IR safe bellows for Chamonix/Arca Swiss

[Vic Montaigne]

Hello everyone!

Up to now I shot IR rollfilm with my Hasselblad. And luckily I do have Efke 820 IR rollfilm stocked. But anyway, although still quite new to LF, I would like to prepare and be ready to use my LF equipment for IR, too. I suppose the bellows of Arca Swiss Metric (171) will be safe (can anyone confirm this?) but probably this camera is not exactly what I will enjoy to carry around in the field, so in most cases it will have to be my little much respected Chamonix.

After reading this thread it is however very obvious that the universal bellows of the Chamonix 45N-2 is not safe for IR use. My special thanks to Vinny for establishing this fact without any doubt!

Two questions remain:

1) Can anybody say for sure (that is from practice) that the original Chamonix wide angle bellows (made of supple leather) is safe for IR? I know leather should be, but there are also the frames, and I'd just like to know for certain.

2) Which is the exact model of the Shen Hao bellows that could replace the Chamonix 45N-2 universal bellows for IR work? And is it of the same type or is it shorter?


Many thanks,

[vinny]

I use shen hao bag bellows and shen hao regular bellows on my chamonix 45n-2. I believe their hz and ptb cameras use the same frame sizes. Jeff at badger can tell you w/o a doubt. He'll also tell you that the shenhao ptb bellows won't allow use of a 450mm lens. I use a 450mm w/mine all the time. As I said in that thread, the shenhao standard bellows I have are better for IR than the chamonix universal but they still allow some IR in so either work fast or just stick with what you have and make mylar covers like others have.

[Vic Montaigne]

Oh, if the Shen Hao bellows does not block IR light completely it might indeed not be worth buying one solely for this purpose.

So Mylar is the only solution fully up to the task... The Mylar mentioned propably refers to the aluminium coated version of boPET that is used for emergency blankets, please correct me if I am wrong. Well, I might give it a try. DIY all over in LF...