I think it would be a suitable replacement.


Marcelo

Too bad that CV was unable to continue manufacturing cameras.

 

[vandal138]

Yes they managed to keep 1950s American cars going in Cuba to this day by fabricating replacement parts. But don't you think if demand remains high over the next say twenty years a manufacturer will step into the breach with new film cameras?

and with more people embracing 3d printing, it could be easier to print parts and maybe resurrect old obsolete camera parts.

 

[mpaniagua]

Yes they managed to keep 1950s American cars going in Cuba to this day by fabricating replacement parts. But don't you think if demand remains high over the next say twenty years a manufacturer will step into the breach with new film cameras?

Could be, but problem with that is the huge used camera market. I live on Mexico, and following the car analogy, new cars dealers are facing a huge competition from used car market. Why buy a $20k+ car when you can get a nice working car for $6k?. They do have a market and they are staying on business, but that is because new cars dealers offer payment plans, service policies, etc. that makes a new car attractive over a used one (reliability factor, does it ring a bell?). Camera makers would need to pull a similar stun.

I suppose that, as time goes by and lots of those used cameras fails and become unfixable, new cameras would become more attractive and probably have a lower price.

Marcelo

 

[mpaniagua]

and with more people embracing 3d printing, it could be easier to print parts and maybe resurrect old obsolete camera parts.

Yeah, that is very likely. I'm already printing some adapters, handles and other pieces on my own. What keeps a person with a full set of parts (say parts for non meter Leicas) from drawing them (say on Solidworks), printing and selling for cheap?

Marcelo

 

[Ko.Fe.]

People might step up, but if no parts are provided it is irrelevant how smart those people are to fix film M without training by Leica.
Not just magically 3r printed parts, but RF assembly.

Sorry, but those rosy assumptions what some Joe Blow will somehow fix film M seems to come from those who never fixed any camera and never read Leica repair manual.
Most of it consist of same sequence - remove, adjust; if doesn’t work - replace.

 

[olifaunt]

When I was on this road the Leicas were (and still are) too expensive for me. I ended up with a Minolta CLE and am very happy with it. It has a light meter and automatic mode.

 

[CharlesDAMorgan]

The price of the Minolta CLEs has moved up a lot too!

 

[Gregm61]

There's an EX++ CLE system right now at Tamarkin, with the 40/2 and 90/4 Rokkors with caps and hoods, for $1,000. Between my M6, two M4's and a Contax IIA outfit a CLE would never see action or I'd buy it in a minute.

We don't know who'll be servicing Leica M bodies 10-15 years from now, but you know there will be people who do. Like Youxin Yee, they may not be trained at Leica but they're likely to be very good. Many of us most likely don't need to be worrying about it beyond 15-20 or so years anyway.

 

[Huss]

Both my perfect condition CLEs failed so I’d
never touch one again. One failed after I sold it, the other I had repaired by Dave Easterwood. He was the only person in the US who I could find who work on it. Basically the electronics had oxidized from age and he had to go thru everything.

 

[rlouzan]

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