Michael Ross
Member
Here we have the 'before' shots of my competition-entry-purchased £4.99 Yashica FX-3:
A pretty sorry sight you'll agree? Soon to be transformed with a new set of VH Black leatherette panels from cameraleather.com as reviewed on this site recently. I had to resist buying the Lizard Skin kit at $48, settling for the VH at just $14.10 including postage, or £9.35 sterling. The kit looked like this:
I suspect Morgan runs cameraleather.com as a side-line as the kits are made to order and took nearly a fortnight to arrive, so not for the overly impatient.
The first job was to strip off all traces of the old perished covering, including the film-wind lever and the delay-shutter lever. Removing the covering on the delay-lever revealed a number 0 ISO screw retaining the lever which also needs to be removed:
The next stage involved white-spirit and elbow-grease to remove all traces of the glue that held the original panels.
When the body was completely dry I started to apply the new panels. I used a fine flat-bladed screwdriver to push the edges of the panels into place:
Here you can see why the lever needs to be removed:
And finally, the end result:
Full marks to cameraleather.com for the fit of the kit, it was incredibly accurately cut and very easy to apply. All I need to do now is get some black enamel paint to touch up the metal-work a bit and my £4.99 bargain will look as good as new again. And I might treat it to a new set of light seals. And I'm going to need another camera-bag as I've already bought two more lenses from eBay with the Y/C bayonet and the next nice day we get I'm going to put a reel of Fuji Velvia through it. Drat you Hamish, I thought I'd gone digital!
A pretty sorry sight you'll agree? Soon to be transformed with a new set of VH Black leatherette panels from cameraleather.com as reviewed on this site recently. I had to resist buying the Lizard Skin kit at $48, settling for the VH at just $14.10 including postage, or £9.35 sterling. The kit looked like this:
I suspect Morgan runs cameraleather.com as a side-line as the kits are made to order and took nearly a fortnight to arrive, so not for the overly impatient.
The first job was to strip off all traces of the old perished covering, including the film-wind lever and the delay-shutter lever. Removing the covering on the delay-lever revealed a number 0 ISO screw retaining the lever which also needs to be removed:
The next stage involved white-spirit and elbow-grease to remove all traces of the glue that held the original panels.
When the body was completely dry I started to apply the new panels. I used a fine flat-bladed screwdriver to push the edges of the panels into place:
Here you can see why the lever needs to be removed:
And finally, the end result:
Full marks to cameraleather.com for the fit of the kit, it was incredibly accurately cut and very easy to apply. All I need to do now is get some black enamel paint to touch up the metal-work a bit and my £4.99 bargain will look as good as new again. And I might treat it to a new set of light seals. And I'm going to need another camera-bag as I've already bought two more lenses from eBay with the Y/C bayonet and the next nice day we get I'm going to put a reel of Fuji Velvia through it. Drat you Hamish, I thought I'd gone digital!
