Talk:Fujica ST605 II

A comment about the Fujinon open-aperture metering lenses:

I own the EBC Fujinon 50/1.4; plus I also have the Tamron Adaptall-2 and Vivitar TX mount adapters made with the Fujica aperture tab on the back of their M42 mount. I find that all of these mount without interference on a Pentax H1a, a Mamiya/Sekor 1000 DTL, and a Zenit 11.

It's quite true that you see Fujinon lenses for sale with the aperture tab ground off. But I don't think we should encourage anyone to mutilate their lenses by saying this is necessary to fit on "most" other M42 camera bodies. I am wondering what bodies, specifically, have a lens flange which fouls the Fujinon aperture tab?

--Vox (talk) 12:05, 29 October 2015 (CDT)

I suspect that people are grinding off the tab when they want to use M42 Fujinons on some adapter ring (e.g. with a DSLR) and they don't care about back-compatibility with Fujica film bodies. I can confirm the tab definitely gets in the way when using an M42-to-K mount adapter. --Vox (talk) 13:48, 29 October 2015 (CDT)

Firstly I agree: removing the aperture indexing tab is a total sin, and must be discouraged. There are few enough Fujica lenses in circulation without people knackering them.

If I understand the question correctly, the problem is that the aperture indexing tab extends slightly beyond the mating face of the lens, and can stop them from being fully screwed home. On all Fujica M42 camera bodies this isn't a problem because the outer perimeter of the body lens mounting flange (i.e. the shiny circular bit seen on naked SLRs) has a slight recess into which the tab fits. Even the closed aperture metering cameras have a step on the edge of the lens mounting flange to accommodate this tab, and the ST701 (early versions from the days before open aperture metering) has a smaller diameter lens mounting flange so the tab doesn't cause any issues.

On some other cameras bodies the tab buts up against the lens mounting flange, with the result that the lens can not be fully screwed home; the tab causes a tiny gap between the lens and the camera, where there should be none. This causes loss of infinity focus. It will affect close focus too, but that's not noticeable. If the Fujica lens has a diameter greater than that of the lens mounting flange then there's no problem.

I can try my Fujica lenses on other bodies if it helps (but I've only got Pentax, Praktica, and Yashica M42 cameras), and post the results here is you like ... but it might take a few days to get to it.

I have an ST601, ST605n, 2 ST701s, ST801 and 2 ST901s. I like Fujicas!!

John Bear - 29/10/2015

Here's the short answer

Provided the camera body lens mounting flange diameter is 54mm or less, then Fujica lenses with an aperture indexing tab should fit. Of the M42 cameras in my collection, the Fujica lenses fit a Pentax Spotmatic F, and Yashica TL Electro X, but do not properly mount on a Praktica LTL.

Hope this helps.

John Bear - 29/10/2015

Thanks John, that jibes with my impression that the Fujinon lenses with the aperture tab will fit on many M42-mount cameras without modification. I think maybe the text here and on the ST801 page might be altered to read something like,

Auto Fujinon lenses are sometimes found to have had their aperture coupling tab filed off. While unmodified lenses do fit many M42-mount
camera bodies, some lens flanges (or lens adapters) are large enough in diameter that the tab interferes with mounting the lens.

I only own an ST801. Unfortunately the friend I lent it to kept it out of my hands for quite a few years! Now that it's home again I'm looking forward to giving this nice camera the attention it deserves.

By the way in the wiki markup code, typing four tildes (or clicking the seventh button with the signature icon) will automatically fill in a signature and timestamp for you. Cheers, --Vox (talk) 23:43, 29 October 2015 (CDT)

Thanks. I clicked that button, but didn't recognise all the squiggles as meaning anything!

--Johnbear (talk) 05:26, 30 October 2015 (CDT)