Assembling the Calumet 540

[Terry Christian]

Greetings, all --
I'm a member of APUG and have been meaning to jump here for a while. I shoot all formats, but have been meaning to give my Crown Graphic more love and have also recently added a Calumet monorail: a 540, I believe (though it could be a 45NX).

Anyway, when I received it in the mail I had a bear of a time getting the standards onto the monorail, and I want to be able to disassemble it efficiently in preparation for a trip I'm taking soon. I feel stupid asking this, but is there some sort of release mechanism to allow the rail to slide out of the standards easier? I had to pretty much force it on and I just know there has to be a better way. I just can't seem to find it, much as I've examined the thing.

Thanks in advance for any insight any of you could offer me on this. I love the camera and hope to do a lot of shooting with it very, very soon.

--Terry.

[Merg Ross]

At the end of the rail on the NX, on the left side, there is a very small silver pin; push it in and remove the standards from the rail. Perhaps this will work with your Calumet version.

[Terry Christian]

No luck there -- but thanks! My Calumet has aluminum rails, and the only thing near the ends are small screws to evidently keep the black endcaps from coming off. Taking off the screws and caps would make disassembling the camera easier, but the caps don't remove quite that easily and I'm hoping for a less invasive solution.

[Marko]

Hi Terry,

Yes, that is definitely a 540 - I have the same camera and there is no hidden secret, just that little screw at each end. I find it easier to leave the standards on the rail but rotate them sideways (around vertical axis) so they get flush with the rail. That way, you end up with a flat package that can fit into a suitcase, although still 18 inch long.

The best way, of course, is to get one of those cases where you simply hang the entire camera off the rails. They are big, bulky and mostly heavy, but they are best suited for the task.

Hope this helps.

Marko

[Terry Christian]

Thanks for your help, Marko - I've heard your same suggestion elsewhere before about flattening the standards for storage, and that indeed sounds like the best option. I'll start looking around to find some sort of case that will work for carrying it that way.