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Leica M3 Shutter Bounce?


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Hello friends,

I seem to have an issue that is not entirely rare. The cloth focal plane shutter curtain seems to stutter, or even bounce. I have searched this issue prior, and I guess "bounce" does seem to be the syntax for this certain phenomenon.

I have included a clip of the shutter at 1/500 from a slow-mo video I attempted to take on my phone. I also scrubbed the video and took a screenshot of every frame that contained the movement of the shutter in the video. And to my surprise, by looking at the past two frames, the shutter does indeed appear to "bounce".

The shutter seems to travel the full distance, with the second to last frame capturing the almost fully relaxed shutter. But then the last frame shows a larger gap of light appearing again. Not ideal.

I noticed on a couple photos I took, a bar of overexposure on the right side of the frame. Since this issue is well documented and the solution known (CLA baby) my purpose for cluttering this forum with a much too common ailment was to possibly learn what could cause this?

To make this already long winded post windier; I purchased the camera from Shueido Camera back in March 2022. It was supposedly CLA'd before sending out. The camera did come in, visually, absolute pristine condition. The first test roll I shot didn't seem to have any issues. But then I went on a 10 day trip to Iceland.

Almost none of the photos I took in Iceland had the bar, but with overcast, cloudy days, I was most likely shooting at 1/250 and lower. (From what I understand this issue comes alight mostly at 1/500 & 1/1000 (increased tension for high speeds?))

Upon returning to the land of America, I shot some random pictures around me to finish off my last roll from Iceland. Almost all the photos exhibit the nefarious white bar of sadness on the right edge of the photo. Now, this is Florida, during midday, in summer, so one could assume almost every photo I took was at 1/500 and 1/1000.

Could the Leica's foray into the land of Fire and Ice been too much for it's old bones? Could the 10 days of constant cold (I camped for the duration of my stay, so my new buddy did not spend much time in a comfy, first class, heated environment) affected this old tools mechanism, summoning the frosty ghost of over exposure?

Thanks for even reading this phone typed, mental diarrhea. I know I have to get it CLA'd, but it is just simply a bummer that a camera would need a second CLA in one year. I'm hoping to figure out how this may have been caused so I may avoid bringing this problem back in the future.

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Here is an example from Iceland: (No shutter Bounce overexposure)

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I chose this as an example, because I figured due to it being midday, and trying to get a shot in a moving car, that I chose a high shutter speed when I took this.

A photo from after my trip (Florida, midday) BUT a somewhat shadowy scene. So I'm not entirely sure as too shutter speed. (Shutter Bounce overexposure)

Edited by Machuca
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Interesting paint job!

I don't know what caused that to happen but it does indeed mean that you need a repair, and it's a fairly common fault. Note, not a full CLA, a camera tech should be able to just do the shutter for you (assuming that it was CLA'd properly before).

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It could be during the CLA the shutter brake wasn't properly adjusted or came out of adjustment once you started using the camera. Thank you for the video, using the slider to move frame by frame, you can see the curtains make their full travel and then instead of being held in place by the brake are allowed to bounce back a bit. It's more likely once you started putting film through the camera, things loosened a bit more than being affected by the weather. Contact the seller and let them know of the situation and see if they can correct it. This is one opinion on what your problem may be, I'm sure there will be others. Nice M3 and very nice images. Welcome to the forum and post a few in the "I Like Film" thread.

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6 hours ago, earleygallery said:

Interesting paint job!

I don't know what caused that to happen but it does indeed mean that you need a repair, and it's a fairly common fault. Note, not a full CLA, a camera tech should be able to just do the shutter for you (assuming that it was CLA'd properly before).

Thanks, Shueido and Kanto camera do some really cool stuff with vintage mechanical cameras. Just a small shutter job would be best case. 

 

5 hours ago, madNbad said:

It could be during the CLA the shutter brake wasn't properly adjusted or came out of adjustment once you started using the camera. Thank you for the video, using the slider to move frame by frame, you can see the curtains make their full travel and then instead of being held in place by the brake are allowed to bounce back a bit. It's more likely once you started putting film through the camera, things loosened a bit more than being affected by the weather. Contact the seller and let them know of the situation and see if they can correct it. This is one opinion on what your problem may be, I'm sure there will be others. Nice M3 and very nice images. Welcome to the forum and post a few in the "I Like Film" thread.

I both hope it is that simple, and wish it wasn't the case! The vendor has an amazing track record with repair, restore and repaint. But mistakes happen I guess. I may try reaching out (they are in Hong Kong), or perhaps just getting in touch with Youxin Ye or DAG.

I have contacted Youxin Ye upon receiving the camera due to viewfinder de-silvering and needing a possibly recement, or replace. But Mr. Ye intimated that nothing could really be done as he did not have adequate supplies. Oh well. Little blue and black sticker on the VF it is.

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it is unfortunate that it needs to be CLAd again so soon, but frankly that's because the first one was not performed correctly.  No matter how famous the tech was.  I mention this as a few months ago I bought an M4 that had new shutter curtains and CLA from a very famous tech just performed - I had the receipt from the shop where I bought it.  And the shutter was a complete mess - bounced like a trampoline.

Edited by Huss
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