It took 40 years

[joelbolden]

Forty years ago in 1984, I was just getting ready to retire from the Navy. One of my last tasks was to wander over to the main base and take some old electronics over to property disposal. When I walked through the gate there lay a huge box literally overflowing with various models of Rolleiflex TLR's and Graflex. Some were still set up for 120 film, some had been modified to shoot 35mm. I grabbed the first 10 Rolleiflex's and a couple of Graflex and took them back to my division and handed some to a couple of friends who were also into photography. Saved 2, a 2.8F Type 1 and a Model T, plus a Graflex for me and 2 of the 2.8F's for my dad who was an avid photographer. I recall taking a roll with the 2.8F and all the pics came out heavily scratched; which put a damper on my enthusiasm for Medium Format. Fast forward 40 years and I had started shooting with a Yashica Mat-124G and was loving it; so I hauled the 2 Rolleiflex's out of the wooden drawer they'd been sitting in all these years. The 2.8 is in bad shape; the door latch is frozen open and the Shutter is sticky. The Model T, which was considered the "beginners" Rolleiflex seemed to be working OK, so I put a roll of Gold200 through it as a test roll. I received the scans this morning and lo and behold everything looks good. So now I have two working MF's; one with a lot of memories to it. As far as the 2.8F Type 1 goes I may have that repaired, but the cost from what research I've done is borderline stupendous. Here's some shots from the test roll; all 12 came out nicely. Not bad for no battery/light meter...

 

[wobe]

Those shots look great .
Have never tried medium format but can see myself trying it out at some point.

 

[webestang64]

Nice! Always loved that double lens hood.

 

[ClintLloyd]

As I've said before, I won't be venturing into this type of photography personally but I like hearing these type of stories because I think all avenues of photography are really cool. Great stuff indeed!

 

[Thomas V]

Oh my gosh, what a find that was!

 

[cgw]

Nice. Film real estate matters--the more the better!