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RE: Fixing bellows on a WIsner 12x20

Jorge Gasteazoro — Tue, 25 Dec 2007 13:44:16 GMT

Thanks Eriik, I used vinyl paint used to restore office furniture. It worked good and I was able to paint the entire bellows, I still have some corners with leaks but an extra coat will take care of that.

RE: Fixing bellows on a WIsner 12x20

Eirik Berger — Tue, 25 Dec 2007 13:18:25 GMT

I had the same problem with a 4x5" monorial I once had. The first months I just used it with wide lenses, the leaks did not affect the imaces when the bellow didn´t stretch.

I used some silicone I had on a tube and mixed it with black powder pigment that I had from my gum bichromate days. The silicone is somewhat transparent. It worked very well, the silcicone stayed flexible for years.

But my leaks vere minor, this approach may not work if you have large leaks.

Good luck Jorge, an let us now if you find out. Hmmm a 12x20 camera? I have a dream that I one day will make large contact copies. :crying:

RE: Fixing bellows on a WIsner 12x20

kjsphoto — Fri, 07 Dec 2007 12:52:34 GMT

You could also use body latex, black, not shinny. I used that stuff to patch the bellows on my deardroff. It also dries extremely quick. I got that tip form a camera repairman! I used a QTip to first lay it on the inside where the areas I needed to patch then, used my finger to slightly smooth it. The stuff from the camera store is very expensive and the latex works just as well....

RE: Fixing bellows on a WIsner 12x20

Jorge Gasteazoro — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 11:16:21 GMT

Paper paste will probably become to brittle and flake off after a while...but this is the kind of out of the box thinking I am looking for.

RE: Fixing bellows on a WIsner 12x20

roteague — Tue, 04 Dec 2007 20:09:25 GMT

Have you thought about using some rice paper paste? It seems that might work in areas where there is a lot of bending, like on a bellows. I'm sorry, but I don't know where you could get it though. Just a thought. Let us know how it turns out.

Fixing bellows on a WIsner 12x20

Jorge Gasteazoro — Tue, 04 Dec 2007 11:35:21 GMT

So here is the story. I bought a Wisner 12x20P on E bay. I knew the person who was selling it, him being a memeber of the LF forum. He said he has not used the camera but a few times and when I got the camera it looked like it was new. So, I used the camera and was not happy with the results. Negatives had a lot of fog which I could not figure out where i came from. Well, this past week I had a workshop student and when we developed his negatives I saw the same results. We tested his camera and it had both, pinholes and lens flare.

So to make a sotry short, I then tested the bellows on the Wisner and the tape they used to make the bellows is not light tight. I pass a flashlight along the edges and all four sides on all the corners have leaks that are clearly visible. So what to do? Any ideas? A new bellows is out of the question, the moron glued the back of the bellows to the camera, besides, it would be more than I can afford. Putting tape to the corners would make closing the camera impossible, so...my ideas was to use some of the neoprene B&S sells to fix belloes, but before I do I wanted to post this to see if anybody had any brilliant ideas... :)