Introducing myself and brown FED 1b from 1935

Hello everybody,

I am Ulrich from Germany, a collector of russian cameras since some years (but using them since decades, my first one was a Revueflex B).
Some of you may know me from the Zenit-yahoo-group (Hello Juhani and Guido :-).

In the last weeks I've had mail contact to Vlad, I have told him of my early FED 1b from 1935 that has a brown(!) leatherette. It looks real, not only heavy used, because the whole camera looks as it is new.

It woulb be nice if anyone can what kind of FED this is, I post some URLs to the pictures:

Here is the brown FED 1b from 1935, serial 13743 (with the depression under the speed knob):




compared to a FED 1b with serial 23537:





The vulcanite of the early one is complete different to the later one (and they are only 10.000 numbers away), the early one lokks brown, it is much more finer and feels smoother. The camera itself is very well made, cocks very smooth and releases quiet (compared to a Leica from 1934 it is better!).

Maybe someone knows anything about this kind of early FED? Why is the vulcanite so different? The one with serial 23xxx doesn't cock so smooth and looks a bit more rough.

Best regards
Ulrich
Btw. take a look at my collection under
http://fotos.cconin.de/kameras
I also sell some duplicates of my collection and am able to repair them :-)

http://fotos.cconin.de

Hello Ulrich,
and welcome to this forum .. good to have you here and your collection site is very nice!

I have several FED-1 cameras from this time, with the same vulcanite. In most of these that I have seen, the color can range from black to brown or even a blackish-green. I believe originally they were black (or actually, very, very, dark gray ... maent to be black) but with time the color changes to a dark brown or dark gray-green. I don't believe that they were meant to be these colors, but that is how this specific vulcanite changes with age.

I agree that FED-1 examples from this period of 1935 and early 1936 are very well made and operate quietly and smoothly. This kind of vulcanite is very beautiful and that is a beautiful example you have shown us! Thank you.

I have just checked and I have only one with this kind of vulcanite. Serial No. 12820 and it is looking slightly faded and brown-green.

Regards, Bill

Ulrich, welcome and good to see you on our forums! These cameras are absolutely beautiful, did you get them in this perfect condition or you have some cleaning secret? It would be great if you could share it with us.. I especially have trouble cleaning the corrugated knobs...

Bill, this is very interesting, is the FED vulcanite the only one you know that changes colors? You think it's from sunlight?

Vlad

Hello Bill and Vlad,

thanks for your answers. I also have several FED 1, but never have seen on that has this brown vulcanite (only ones that were heavily used that have a brownish look). All others I own are black and have the rougher vulcanite.

Vlad, I polish the cameras with NevrDull, that gives them a shiny finish. And I clean the curled knobs with a toothbrush and lighter fluid :-)

Here is another pic of the two FEDs compared side by side in daylight, the brown finish is better to see then:

http://fotos.cconin.de/temp/feds.jpg

Ulrich

http://fotos.cconin.de

Hello Ullrich!

Thanks to show such beautiful Feds! Vlad is right: if you have a secret...
I possess several 1b (in fact nine, now), and my # 12840 is exactly as your 13743: very thin brown vulcanite. I never saw such a vulcanite outside of the 12xxx-14xxx range and I think the dark brown colour is original. But why that vulcanite?
Generally, the vulcanite is black (your 23xxx is an ordinary one, as far as I know) , dark grey or green-black and I agree with Bill: it's impossible to say if it changed with age...

I'm going to have a look at your collection now....

Amitiйs. Jacques.

I have noticed on the examples of FED-1 with this same covering that I have looked at (maybe 4 or 5), that when the lens is taken off and the vulcanite next to the lens mount is examined closely, it is darker next to the mount for about 1/8". Also if you look closely at the texture, with magnification, you will see that the indented "cracks" to the texture are darker than the higher surfaces.
All of this leads me to believe that the color has changed from darker to lighter over 75 years of aging, heat, ultra-violet light (the most likely changing source). Vulcanite is not naturally black ... it is colored with lamp black and other substances to make it that color. How stable these added colors are, the exact texture of the surface, and how much exposure to heat and ultra-violet light, among other factors, will determine the color changes of vulcanite over the years. I have seen this brown color on other objects that have vulcanite coverings also, and always with close examination you can see some variations where the material did not age in exactly the same way.

Regards, Bill

Ulrich, thank you for the toothbrush and lighter fluid tip, I will try it tonight! NevrDull... I have to try find it in USA... is it abrasive?

Vlad.

Hello Ulrich and welcome to our Forums!

Regards,
Aidas

Hi Bill,

Certainly you are right about the colour. UV are really bad: we know that too for vulcanite and leather for books, for example.
But what about this special vulcanite which seems to appear only between c. 12000 and c. 14000? A problem of stocks for Fed? Between these numbers, the normal rough vulcanite seems completely absent...

A fine collection, Ulrich!

Amitiйs. Jacques.

Vlad,

NevrDull isn't abrasive. It's kind of cotton wool with petroleum (it smells so) and wax. Just rub it on the metal without much pressure and clean it after some minutes with a dry cloth.
A box with about 160 grams costs 5 EUR here and lasts very long (one box in 2 years until now).

Ulrich

http://fotos.cconin.de

Btw. the 1935 FED came with original attestat, instruction booklet, a table for measuring and the bill from 1936 :-) Nice to have all the matching things together.

http://fotos.cconin.de/temp/feddoc.jpg
http://fotos.cconin.de/temp/fed352.jpg

Ulrich

http://fotos.cconin.de

Thank you Ulrich, I will try to find it.. by the way the toothbrush+lighter fluid works magic! But I broke 2 toothbrushes cleaning 5 cameras yesterday I used those cheap plastic ones, since the good ones I keep for my teeth .. I guess will have to get some kind of industrial one, just for that purpose.. But it did clean off 80-year old dirt, I was very impressed.. Now is there a cure for the brass that shows from rubbed off silver surface of the cameras? How about rust spots?

Thanks,
Vlad.

Vlad,
Never Dull is good. If you put in a search on Ebay you will find some and many hardware stores have it. But, I have used it for years on antiques and I can say that on soft polished metals such as silver or some polished brass surfaces, it can leave "micro-scratches" so not true that it is non-abrasive. These scratches will not be visible on the matte chrome of a FED, but I would worry a bit to use it very hard on a Kiev where the chrome is smoother and can easily become shiny, if rubbed, instead of matte. So, the stuff is good, but be careful with it. The best non abrasive metal polish is Simachrome. Best for everything! but a bit more expensive.

Regards, Bill

Thank you Bill, I will look into the Simachrome! By the way I've received a FED Siberia from DVDTechnik today, but as most of his cameras unfortunately the letters on top were filled in with black.. a little bit of lighter fluid, a little bit of Brasso and a toothbrush took care of that! .

I don't know how I did not think of toothbrushes before, I've used q-tips and cotton pads, but Ulrich, now I've discovered a whole new level of cleaning! Thank you!

Vlad

Hello Everyone,

Here are two photos I just saw of a FED-1, serial number 133404, with the kind of smoother covering we have been talking about that can be brown. This example shows how the covering can look when black and partially turning brown. So, this is why I think that these cameras were originally black, but sometimes turned brown with age, probably due to unstable dyes in this particular formula of vulcanite:





Regards, Bill

Hello Bill,

I had seen that camera and I wonder if it's not just the contrary: an original dark brown vulcanite turned to black with dye! The #12-15xxx look more fine and regular, if I can say.

This #133xxx is surprising: it's the first time I see such a vulcanite in these numbers. Anyway, the screw of the viewfinder and the lens are not original, but of course it doesn't say anything about the vulcanite!

Amitiйs. Jacques.

Hi Jacques,
Yes, I have thought that too and there would be no way to know unless you could look at the camera held in your hands and with magnification. However, I would say two things I observe ... always on the brownish ones you can see black in the crevices of the textured pattern of the vulcanite ... always you can see a darker area just next to the lens mount. This leads me to believe that it was once black, or close to black, and has changed over the 70-80 years, probably from a combination of ultra-violet light, heat, and handling.

Also, two other observations or thoughts. I am an antiques dealer and so I go to the flea markets and there are often piles of old cameras. I have seen this exact changed vulcanite on other cameras from this general period and it always has the same look, which is dark in the crevices of the texture and a sort of brownish-green which is almost translucent looking on the higher surfaces. Also, many times uneven like the photos I just posted.

And, why would anyone think that FED would suddenly decide to use brown for 6 months when all of the other original FED-1 cameras always had black. To me it seems more likely that this type of vulcanite was just not very stable, possibly even a reason it was discontinued. To me, more likely than FED decided to buy brown vulcanite for any reason of fashion or creativity, especially when FED was trying to make the camera be just like a Leica which was always black.

Anyway just my opinion and I know that having a brown FED is a more attractive idea.

Regards, Bill

Thanks Bill.
Certainly you are right. To be sure, there is only one way: to unscrew the lens plate of a "coloured" body and to look what is under.

I will tell you what I find in a while!

Amicalement. Jacques.

Well; I took three bodies and uncrewed the lens plates to have a better view...
And with my magnifier, I examined all that:

- my #12840 shows a dark brown colour on the whole surface of the vulcanite. And this colour is perfectly homogeneous: we could have expected some discoloured or black marks at the places where fingers hold the body. It's not the case. There is nothing in the crevices of the texture, except that same brown.
- my #54229 shows a very dark green vulcanite, with a grain less coarse than the regular black bodies and different too from the much thinner #12840. The colour once more is homogeneous, and there is a very small place where the vulcanite was superficially cut as if with a razor blade (perhaps Alain? I bought this camera from him!). This very place shows the same colour, though the superficial part of the texture was removed.
- to compare with a Leica, I have in hands one of my Leica II D "Couplex", a 1934 one. I have chosen it because of the vulcanite which looks brown. No doubt: it's because of age and use: the crevices show some black dye. Idem for my 1933 Leica III with a very dark brown vulcanite.

So Bill I cannot fully agree with you. But perhaps it would be useful to open a special topic for the different kinds of vulcanites (grain, colour, thickness) which were used by Fed: I have just taken out my # 5330, 8528, 10020, 20251 and I realize that if all the four are black, the first three have a coarser vulcanite than the last one. I prefer not to look at the others!...

Amitiйs. Jacques.

OK Jacques ... good idea, and I will take the take the lens plate off of my body # 12820 and report back with the results too!

Regards, Bill

Hello Jacques,

here it is the same, the brown colour is homogeneous up to the edges, also directly to the lens mount and the top and base plate.
My Leica from 1934 has also a brown body but there I can see that this is a sign of heavy use, the black colour weares off. There are black parts near the lens mount and at places where the fingers weren't.

Ulrich

http://fotos.cconin.de