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  #1  
Old 22nd February 2012, 02:32 PM
dave shutter dave shutter is offline
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Default Ross Ensign 820 Folder

Firstly thanks to everybody who answered my post re Isolette, I am well impressed at the quality of the beast.
Are these foldersaddictive, the wife is in a state of panic!
I have purchased an Ross Ensign 820, Please has anybody got operating instructions for it?
Kind regards,
David
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  #2  
Old 22nd February 2012, 03:56 PM
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Xpres Xpres is offline
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BUtkus again... Here
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  #3  
Old 22nd February 2012, 05:32 PM
Richard Gould Richard Gould is offline
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Dave There is not a lot to learn, I have an Ensign Selfix 820, amongst my collection of Ensign's, 4 to date, and the 820 is a terrific camera, one tip is to make sure the film is held under tension with one hand while winding onto the start marking, otherwise it can end up winding lose, and be careful when using the 6x6 mask as the first negative is very close to the tape, I find it better to get the tape off the film in the dark before developing the film, other than that it is very easy to use, and yes, if your wife is like mine then she should start to worry as I find these old folders are very addictive indeed, so far I have 7 MF folders, and 5 35mm folders, and they all get used, Have fun with the camera and let us know how you get on,
Richard
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Old 24th February 2012, 07:55 PM
KevinAllan KevinAllan is offline
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Dave, I presume you paid less than £4000 for yours ... a Ross Ensign 820 recently sold for just under £4000 on eBay ...


http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/3103794880...d=318431157756

I find this rather puzzling !
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Old 24th February 2012, 08:20 PM
TonyMiller TonyMiller is offline
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That is unbelievable! Perhaps the point in the starting price of £1250 was missed off and they decided to leave it.

cheers, Tony

Quote:
Originally Posted by KevinAllan View Post
Dave, I presume you paid less than £4000 for yours ... a Ross Ensign 820 recently sold for just under £4000 on eBay ...


http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/3103794880...d=318431157756

I find this rather puzzling !
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regards,

Tony
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Old 24th February 2012, 08:42 PM
Mike O'Pray Mike O'Pray is offline
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I am a little confused as I am trying to piece it together from start to finish but going backwards but what sounds to be an experienced seller pitches it at £1295 as a BIN price which once bidding starts is no longer available and it sells for nearly £4000?

Have I got this right? So a "quick off the mark" buyer could have bought for £1295 and immediately put back on e-bay and sold for over 3 x the amount? Strange that the experienced seller had underestimated its market value by over 300%

What do good condition Ross Ensigns normally sell for and I wonder what the seller's next 820 Ross Ensign will be pitched at?

Mike
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Old 24th February 2012, 08:54 PM
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It was an Autorange though, with the coupled rangefinder and has been serviced, which does seem to have become a cult camera. Recently they have been selling around £2000 so this is exceptional. There is one at the Vintage and Classic Camera Co going for a mere £2400. One with an uncoupled rangefinder is £250 at the same dealer. More mundane models are a lot cheaper, say £150 or less.

If you want one another has just gone on the auction site starting at £100 and yes the buyer does know about the £4000 job. Needs a bit of work though but could be an investment opportunity!


Bill

Last edited by Bill; 24th February 2012 at 09:11 PM.
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Old 25th February 2012, 07:57 AM
Richard Gould Richard Gould is offline
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That does seem very high, even for an Autorange, which is pre the Ross era at Ensign, I have seen then recently, in good condition, serviced, for the £150 to£200 mark, and even that would be more than I would pay for one, much as I like Ensign's I prefer the the Selfix range, with the Ross Express Lens, as far as a Ensign with Coupled rangefinder, I think the Ensign Commando, which was made during and after the last war, to be a better buy, and I would have thought the Commando to be a better investment, they were made in smaller numbers and for a much shorter period than the autorange,
Richard
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Old 25th February 2012, 08:51 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Richard Gould View Post
That does seem very high, even for an Autorange, which is pre the Ross era at Ensign, I have seen then recently, in good condition, serviced, for the £150 to£200 mark, and even that would be more than I would pay for one, much as I like Ensign's I prefer the the Selfix range, with the Ross Express Lens, as far as a Ensign with Coupled rangefinder, I think the Ensign Commando, which was made during and after the last war, to be a better buy, and I would have thought the Commando to be a better investment, they were made in smaller numbers and for a much shorter period than the autorange,
Richard
Doing a bit of research I think the 820 Autorange was possibly the last camera made by Ross Ensign and was fitted with the Ross Xpres lens. The production period appears to be between 1955 and 1958. The company appears to have folded by 1960 or so. There were earlier Autorange cameras for example a 220 and a 16-20 that I have found. The Commando was an earlier camera finishing production in 1950 and was fitted with an Ensar leans. I think they used different focussing methods. There was also an 820 Special with the uncoupled rangefinder. This appears to be the cheaper model but not as cheap as a standard 820 with scale focussing.

Bill
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Old 25th February 2012, 10:52 AM
Richard Gould Richard Gould is offline
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The Commando was a Ground breaking in it's day, the Focusing is at the film plane, and is coupled with a built in rangefinder, and is a 6x6 camera, with built in masking in the form of hinged flaps for 645, and it works very well indeed, I can speak from personal experiance as I have and use one, Stopped down to 5.6 or 8 the ensar lens, which was the in house standard in the pre Ross days, is pretty good, although it was uncoated, I had an auto range that was again pre Ross and I did not like it, Ross Barnet Ensign folded in 1961, their big mistake was in not making any form of 35mm, although I think they had a design, they would not put it into production, the only ''Minuture'' camera they made was the Ensign Selfix 16/20, which simply could not compete with the 35mm cameras which became market leaders, but the ensign cameras were considered very high end cameras in their day, the equal to anything from Germany, and were market leaders,and today have a very strong following among collecters of Usable classic cameras, the only weakness can be the Episolon shutter, which was made in house, but I have yet to find a bad one, normally if there is a problem it is simply dirt, and they are one of the easiest to service, as they are fairly simple, and as long as you follow one fairly simple rule,and NEVER,EVER, change shutter speeds from the faster speeds,(25 and above) to a low speed(10 and lower),while the shutter is cocked, which will cause the shutter to complain and damage the slow speed cam, A mistake I made on my first Ensign, and treat them as the 60 year old cameras they are, then they are capable of terrific results, and get one with the Ross xpress lens and you have a very good camera indeed, well worth getting and using, I have 4 of them, and love the results I get from them.
Richard
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