What's With 141mm Standards on Arca Swiss F-Lines?

[Scott Fleming]

Nobody shows this size. I'm pretty sure I have all extant AS literature and it's not in there. I'm hearing this from Rod @ Photomark. He won't be back in till Tuesday and I'm impatient. I didn't realize he was telling me about something new and or different until I started looking around. He calls it a 141 series. It's not anything custom thru buying parts. I'm telling him I want a 4 x 5 Metric with geared Orbix. I'm not even looking at a collapsible rail. He says we are talking about a from the factory configuration. All the literature out there or what B&H shows is the classic 171mm standards or the 6 x 9 front with the 4 x 5 rear in the Field Camera. I know he's not talking about the Misoura either.

[Richard Martel]

Scott, have you seen these sites below?

A/S F-line field is a 4x5 with a 6x9 front standard that uses the 141mm lensboard.

http://www.tomwestbrook.com/Photography/arca_swiss.html
http://www.tomwestbrook.com/Photography/arca_swiss.html

[Scott Fleming]

Richard,

Thanks. Yes I've had that for a while. Maybe I just heard him wrong but I thought he (Rod) said that we're talking about a camera with 141mm standards both front and rear. He did say the bellows has a taper however. I'll get it straightened out on Tuesday I guess.

[Glenn Kroeger]

Sorry, but Richard is wrong. An Arca-Swiss Field uses 110mm front standard from the 69. But at Photokina 2004, Arca introduced new 4x5 standards that shrunk from the traditional 171mm to 141mm and now use the rotating locking clips ala the 110mm standards. This reduces the weight and size of the standard 4x5 cameras and the 4x5 field cameras. This 141mm standard was first used on the Misura and is now the new standard size. The newest 4x5 Field cameras now have 110mm front and 141mm rear and get the wonderful leather bellows from the Misura that have considerably more extension than the older 6x9-4x5 leather bellows. This new bellows can easily extend far enough to accomodate a non-telephoto 300mm lens, although one would need to use a rail extension. Arca also introduced a new shorter rail extension that works wonderfully with the new field camera.

Greg Miller (in thread http://largeformatphotography.info/l...00233.html#end) posted some excellent photos of the new field here:

www.gregmillerphotography.com/arcaswissfield.htm

[Scott Fleming]

Glen, a man with your responsibilities should be in bed by now. ;-)) Thanks for clearing this up. It all makes sense now.

[Emmanuel BIGLER]

Scott

In this article, at the end, you have a picture of the new F-classic, 140mm frames, with the new synthetic "square" bellows 140mm->140mm.

http://www.galerie-photo.com/une-vis...rca-swiss.html

The configuration you are looking for only differs by the "metric" function supports and "metric" geared-self-locking frames, plus the additional Orbix in front ; altogether both the classic and the metric have a very similar size as usual, the metric is slightly heavier, this is due to the extra weight of geared "metric" function supports. Metric frames are not heavier than classic frames. You can use metric frames on a classic function support, the dovetail clamp is the same.

At a first glance the new 140mm frames look like 110 mm / 6x9 cm frames with the same (and so convenient), "one-hand" rotating panel latch.

Off-topic : Arca-Swiss-o-philes will be happy to learn that the new 8"x10" misura is in progress ; new 8"x10" A/S cameras will share the same front 140mm standard common to 4"x5" and 5"x7" F-line "new". When we visited A/S last November with a group of French LF enthusiasts we could already manipulate the 8"x10" misura prototype and, of course, argue with the Vogt family about technical solutions they have impletemented for this new camera.

[Frank Petronio]

If Arca put up a simple website and explained what they were selling it would all be obvious. They should thank you guys for doing their job for them, but I am still confused as to what exactly to purchase to build a 141 system.

[Richard Martel]

Glen is right ..."never mind!"

[Glenn Kroeger]

Frank:

In Arca-Swiss speak, only the format-frames have changed. Rails and function carriers have remained the same. If you have a 4x5 field, you would purchase a new rear format frame, tapered bellows and spring back. If you have a regular 4x5F you would need new front and rear format frames, a new spring back and a new 140mm square bellows. BTW, I was very impressed with the new leather tapered (110-140mm) bellows, but less impressed with the new synthetic 140mm square bellows... but didn't have much time to manipulate them.

[Frank Petronio]

I just went back to Miller's photos. It is truly the ultimate camera at this point (except for the funky QR plate LOL). Now I understand why they made the Misura... but I wonder why anyone would buy a Misura with the new 140-110 field available?