Emmanuel Bigler has given me permission to post the full e-mail that he sent me about these pre-1984 Arca-Swiss components and their compatibility with more recent components. Emmanuel lives in Besançon, where Arca-Swiss is located, and knows rather a lot about these cameras:
Regarding Arca Swiss lens boards.
Old A/S logos usually denote pre-1984 A/S Oschwald products.
But 171 mm boards are compatible between pre-1984 Oschwald and modern 171 mm F-line products.
- Pre-1984, i.e. Oschwald 171 mm lens boards are fully compatible with all modern F-line 171 mm cameras;
- If any lens comes with such a 171mm lens board, be it a pre-1984 (flat) or modern F-line (slightly recessed) you can mount any 171x171 mm A/S lens board directly on any modern 171 mm F-line camera;
- regarding smaller lens boards intended for 6x9 cameras, but actually very useful for 4x5 and 5x7 A/S cameras as well (all my lenses so far are mounted on a 110 mm 6x9 A/S F-line lens board), pre-1984 6x9 Oschwald lens boards for the 6x9 cm format differ with modern F-line cameras.
- 6x9 Oschwald lens boards are 109x109 mm square with round corners, and most of them have a notch on top;
- 6x9 F-line lens boards, the current ones, are 110x110 mm square, round corners, no notch.
So as a summary
- if you have a 171 mm A/S camera, either a pre-1984 Oschwald or a modern F-line, any 171 mm A/S board, old or recent, will fit;
- if you have a pre-1984 Oschwald 109 mm lens board, it will directly fit only pre-1984 6x9 Oschwald cameras;
- if you have 110 mm lens board with no notch, it will directly fit only a modern 6x9 F-line camera with 110 mm standards, or any camera, any brand, fitted with an adapter plate from F-line 110 mm A/S to [your A/S or non A/S camera].
If a smaller 109 mm or 110 mm lens board is mounted on a A/S or 3-rd party 171 mm adapter plate, il will fit any A/S 171mm camera, be it pre-1984 Oschwad or modern F-line.
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Originally Posted by r.e.
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