Taylor, Taylor & Hobson lense set, convertible?, what can you tell me?

[harlingpt]

This is my first post to this forum though I have been lurking for a while. About 30 years ago I purchased a Sanderson Hand and Stand 4x5 camera with lenses. My idea was to fix it up and use it, but lacking a big enough enlarger, and being out of town a lot in those days, I never got around to it. Now my son is interested in photography prompting me to research this camera a bit.

I can find quite a bit of information about the camera, though I have not seen anything about its rear bellows extension. It also has a Heliar lense, which is pretty well documented. There are two other lenses about which I can find out almost nothing. One has no markings and the thread does not fit on the camera.

The other is a TTH lense set with 6 elements and I can find nothing similar on the web, including in searches of this forum. These elements make up different focal lengths labelled on the main part of the lense (containing diaphram) as W.A.R. FOC. 4.12 IN; R.V. EQ FOC. 8.44 IN; and R.R. EQ FOC. 7.4 IN. Elsewhere the lense is labelled Taylor, Taylor & Hobson, Leicester, No. 10111, and 6 1/2 x 4 3/4 No.3 CASKET. Individual lense elements are labelled W.A.R. FRONT, W.A.R. BACK, R.R. FRONT, R.R. BACK, and R.V. The lense box is labelled Taylor, Taylor & Hobson, Scientific Instrument Makers, Leicester, Eng. I think it probably dates to about 1912 or 1913.

So, I would be interested to know what you can tell me about this lense set. And, in more general terms how it fits together with the camera and other lenses as a kit - why this combination of gear, painted black (except the TTH lenses). Might it have been used for nature close ups or something similar.

Photos can be found at the following link. I apologise for the quality of some of them - my wife's point and shoot digital is difficult to control. The lense photos follow the camera photos.

https://picasaweb.google.com/Harling...thMacroBellows

Thanks in advance for your comments. This is a terrific forum.

Harling

[harlingpt]

Figures that after weeks of searching I post on this site and then find a very similar or even the identical set, on a Hong Kong website. No information though:
http://www.oldlensclub.hk/viewtopic.php?f=29&t=1127

[Steven Tribe]

This is what the Lens Vade Mecum says about your casket set. The VM is available at a low fee from CCHarrison here!
Yours is the Rapid Rectilinear set with the additional RV (Rapid View) meniscus landscape lens.
WAR means Wide Angle (Rapid) Rectilinear.

Caskets of RR, WAR and RV in the same sizes.
A casket set has been met with one barrel and glasses but with an extension ring to convert it from WAR to
RR perhaps, but it may have not been complete. These were continued in 1898 as an RR with a triplet Series
111 packaged as a casket. Possibly a WAR was the RR used. An unspecified casket was sold at No398x on
an Underwood of Birmingham 1/2plate camera

It is obviously the most expensive "option" with the best UK plate cameras in its time.

I think the Hong Kong gent is mistaken in saying his set is missing the "2nd" RV cell as these only have the rear cell. It is probably a spacer ring for conversion between RR and WAR that gives the empty section in the casket.
It may have still been available at the date you suggest, but is likely from the 1890's.

[akfreak]

Very Cool Camera and lenses. I would love to play with that glass. You son is going to ride first class getting to use that quality equipment. I hope he really understands how wonderful that stuff is. Really a nice kit!

[Emil Schildt]

uhmmm - that is a sweet lens set, I think.

I have a RP(portrait)V TTH lens (not casket) and I love it to bits!

[harlingpt]

Thanks for the feedback, and especially Steven for the information about this lense set. I agree that it is spacer ring or similar that is missing - there is one in my set and everything else he shows appears to be the same as what I have.

To make this camera really useable, its going to need a shutter - I know I can do longer exposures by covering/uncovering the lense, but that is not very versatile and requires experience too. The Goerz focal plane shutter is full of pin holes and redoing it is beyond my technical capacity. So, I assume that a shutter mounted on the lense is the way to go. Any suggestions for something that would work with these lenses, or if there is some other approach?

[Steven Tribe]

Making a good job of getting these focal plane shutters work is beyond anyone!
I would thought that it would be a good idea to get hold of Thornton-Pickard (T-P) front mounted simple shutter as your current selection of lenses have the same the same mounting size. There are more simple solutions and more expensive one (copal/sinar shutter). It is also possible to mount a modern shutter (Copal, Prontor, Compound ) as a rear extension - in front of the lens board. The old iris control is maintained, whilst the shutter gives exposure times. You would have to find a shutter type which has a front thread the same (unlikely) or slightly larger with a short adapter section. Renes, here, has shown how well and tastefully this can be done.

[harlingpt]

Thanks! research time again. I am feeling a bit like I did 30 years ago when I bought the camera - that there a lot of paths I have to go down before I will ever be able to take that first photo with this camera.

[harlingpt]

Updating this thread - the original link to photos was changed by the host sometime. At this time the following link is working for me on different browsers so I hope it works for you as well: https://goo.gl/photos/oAkHHQYj3wShWr7r5

Also, I have not got the camera working - so many variables. But this year I am getting serious about it and hope to get a shutter that works, fix light leaks (if any) and make some images with it.

[Steven Tribe]

Yes , the link works well!

Since the original posting (2011), I have have seen a few of these sets (complete and uncomplete!) listed and I managed to get one of the poorly described sets!

It is interesting that the position of the iris housing is such that the maximum aperture for the RV is much faster than in the standard RV (rapid view) from T,T & H. Which means it has virtually the same characteristics as the legendary RVP (rapid view portrait) version from T,T & H.

Taking a fresh look at the photos, it looks like the focal plane shutter is a version of the Goertz Ango shutter, which should make refurbishment easier!