RE: [Leica] M Durability

[Marc James Small <msmall@roanoke.infi.net>]

The early M's were built to different engineering standards than are the
later ones (M4-2, M4-P, M6, M6TTL).  The reasons have little to do with
"declining standards" and much to do with changing industrial circumstances
and radical evolution in marketing realities.

The early M's were built when Leitz benefited from the hiring of large
numbers of war-disabled German veterans.  Leitz received a hefty tax credit
for doing this -- and had the benefit of a work force of dedicated and
skilled workers who were simply glad to have a job in a Germany only slowly
climbing out of the economic chaos of the War.  These workers had pretty
much all retired by the early 1970's, one of the factors behind the
decision to shift gears with the M5.  The workforce over the past 30 years
are still skilled and dedicated workers -- but they are not as capable a
force, all in all, I suspect, as the earlier generation -- and I suspect
they also lack the pride of workmanship which so marked the workforce in
the 1950's.  So, in that sense, an M3 might well be "better built" than is
an M6.  But, as the American radio commentator, Paul Harvey, would -- and
does! -- say, there's "the REST of the story".

During the 1950's, Leitz sold its products through locally-owned camera
stores for the most part.  These stores all had one or more repair guys on
their staff, and they were afforded the opportunity to send these guys to
free schooling on the repair and overhaul of Leica cameras and gear.  Thus,
a camera store owner in Raleigh, North Carolina, or Walla Walla,
Washington, could buy a train ticket to and from New York City for his
repair guy and pay him to stay in a hotel and buy him his meals, and the
result was a trained repair guy.  Kodak offered a similar course on the
same terms at this time, as well.  

The big pay-back to the camera store owner was that Leitz then recommended
that their cameras be CLA'd annually.  So, a new Leica owner would be back
a year later to have his camera checked out by the repair guy.  While he
was in the store, the store folks could ensure that the camera owner was
subjected to a sales pitch on other Leica gear and could be reminded to buy
some film and filters and the like.  It was a nice trade-off for all
concerned.

By the 1970's, the locally owned American camera store was becoming a thing
of the past, and many stores were laying off their repair guys.  To meet
these changing conditions, Leitz reworked the M4-2 design from a concept
with a large number of adjustable parts to one with relatively few
adjustments.  Thus, the later M6's have a longer MTBF in many cases -- but,
when repairs are required, they are often of a more serious nature than
with the earlier ones.  (Pop did a side-by-side illustration of an M2 or M3
and an M6 some years back, showing these differences in some detail.)

There is also the matter of materials.  West Germany lacked reliable
supplies of really high quality materials for the first fifteen years after
the War, and this often comes back to haunt the older cameras.    The
problem with the M3 rewind knob illustrates this perfectly -- Leitz had to
redesign the shaft twice and had to upgrade the materials used before
getting it right with the "two dot" design.  (There were some problems with
1950's era lubricants, as well, and, of course, with the wet "drip"
coatings used on Leitz lenses until the Zeiss vacuum-coating technology
became public property in 1958.)

So, is an M3 more or less reliable than an M6?  Which one is "better"
built?  It all depends on your definitions, and it is a difficult call to
make.  In the end, most M3's have been maintained at least to some degree
over the years and probably have had the most likely problems already
occur, so that they are now in a long-term user-friendly condition.  I find
my M3 DS and my M6 about equally reliable -- both have been in the shop
once in fifteen years, and the M6 is now in-shop for an RF adjustment I was
too lazy to do myself, while the M3 will then go in to have its advance
tweaked.  And, then, I suspect, I'll have fifteen years more great service
out of both of them, at the least.

Finally, the RF separation problem is a real one, but there are guys out
there who are fully capable of repairing the problem for a substantial fee.
 The work required is difficult in the precision required but is not all
that difficult.  Leitz and Leica, after all, DX'ed these for years and it
is far from impossible that the RF assembly in an M3 today has been
replaced by a rebuilt one at some point over its service life.

Marc

msmall@roanoke.infi.net  FAX:  +540/343-7315
Cha robh bąs fir gun ghrąs fir!

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