Argus A2B

From Camera-wiki.org
Revision as of 18:37, 6 February 2010 by U. kulick (talk | contribs)
Jump to: navigation, search


Like the Argus A but had a built-in extinction meter and exposure calculator. Produced from 1939 thru 1950 originally costing $12.50. Argus of Ann Arbor, Michigan, held two U.S. patents on it, one on the pop-out lens tube with a simple bayonet locking mechanism, invented by C.A. Verschoor, and one on the extinction meter with exposure calculator, invented by W.F. Carr.

The Camera had a 50mm f/4.5 coated Anastigmat made in USA, mounted in a shutter/aperture assembly with nine-blade diaphragm for apertures f4.5 to f18 and a everset shutter with T an B mode plus the speeds 1/25, 1/50, 1/100 and 1/150 sec.. Other sources report A2B cameras with Ilex shutter (1/200 sec. max speed), maybe the prewar variant. An exposure counting wheel in the camera's top is driven by the perforation of the 35mm film. On top are also the film advance wheel, the reverse Galilean viewfinder, and the meter. The meter has a broad window in the backthrough which more or less of the extinction meter's more or less translucent foil pieces become visible, depending on the light situation. The exposure calculator's big shifter on top of the meter must be shifted as far right as light is visible through the window. Then the lower end of the little shifter must be shifted so that it points onto the word for the light situation (bright, average, cloudy, or internal light). Then the possible apprpriate shutter-speed/aperture combinations can be read from the little shifter and the speed-table column beside it.

Links