Thanks for all the replies. In the link below you'll see that I have a K and an S2 along with two lenses. I don't know which lens was original to the K or the S2. I put the 55 mm lens on the S2 and it works beautifully.
When I lift the dial to select the shutter speed it not only doesn't fall on the number, it won't go down even with pressure. After pushing and rotating it a bit, it will find a place and go down; the dial then will spin. I can't imagine how this could possibly work. One thought though, would having film in this camera possibly change the way it is behaving? I'd prefer to not destroy a roll of film just to test this out.
Also, can anyone provide any information about the 135 Super Takumar lens? I've seen plenty of info about the Auto-Takumar but not the Super.
One thing to note here is that my wife's grandfather, who passed away about 3 years ago, was a very serious amateur photographer with top of the line equipment, all of it in near perfect condition. It just doesn't make sense to me that he would keep this K model that didn't work properly. FWIW, along with these two Asahi Pentax cameras, we got a Nikon F3 with 6 Nikkor lenses and a Leica M6 with a 35 mm Sumicron Asph lens.
Asahi Pentax Cameras - Album on Imgur
---------- Post added 03-03-16 at 04:16 AM ----------
Originally posted by TomB_tx The K is more rare than other early Pentax, and brings higher prices. The shutter speed dial should only be changed AFTER winding film (cocking the shutter) - as on all the old "rotating" shutter dial cameras, which are based on the Leica shutters used by Leica from 1925 to 1954. Non-rotating shutter dials which could be set before (or after) winding film appeared on new models in the mid 1950s, largely from the Leica M3. It took a while for other makes to phase in new designs with all speeds on a single, non spinning dial. Canon changed their Leica copy rangefinder models to a rotating dial that could be set before winding, before adapting the single non-rotating dial on their VI series.
I still use several older models with dual dials. I learned not to wear gloves with them, where the glove may rub on the spinning dial ans slow down the shutter.
Your last sentence suggests that the dial spins with some tension, like the line that, say, points to 500, spins
with the dial and remains pointing at the 500. Is that the way it should work? My dial, the outer portion with the numbers, spins independantly from the inner dial with the line.