Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2006/06/29
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]On Jun 29, 2006, at 4:17 PM, lug-request@leica-users.org wrote: > At 09:24 PM 6/29/06 +0200, Daniel Ridings wrote: >> If you have any of these metal, reloadable cassettes lying around, I >> could use them. >> >> I'll be using them, not collecting them, so it's user prices I'm out >> after. I picked up 10 for 25 pounds off of the auction place. >> >> I'd like to have around 40 (two rolls of bulk film). >> >> Preferably the kind that work with M's and backwards even with Barnack >> Leicas. The newer kind have a chrome knob and are about 2mm shorter >> (which is hard to verify unless you have both kinds, of course). >> >> I'm leaving for a few days vacation on Tuesday, so I might not respond >> promptly after 4 July, but I will get back to you. > > I have a number of these which I do not have for sale, as I use them. > I > use them on my M Leicas and on my LTM Leicas. I do not own a "Barnack > Leica" so I have no idea of that which your are speaking in that > regard. > > I even own a bunch of the LTM cassettes with live film in them which I > have > never had processed and which is probably dead by now. I probably > should > check this out. The film would have been shot around fifty years back. > > Marc > > msmall@aya.yale.edu I presume both Daniel and Marc are referring to the Leica reloadable cassettes. These are the brass cassettes in which the film travels along a curved channel. Turning the key which locks the camera bottom opens the cassette, obviating the possibility of grit scratches on the film from the velvet light trap of stamped cassettes. As Daniel notes, they come in two sizes. The first is the B cassette intended for the LTM cameras. Through a clever design strategy, Leica made the film chamber of the M series cameras about two mm. shorter than that of the LTM cameras, instantly obsoleting all the B cassettes. Leica then introduced the L cassette, 2.2 mm. shorter than the previous model. The L cassettes will work in the LTM cameras although they will rattle if you shake the cameras hard. Neither cassette will work in the M5 or the CL. I have never figured out if the B and L designations mean anything. If you really, really want to buy them, they are available on eBay for about $20. Older film loaders had a knob which would open and close the cassettes. Newer loaders don't. Leica admits that standard commercial film cassettes are perfectly satisfactory. All of Leica's other film cameras use standard commercial cassettes. There is little justification for using the Leica cassettes unless you reload stamped metal cassettes over and over. Porters sells heavy duty stamped cassettes for about $1 which will tolerate repeated reloading. Larry Z