Remembering My Father Part II: Repairing His Beloved Cameras
This past March, my dad Thomas Schneider passed away. He left behind a few things including a silver money clip, an Omega Speedmaster, and two cameras: a Nikon F and a Nikon FTN.
As I wrote in his obituary, my dad was an avid street photographer. He spent the 1960s and 1970s traveling extensively around the United States, Mexico, Japan, and Europe with his two cameras in tow. He captured some wonderful moments and the art he made with them hangs like a gallery in his home. While they have spent the majority of the last few decades tucked away in an old camera bag in his office thanks to the advent of digital cameras, I wanted to pay homage to his memory by picking them back up again and giving them another opportunity to see the world — or, rather, allowing their original owner’s son to see the world through them.
They were in rough shape. While the Nikon F still worked, it felt stiff. The FTN, on the other hand, was jammed and inoperable. Both were dinged up and grimy and the lenses my dad left with them had also seen better days. They not only needed a tune-up and cleaning, but some pieces of his kit also needed a full repair. After publishing an episode of The PetaPixel Podcast where I said I was looking at options to get them fixed, KEH reached out and offered both condolences and to bring my dad’s cameras back to life.
I had no idea KEH even did repairs, but it makes sense. Since the company specializes in pre-owned (used) equipment, it tracks that it would want to make sure gear was in good working order before sending it out. To do so, it keeps a huge inventory of parts that it can tap into when needed. It’s not easy to find working parts for long since discontinued cameras, especially film cameras where the parts haven’t been made for decades.
When Pentax decided to make a brand-new film camera, the Pentax 17, it said the most difficult aspect of the project was sourcing the mechanical parts.
“We have an extensive supply of parts cameras for most all older cameras and parts won’t be a problem for us,” Bill Tomlinson, a Senior Repair Technician at KEH and who cleaned my dad’s equipment, tells me.
“We have literally thousands of new parts and parts cameras on hand. KEH has bought stores and many times we receive very old but new parts. Our team has several seasoned camera techs with well over a hundred years of experience. We also have hired apprentice techs that we are currently training and we are looking for more. I believe what suits us for these types of repairs is our availability of parts as well as our highly trained technicians.”
While I do think that if you are like me and need to get a vintage camera or lens repaired, you should try and find a local solution. However, I recognize that’s not always going to be an option for everyone. The small town where my mom and dad live doesn’t have a local camera store let alone access to the parts and people with the expertise to repair a camera from the 1960s. In that case, KEH’s repair services are very handy.
The starting repair rate for an SLR is $225 as shown on KEH’s repair web page.
My Dad’s Cameras Restored
I mailed KEH my dad’s cameras and, a couple of weeks later, they returned to me looking nearly brand new. Except for a few dents in the camera bodies — I consider them physical memories — they looked and felt incredible. It was a night and day difference from when I sent them off.
The repair technicians told me that the condition of my dad’s cameras was pretty typical of the age — they’d seen some in better shape and some in worse. On old bodies like these, issues are usually caused by old lubricant.
The technicians cleaned and removed the grease, re-lubed the parts where needed, flushed the curtains and slow-speed governor, and then re-oiled the parts. They calibrated speed and run times and replaced the light seals. On the lenses, they removed all the old helicoid grease and replaced it. They also cleaned the aperture blades, all the optics, and collimated the lenses.
KEH said none of the equipment showed impact or water damage, which was nice because that apparently isn’t uncommon for cameras of this age.
“I do enjoy working on older cameras because of the quality of work that goes into the manufacturing and detail that is somewhat lost,” Tomlinson says. “I see customer letters from time to time that mention the camera was their parents or grandparents and it is very satisfying to know they will be running film through a camera that is so special to them.”
Once the gear was back in my hands, I attached a strap and drove out to Blue Moon Camera and Machine in North Portland — which came highly recommended multiple times — to pick up some film. I also picked up a new lens there based on Chris Niccolls’ recommendation: a Nikkor 28mm f/2.8 AI-S. Next on my list is a 24mm f/2.8 — my dad’s lens of choice, although his copy went missing years ago — and perhaps a new 35mm.
I am not a great street photographer, but I hope that someday maybe a few of my captures will come close to the standard of work he set. At the very least, a little part of my dad will always be with me now.
Disclosure: KEH is a sponsor of the PetaPixel YouTube Channel but had no input on the content of this story. Unless otherwise noted, photos by John Loudermilk.
