Re: Slow Escapement Speeds

[Fred Ward <fward@erols.com>]

Ben,

You must have missed the rather extensive discussion of this topic last
year.

We have all had this problem one time or another with M cameras. (I have
never had this problem with any other make of camera.)

I believe you can trace this to two things, which seem to work together
to make this happen just when you want to use slow speeds.

Lack of use.....   and some dirt.

What happens with M cameras is that people do not usually use the 1/30
and slower speeds very often. When not used, the grease used by Leica
(which is obviously different from that used by other camera makers)
seems to harden more than usual. And if there is any dirt in there to
mix with the Leica grease and make it thicker, the problem is worse.

Solution......

    Every month, take out your cameras and fire off 5 or 6 frames each
at all the slow speeds, 1 sec, half sec, quarter second, etc.  If you do
this routinely you will most likely never have this problem again. 

Cheers.

Fred Ward