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In Reply to: Canon made a 50mm f 1.0 posted by Joe M on July 19, 2005 at 18:50:48:
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designed the Record 4 52mm f0.9 lens for the Kiev 5 rangefinder in 1971, but unfortunately it never made it into production. Supposedly quality control had gotten so bad by then (after being quite good in the 50's and 60's) that it probably would have been a hit or miss lens anyway.
Yeah, quality control at the Kiev plant depended on how much Vodka was rationed that day.sam.
Actually I hear all sorts of different stories about Russian quality control, from "The inspectors came and threw out the entire production of May 1983" to "the shutter of the Kiev 4 from the 50's is actually much more reliable and more quiet than the Contax II". Certainly we Americans were no better in many industries - consider that everyone in the midwest in the 60's knew that you should never buy an American car that came off the assembly line on Monday.I plan to take all of this as gossip until I see for myself. I have a 1969 vintage Kiev 4A and 1981 vintage Helios 103 on the way from Russia. I'm hoping it will be an interesting restoration project, and a nice shooter when I'm done with it.
The Kiev 4A is a cool camera, lots of quality lenses you can use with it. I have a Fed 3 and a Zorki 4 with Jupiter 8 L/D, I wish I had a Leica lens for them.I'm also having a lot of fun shooting with my new Ukranian beast, the Kiev 60.
I should have put a smiley on that Vodka comment. : )
Sam.
Yeah the Soviet camera flood is pretty fascinating for somebody like me who delights in dismantling stuff and trying to put it back together. If I totally screw up the 4A, well, it cost me $50 for the education and it can just be given away or tossed in the trash. A lot of detailed repair and adjustment info that has hit the web in the past year or so, making it all the more intriguing to get one to see how well you can get it to work.I went back and forth about whether to start with a Kiev 4A or a Zorki 3M. At around $50-$75 it's not a big deal to buy one of each! I got intrigued with the notion that the Contax II was supposedly introduced as a more rugged pro type camera and the screw mount Leica was initially intended as an advanced amateur camera. Obviously a lot of pros thought otherwise. The tiny size of the Zorkis is attractive, but that crazy vertical metal shutter and the really wide rangefinder and the potential for adding some Zeiss lenses influenced me to try the Kiev first. The Zorkis have a definite advantage in terms of lens choices. Have you done the whole rangefinder alignment/lens registration thing? Seems to be worthwhile to get it all adjusted "just so" from what I'm reading.
How's that Kiev 60 working? I have a really pretty 6 x 9 Busch Pressman with an adapt-a-roll 620 film back that was going to be used for some MF landscapes, but it's not happening. Maybe a more portable MF rig is the ticket.
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