Point & Shoot maker Ricoh buys PENTAX! The horror!!

I think their Sensorex was the first with a meter on the mirror - which
allowed interchangeable finders while retaining the metering.

My old favorite Topcon Super D had it too, but later I think.

 

Ricoh "acquired" back then too. It was rumored at the time that they
made the Nikkorex for Nikon as well as the Nikon mount Ricoh Singlex.
Mamiya actually made the Nikkorex - and Ricoh bought the design, so no
surprise they eventually went to the same Pentax screw mount the
infamous Mamiya-Sekor used.

 

That's interesting too. I wasn't aware of those non-Miranda "Mirandas."

 

Yep, they did. I have no idea what the reason was for Zeiss using a screw
mount on the Contax S.

At that time (the time of WWII or thereabouts), at least one of the old
Zeiss factories was in Russina-occupied East Germany, and there seems to
have been some confusion as to brand names used. I believe the Contax S was
also sold under the "Pentacon" name, but at what time period and what the
reason was I don't know.

Exactly right. Canon used a screw mount similar to Leica, and Nikon S-series
rangefinders used a bayonet mount like the Contax, but I understand the
Japanese mounts were not necessarily identical to the German ones in either
case.

 

My original Spotmatic still had the M42 screw mount which changed to
the "K bayonet" mount when I replaced it with my K1000.

 

Outside the U.S. they are quite well known as a camera maker. For
whatever reason they decided not to continue to sell their cameras in
the U.S., except via one NYC retailer, Adorama.

Clearly it's too late for Ricoh to enter the D-SLR market and Pentax is
so far behind the market leaders that it's a very strange acquisition
unless it was just to prevent Pentax from shutting down. 125 million is
just a token amount.

 

Rich wrote:
: >
: >
: > > On 01/07/2011 12:43 PM, RichA wrote:
: > >> I pity Pentaxians. But Ricoh as a company has acquired more than a
: > >> few other companies over the last 10 years to boost its position in
: > >> various markets. I wouldn't worry about a name change, Pentax is the
: > >> name they want, Ricoh isn't well-known as a camera maker.
: > >>
: > >> http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1036&message=38795593
: > >>
: > > Ricoh has made cameras since 1936.
: > >
: > > Ricoh was a SLR maker for eons, they used the M42 (Practika/Pentax
: > > screwmount, and in the mid-1970's switched to the Pentax K-Mount. They
: > > were an OEM maker of some of the Sears cameras.
: > >
: > > http://camerapedia.wikia.com/wiki/Ricoh
: > >
: > >
: > > Mike
: > >
: > >
: > >
: >
: > Second-tier maker. Pentax, Nikon, Canon, Minolta and Olympus were the
: > most well-known in the SLR days. Ricoh, Mamiya, Fuji, Konica, etc.,
: > brought up the rear.
:
: Ricoh "acquired" back then too. It was rumored at the time that they
: made the Nikkorex for Nikon as well as the Nikon mount Ricoh Singlex.
: Mamiya actually made the Nikkorex - and Ricoh bought the design, so no
: surprise they eventually went to the same Pentax screw mount the
: infamous Mamiya-Sekor used.

I recall the name "Mamiya-Sekor", but nothing else about it. What was it, and
why was it infamous? If I'd had to guess, I might have said it was that TLR
with interchangeable fronts. But I don't think that had a screw mount. ;^)

Bob

 

They were pretty big in the early days of digital too. My first digital
camera was a Philips ESP80 which was a rebadged Ricoh RDC-4300.
Excellent camera for the time, but they forgot the optical viewfinder so
it didn't do well against the Nikon and Olympus competition.

 

A 35mm slr - two models, a 500DTL & 1000DTL - the only problem was the
QC - every one of them sold at the local pro photo store got returned as
defective.

They sold like crazy because there was a spiff on them - so the salesmen
pushed the hell out of them.

Once they got refurbed, they performed as well as any low end slr with a
mediocre lens.

Their TLRs weren't bad, but the first gen. of their 6x7 format RB67 slr
lenses had that QC problem - they apparently used the wrong viscosity
lube on the leaf shutters and they'd stick and hang open. Once again, if
you were lucky and got them fixed under warranty, they performed fine
thereafter.

Pros don't like to be beta testers, so I'm sure it helped sell a lot of
'blads.

 

....snip...

I had a TLR and perhaps it was a freak, but it had the best lens of
any camera I have had since. I also still have an RB67. I didn't ever
have the sticking leaf shutter problem, but the weight of the camera
was a huge drawback. With the prism finder attached, it was like
carting around a bag of house bricks. Optically the standard lens was
good, but not so good were the 250 and 360 lenses.

 

Because its M42 mount was different than the others.

 

Why "infamous"? I had a couple of Mamiyar/Sekor 1000DTLs in the '70s and
they were very nice cameras. Gave me no problems of any kind over the years
I owned them.

Not the TLR, no. But Mamiya made a few 35mm SLRs, for some reason named
"Mamiya/Sekor," that did have a standard M42 screw mount. The 1000DTL model
had an interesting dual TTL metering system (hence the "DTL"), switchable
from center weighted to spot, that worked very well. A couple of earlier
models did not have the dual TTL system.

 

The Mamiya/Sekor had a standard M42 screw mount, at least as far as using
preset lenses was concerned. There may have been some difference with auto
diaphragm lenses.

In those days I used preset lenses (other than the auto 55mm that came with
the camera) because they were generally $40 or $50 cheaper than the same
lens with an auto diaphragm.

 

The Mamiya M42 lenses had a lip around the edge (the aperture ring)
something like the old Nikon F lenses and like them, they would have been
incompatible with most other M42 cameras, the lenses wouldn't have
screwed in correctly. They also had a slot-lock like Nikon does today.

 

I don't remember any of that, but then the auto 55mm that came with the
camera was undoubtedly my least used lens. Certainly I never had occasion to
try the Mamiya/Sekor 55 on a different make of camera. My 1000DTLs accepted
and used standard M42 preset lenses with no problem.