Ilex Paragon 6.5" f/4.5

[cyrus]

I have come into possession of an Ilex Paragon 6 1/2 inch f4.5 lens in a No. 3 Ilex Synchro Electronic.

Never had of these before. There are two posts but no shutter release. Hmmm...
Anyone else familiar with this?

[Mark Sampson]

Semi-educated guesses: It's probably a Tessar-formula normal lens for 4x5, made post-WWII in Rochester. It may be that the later ones may have been labelled "Ilex-Calumet Caltar". I'm not familiar with that shutter, which suggests 1960s-70s, but "two posts" sounds like the old bi-post flash synch. Or could they be the connection for a seperate control box?

[Dan Fromm]

Y'r new Ilex Synchro Electronic shutter is sort of spring powered, electronically timed. A solenoid opens it against a spring, and when the solenoid is de-energized the spring closes it.

To use it you need the electronic control box, which will connect to a cable that connects to one of the two pairs of posts. The other pair of posts is for flash synch.

This site http://www.chemie.unibas.ch/~holder/ has directions for making and programming a control box.

But since your shutter has only one pairs of post, not only is it useless (no control box), it is damaged.

I hope you paid little for it.

Sorry,

Dan

[cyrus]

Y'r new Ilex Synchro Electronic shutter is sort of spring powered, electronically timed. A solenoid opens it against a spring, and when the solenoid is de-energized the spring closes it.

To use it you need the electronic control box, which will connect to a cable that connects to one of the two pairs of posts. The other pair of posts is for flash synch.

This site http://www.chemie.unibas.ch/~holder/ has directions for making and programming a control box.

But since your shutter has only one pairs of post, not only is it useless (no control box), it is damaged.

I hope you paid little for it.

Sorry,

Dan

Thanks - no it is two pairs of posts but I'm not about to build an electronic control box, so I guess I'll use the lens elements by themselves or maybe a packard or something. Anyway, it was practically free - can't beat free :p