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Is that a M6 Light leak ?


bushmonk

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Hi,

 

bought my first M6 a month ago with a 35 Voigtländer f1.7 and a one month warranty. To me the camera seemed to be in a good condition (after going through a visual inspection checklist). The first B&W roll turned out just fine, however, this roll was shot in low light conditions. Now I got my first colour rolls developed and scanned them in at home (canon 9000F). Most of them are fine. However, in some of them I can see an overexposed area. When looking closely at the negatives, this area extends beyond the exposure area and is almost always found on the lower left part of the negative (see example images).

 

Does anyone have experience with such a problem ?

 

Would you return this camera and look for another one, or would you let it get fixed at a Leica repair service and ask for compensation ?

 

Or is this something to get used to with an M6 ? (I would probably not get used to this, especially having paid for it 1200 CHF)

 

Cheers

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M6 is sent in for a service. But still, out of general interest: In the dark, ever shined a torch-light through front side (without lens on) to see if shutter curtain leaks ? In my case light comes through the top shutter curtain seal, but disappears when charging the shutter. Thus, the sealing seems to only let light through the first shutter curtain, not the second. Posted an image of the state of the top shutter curtain seal on German forum at:

 

http://www.l-camera-forum.com/leica-forum/analog-forum/201380-m6-lichtleck.html

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In the dark, ever shined a torch-light through front side (without lens on) to see if shutter curtain leaks ? In my case light comes through the top shutter curtain seal, but disappears when charging the shutter. Thus, the sealing seems to only let light through the first shutter curtain, not the second.

http://www.l-camera-forum.com/leica-forum/analog-forum/201380-m6-lichtleck.html

 

Of course when I read this, I had to try it to see. You are right, I can see light at the top edge of the curtain, a considerable amount. Guess the lens focuses the light so that it does not go up that far once the lens is on, otherwise my camera would also fog the film, which it does not.

 

Wayne

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Problem solved. According to Leica (Nidau, Switzerland), light entered through two holes at the top right side. These holes are normally covered by a plastic protection pad, which is missing on my camera. See

http://www.l-camera-forum.com/leica-forum/analog-forum/201380-m6-lichtleck-2.html

 

Thank you for your attention and remarks !

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  • 5 months later...

On the light leakage question, has anyone ever replaced the felt seals by the tracks on an M4. I believe that apart from the seal between the rangefinder/viewfinder and the film chamber, these are the only seals on an M4. It don't think it has the seals on the rear door like some of the later M's do. The only service my M4 has had from new in 1967, was a CLA of the shutter mechanism plus a clean and sterilise of the fungus attacking the semi silvered mirrors on the RF, about 2 years ago.

 

Wilson

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On the light leakage question, has anyone ever replaced the felt seals by the tracks on an M4.

 

Well, Leica did it for me (I didn't do it myself ;) ). The first camera I bought in 2001 - M4-2 - leaked like a sieve if the sun shown in the front while changing lenses. They used more modern M6 plastic "awnings" in place of the original felt pads.

 

I had a leak in another M4-2 30 years ago, more akin to bushmonk's in cause (the fog pattern was a different shape, though).

 

The shaft of the "R" rewind switch on the front was too long, and thus held the lever too far away from the camera body, allowing light to leak past the lever, through the mounting hole and through the space occupied by the self-timer mechanism in a regular M4 (which is empty space in the M4-2) to the film, between the sprocket shaft and the takeup "spool".

 

A friendly machinist at the hospital where I worked fixed it by grinding a mm or so off the back of the shaft so that the lever sat flush against the camera.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On the light leakage question, has anyone ever replaced the felt seals by the tracks on an M4. I believe that apart from the seal between the rangefinder/viewfinder and the film chamber, these are the only seals on an M4. It don't think it has the seals on the rear door like some of the later M's do. The only service my M4 has had from new in 1967, was a CLA of the shutter mechanism plus a clean and sterilise of the fungus attacking the semi silvered mirrors on the RF, about 2 years ago.

 

Wilson

 

I've replaced the seals that you mention on an M2 once. To do the job you have to remove the innards from the shell so that you can remove the shroud that they are stuck to. The glue dries out on these strips of felt (looks like the same style of material as a film cassette) and in this particular M2 one had fallen off and got stuck under the ribbon of one of the curtains which had jammed the shutter. It's an easy fix but you have to take the camera apart to do the job.

The other seal common to the M's is the ribbon strip under the hinge line on the back door. This was worn on an m6 ttl I had and had rucked up a little at one edge causing rear door leaks. Same again, easy fix but camera neads to come apart.

There's a plastic shroud under the top plate at the top of the bayonet which deteriorates and cracks on some M's. It's on the M4-P I've got apart at the moment but missing on others I've had apart. It doesn't seem to affect light.

Edited by nobbylon
spelling :)
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  • 5 years later...

I just bought an M6 a few weeks ago and experiencing some light leaking as well I believe.. could be something in dev.  All the photos on this roll before this image are fine, all the ones after have the same sort of light burn effect. The roll I used immediately after was completely fine. Not sure what the issue is, one thing to note is I lost my lens cap during that trip but that shouldn't really have an effect on this. Do you guys think you can identify the issue by looking at this image? 

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  • 1 year later...
On 3/17/2018 at 8:03 AM, Akm24 said:

I just bought an M6 a few weeks ago and experiencing some light leaking as well I believe.. could be something in dev.  All the photos on this roll before this image are fine, all the ones after have the same sort of light burn effect. The roll I used immediately after was completely fine. Not sure what the issue is, one thing to note is I lost my lens cap during that trip but that shouldn't really have an effect on this. Do you guys think you can identify the issue by looking at this image? 

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I had a similar problem with a film after going through airport scanners a few times 

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On 3/17/2018 at 1:03 AM, Akm24 said:

I just bought an M6 a few weeks ago and experiencing some light leaking as well I believe.. could be something in dev.  All the photos on this roll before this image are fine, all the ones after have the same sort of light burn effect. The roll I used immediately after was completely fine. Not sure what the issue is, one thing to note is I lost my lens cap during that trip but that shouldn't really have an effect on this. Do you guys think you can identify the issue by looking at this image? 

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Sticking shutter that is not moving smoothly? Looks like the gap between shutter curtains. Did you have any pics on the same roll at slower shutterspeeds?

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It looks like the faint vertical streaks that continue across the frame are about the same spacing as the film sprocket holes. On B&W I've seen similar from over enthusiastic agitation during development. However, the streaks on the left could be shutter curtain related, as they seem uniform brightness top to bottom. 

Edited by TomB_tx
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5 hours ago, jmahto said:

Sticking shutter that is not moving smoothly? Looks like the gap between shutter curtains. Did you have any pics on the same roll at slower shutterspeeds?

Occurred to me too - but since he says another roll came out fine, that tends to point to something roll-specific like processing.

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