Bronica rf645 135mm lens

rowghani

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Anybody had any experience with this lens? I've read there's focusing issues but I'd rather hear it from someone who's used it. Thanks in advance.
 
The story is of manufacturing tolerances stacking up to cause a problem in focusing at wide apertures. This only affected random camera and lens pairings, and some more than others. So a solution offered by the UK importers "tuned" the camera and lens more closely to their nominal standards as necessary for accurate focus.

Tamron, having just purchased Bronica at the time, had a different solution: Recall all 135mm lenses and replace them with new 100mm lenses, and recall all bodies for viewfinder mask change to replace 135mm framelines with 100mm.

One of my RF645 bodies has the older 135mm frames but I never found a 135mm lens to use on it... So, I regret not being able to share personal experience with one.

Camera bodies with serial numbers starting with "11" were originally supplied with 100mm framelines. Bodies with serial number starting with "00" originally had 135mm frames and may or may not have been converted on recall.
 
Camera bodies with serial numbers starting with "11" were originally supplied with 100mm framelines. Bodies with serial number starting with "00" originally had 135mm frames and may or may not have been converted on recall.

This is a helpful information. Mine has a serial number starting with 00 and I thought about getting a 100mm lens. :confused:

Is there an option to check what frameline shows up without having the lens?
 
To determine whether an earlier body has the retrofitted frameline mask, remove the lens; the camera will now display the "long lens" frame. If this is the 100mm frame, it will have open space on either side of the RF spot equal to about twice the spot's width. If it's the 135mm frame, it will have open space on either side of the RF spot equal to only about the spot's width.
 
Just checked the camera and it has the 135mm framelines. No problem, I think I will use with the 65mm lens only. Next week I travel to the Alps region for two weeks equipped with the Bronica as my main camera and lots of bw film. The camera is not too heavy to carry it in the hiking backpack for a couple of hours.
 
Have a good fun trip! The camera is great for carrying... compact and not heavy, in my experience.
 
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