[lotech]

I was looking for an old Pentax mechanical manual SLR with metal shutter curtain the other day but can find none, the closest I can get was the K2 and LX, but both are electronic that I don't want, I don't know of any other Pentax mechanical SLR with metal shutter curtain or I missed ? I don't know why Pentax chose to use cloth shutter in most of the models, where my first entry level SLR the Yashica FX3 used metal shutter already, I believe it was released about the same time as the K1000. I know cloth shutter is more silent and cheaper to produce, but it is not as reliable as metal one especially on vintage cameras, of course there are exceptions such as Leica. I'm not a Leica person so I don't know much about it, but as far as I know Leica used cloth shutter up to the M6. On the other hand my Fujica ST801 has cloth shutter that can go up to 1/2000sec that suited most needs, so speed is not the main reason to use metal curtain, then what's the reason for choosing one over the other ?

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Last edited by lotech; 05-06-2023 at 12:22 AM.

[Not a Number]

Cloth shutters are cheaper. I think the MX was the last Pentax to have a cloth shutter. The Program/A series certainly have metal shutters.

[Wheatfield]

I suspect it was economics. Pentax was very much competing on price and cloth shutters were less expensive.

[lotech]

Cloth shutters are cheaper. I think the MX was the last Pentax to have a cloth shutter. The Program/A series certainly have metal shutters.

I wished MX used metal shutter, it's the best mechanical Pentax I know of, I always compare it against the Konica Autoreflex T3n which has metal shutter, both are beautiful, practical no gimmick.

[Dartmoor Dave]

I'm still using the same K1000 that I bought back in 1980 and the shutter works as well as it ever did without ever having needed any servicing. And lots of members here are using Pentax cameras as much as 20 years older than that.

The "cloth" shutters in Pentax SLRs are actually rubberised silk, so they are a lot stronger than you might think.

[lotech]

I'm still using the same K1000 that I bought back in 1980 and the shutter works as well as it ever did without ever having needed any servicing. And lots of members here are using Pentax cameras as much as 20 years older than that.

The "cloth" shutters in Pentax SLRs are actually rubberised silk, so they are a lot stronger than you might think.

Yeah, I've never heard of cloth shutter failure on Pentax cameras, but some other vintage RF with jam, leak and fall apart curtain, the Soviet made ones especially and I had enough, so that I started looking for fixed lens RF with leaf shutter, but will also grab a Spotmatic, btw is that Spotmatic II or F the best of the family ?

[jcdoss]

What about current DSLRs? What are their shutters made of?

[lotech]

What about current DSLRs? What are their shutters made of?

Vertical travel metal shutter like the Super A on the K3

[rpjallan]

I think the MX was the last Pentax to have a cloth shutter.

I think you are right. The ME Super had a metal shutter & I'm pretty sure the ME did as well.

I bought my MX in 1979 & the shutter curtains look as good as new...

[Bob 256]

Cloth shutters mainly came out of old technology and new technology led to ways to build a metal shutter mechanism. With that came costs, however metal shutters have several advantages including durability (though failure of metal shutters also happens). The weight of a cloth shutter limited its sync speed to under 1/100s in most cases while metal shutters offer considerably higher values. Metal shutters usually are more complicated than cloth shutters and more delicate (pretty thin blades). The metals are chosen for corrosion resistance since the blades ride against each other and have to work like an iris of sorts. They also cannot warp or binding can happen. Cloth shutters are simply two separate shutters, one in front of the other. One falls away to be replaced by the second curtain (or they both travel together presenting a slit to the film in the case of higher speed exposures).

[grog85361]

I bought my SP500 in 1972. I has been used a lot, stored in less than ideal conditions at times. It still works fine. I have had and sold several Spotmatics, and none has ever had a problem with the cloth shutter curtains. I would say that the cloth shutter is quite reliable.

[Dartmoor Dave]

I bought my SP500 in 1972. I has been used a lot, stored in less than ideal conditions at times. It still works fine. I have had and sold several Spotmatics, and none has ever had a problem with the cloth shutter curtains. I would say that the cloth shutter is quite reliable.

Yep, you know that the cloth shutters in Pentax cameras are reliable. And I know that the cloth shutters in Pentax cameras are reliable. Everyone who owns a Pentax camera from the 60s or 70s knows that the cloth shutters are reliable.

But what we've got here is one of those threads where someone has decided that a metal shutter just has to be better and will ignore any evidence to the contrary. So in six months time people on the internet will be saying, without any evidence at all, that Pentax cloth shutters are soooo unreliable.

And then it will be true, because people on the internet are saying it.

[Not a Number]

I recall Modern/Popular Photography advising to not keeping the shutter cocked/tensioned for prolonged periods of time. The tapes connecting the curtains to the spindles can stretch. Only some slack can be taken up with adjust but at some point either the tapes or the curtains and tapes need to be replaced. I have heard of shortening the tapes by trimming them as a fix. I always try to make sure I press the shutter button on my film cameras before storing them.

[lotech]

I did not say Pentax in particular has cloth shutter failure, and so far I used few Pentax SLR with cloth shutter were around 20yrs old automatic models, and none of them has shutter problem. I prefer metal over cloth/silk shutter due to my pass experience with Soviet RF of high failure rate.