M4 options? With or without plastic .

[odoardo]

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Hi,

Last month I bought back my old  M4.  The transportlever,  the selftimer and  the field of view selector have no black plastic tips. All M4 camera's I know  do have these.

Was no plastic tips an option from Leica?

Does anybody know?

( see 'M4 , 2 versions'  in Customer Forum.)

Thanks,

Herman

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Edited May 6, 2021 by odoardo

[luigi bertolotti]

I think they were standard on all M4... never seen one different.. I think that someone simply has replaced them taking the M3 parts : the M4's ones have, apart plastic tips, a different shape.  The rewind set lever, on the contrary, looks to be the original one.

Edited May 6, 2021 by luigi bertolotti

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[huubl]

Love the all-metal levers on my M4. This was one of the last 100 M4s to leave Wetzlar. I got it from the photography department of the university where I worked when the department was closed down. Never seen the plastic tipped levers on it and I can't imagine this to be personalized by one of the department staff. Agree that it's an easy thing to do yourself, but I 'dream' that Leica were out of parts for the last batch to finish properly and used M2/M4 levers instead.

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Edited May 7, 2021 by huubl

[luigi bertolotti]

2 hours ago, huubl said:

... I 'dream' that Leica were out of parts for the last batch to finish properly and used M2/M4 levers instead...

 

... never had an M5 in my hands... how were its levers ? Identical to M4 ?  I see that some (on black bodies only ?) have a white strip (insert ?) onto..but the black ones look really very similar to M4, and  M5 continued its (difficult) life well beyond the M4s in the 2.1xx.xxx range  

Anyway, M4 is really nicer with those fittings... though the plastic movable termination of the wind on lever  of M4 is (just a bi)t more ergonomical than the more stylish M3's one  (which, as a part in itself, was indeed made also during M4's life... it was mounted on MDa... dunno if in all of them)

Edited May 7, 2021 by luigi bertolotti

[TomB_tx]

Yes - M5 levers were very similar to the M4, but the plastic inserts were two-piece with a white insert in the middle. The white pieces were often lost, so some have been replaced with the M4 style. I also prefer the action of the M4 wind lever - one reason I chose and M4 over a new M3 in 1968.

[luigi bertolotti]

11 minutes ago, TomB_tx said:

Yes - M5 levers were very similar to the M4, but the plastic inserts were two-piece with a white insert in the middle. The white pieces were often lost, so some have been replaced with the M4 style. I also prefer the action of the M4 wind lever - one reason I chose and M4 over a new M3 in 1968.

But not THE SAME you mean ? In this case , huubl's hipotetisis ("out of parts" towards end of production) can be solid.. the wind on lever of M5 also looks different from M4, seems to me

 

Edited May 7, 2021 by luigi bertolotti

[huubl]

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Note that the wind-on lever is somewhat shorter than one on the camera of the OP. It doesn't touch the flash shoe.

Edited May 7, 2021 by huubl

[huubl]

Nope, just checked. It isn’t actually. Same size as on my M1, M2, M3, MD and MDa.

[odoardo]

On 5/7/2021 at 1:47 PM, huubl said:

I got it from the photography department of the university where I worked when the department was closed down. Never seen the plastic tipped levers on it and I can't imagine this to be personalized by one of the department staff. Agree that it's an easy thing to do yourself, but I 'dream' that Leica were out of parts for the last batch to finish properly and used M2/M4 levers instead.

Same here. I've got mine from the University Department when it closed down in the begin 90's. I started to worked there in 1976.  This M4 was bought new in 1969 (So no last batch.) for use by the University. In the 70s and 8os we worked with Nikon and Hasselblad, so the M4 stayed unemployed in a closet. The only Leica's we were using that time were 2 MDa' s, with the Reprovit. I'm almost sure the staff didn't change the levers, so the camera must be delivered like this.

I also have an M4 from the same batch from 1969 and it got his plastics.

Is it a coincidence your M4 also was for a University ??? Both without plastic.

[odoardo]

Huub, I see you worked at the University of Leiden. I worked at the University in Delft ( Technische Universiteit Delft ) 

So same Dutch dealer. Odin.

[wlaidlaw]

If you look at the image below, you can see that the wind-on levers for the M4 and M5 are similar but not exactly the same. The lever on the M5 is a little longer. I am not sure my M5 ever had the white bit on it as it does not look as if anything is missing. 

Wilson

PS This is a very early M4 from the first batch made and was delivered as a dealer demo camera for release day in 1967, so later M4's may have had a slightly different lever. My M4-P is away having an expert adjust the vertical alignment on the RF, after a drunken idiot knocked a whole table over at a wedding I was attending, so I cannot post that for further comparison. I have the Leica special tool but cannot get it to engage in the vertical alignment adjustment fork.

 

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Edited May 9, 2021 by wlaidlaw

[Michael Geschlecht]

Hello Wilson,

They both measure 5.5cm from the tip of the wind lever to the other side of the finger cup in the photo that you were nice enough to provide for us.

Best Regards,

Michael

[huubl]

7 hours ago, odoardo said:

Huub, I see you worked at the University of Leiden. I worked at the University in Delft ( Technische Universiteit Delft ) 

So same Dutch dealer. Odin.

Wow, interesting. Yes, my M4 came from Odin also. And when I showed the camera to Will van Manen, he said he could not find any trace of the use of tools on the screw caps of the delayed timer lever or the frame selector lever, suggesting that they were never removed. BTW, I have another M4 from the same department that did have regular M4 levers, also from Odin...

Haha, these Dutch Universities used very similar sets of cameras. Mine were from the chemistry department. They also used MDas mostly, they had three, on reprovits, and Nikons and Hasselblads (an a Sinar) in the 70-80s. Somewhat later the Nikons were replaced by Canons.

Edited May 9, 2021 by huubl

[sandro]

Odin was the importer for a long time of all Leitz products. I believe in a few of my Leica's there is a sticker from Odin. The lever sometimes seems to be used by what was available. Here are the levers on my M4, and on the second photo on my M4-2 (top) and two M4-P bodies. My MDa is from the first batch of that camera but it has the same lever as the M4, whereas many MDa bodies show the same lever as the M3 and M2.

Lex

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