Re: Which M camera

[henningw@portal.ca (Henning J. Wulff)]

Last November I posted:

I bought an M4-2 new shortly after they came out. Two months later I was
hiking in the mountains, with the camera and an equally new 35mm Summicron
hanging from my shoulder by the official strap. Suddenly the camera fell
onto rocks, destroying both itself and the lens. The eyelet to which the
camera strap was attached had loosened from the body. Leitz replaced both
the camera and lens immediately (the passport was not yet invented). I was
never able to have the rangefinder adjusted properly, and what adjustment
there was, never stayed put. From my first IIIg and Ig to my present M6's,
I've never had such a dog.

With respect to durability; my Nikons need regular servicing (both before
and after nasty failures), and the lenses have shown all the variability
from sample to sample that anybody has ever complained of; my Leicas have
failed in various ways over the years, and the lenses in a whole range of
new ways (just ask me!), Canons have had a strange variety of electrical
problems......

There was more to this post. Some cameras _were_ durable.

All this might seem like an extraordinary string of bad luck or gross
mishandling, but note that I have had over 50 35mm bodies and over 300
lenses over the last 30 years, plus medium and LF stuff, so the results
aren't really that bad.

My oldest M6 seems as durable as my (1971) M4 at this point, and my fairly
new M6 doesn't seem any worse. All stay adjusted about equally well, and I
have enough confidence in them to use them regularly (which confidence
faded pretty rapidly with the M4-2).

Some comments about the M5. The metering was good, the shutter speed in the
viewfinder excellent, the shutter speed dial overhang very good (but as
mentioned before, a bit too loose), and the overall quality very good. The
size and shape annoyed me more and more as I owned the camera, and the
flapping semaphore also started bothering me more. I thought I would get
used to these things, but it got worse. I sold it after about 3 years.


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