Rangefinder query (Contax iiia)

lindsay

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Lindsay
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I have thisZ-I Contax ilia, in very nice condition and with a working selenium meter. However the rangefinder is out of alignment. From what I read online, this is unlikely to be economical to fix, but I am wondering if it can be worked around easily. Obviously I could just use zone focusing and with a narrower aperture I could get away with that probably, but...
if I get the two images in the rf to align so that one is directly above the other, ie that they are horizontally aligned if in landscape orientation, would that imply that the focus is ok?

Thanks in advance for any guidance

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They are immediately one above the other. When I look from the front of the camera at both windows, I can see the light through both but they are not vertically aligned
 
That sounds like it will be fine. Maybe run a cheap roll through and check, measure out a few known distances and see how it looks.
 
That's what I'm doing - but do you think it'll be ok-ish if I align the images one above the other, it's likely to be in focus? That's my assumption. It's too nice a camera to become shelf ware
 
For close focus it might be quite difficult to get it bang on without the overlap but for that you'll just need to stop down to compensate otherwise yeah it'll be fine.
 
Thanks @steveo_mcg . @AndrewFlannigan that is an interesting site and certainly explains what I'm seeing. I'm going to shoot off a roll of film through the Contax and see what it produces, then decide whether to CLA/repair, but if I do, I'd prefer a UK repairer rather than send it over the pond.
 
When I want to test rangefinders, I use a decorative fence along the Witham bank. This has finials every two metres and a number of vertical bars in-between. Using the widest aperture, I focus on the finials in turn using the rangefinder. If the rangefinder is calibrated correctly, the finial I focused on will be in good focus and I can use the other vertical bars to estimate depth of field.

The vertical displacement should not be a problem of itself but if it is the result of a knock there might be other problems.
 
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