I've started again!

[PeterW]

Hi,

I know I said I was still pruning my accumulation of cameras, but I've already started spending some of the proceeds.

I just happened to be browsing Ebay (like you do) and spotted this one as a relisting, I must have missed it first time round. I checked the completd listings and no-one had shown the slightest interest, either because the flip-up eye-level viewfinder was broken or because he had just listed it as a 1930s Kodak folder.

This time with 6 days still to go it still had no bids, but had five watchers so I emailed the seller and asked what he would take as a Buy It Now price. After a friendly exchange of emails we agreed on a very reasonable price, including post and packing, he altered the listing to incude BIN and I bought it.

Yes, it's a Kodak folder, but not just any old 1930s Kodak snapshot folder. In quality it's as different as chalk from cheese. It's a Vollenda 620 made in 1934-35 in the ex-Nagel works at Stuttgart.

Cameras designed by Dr. August Nagel are one of my collecting interests. Nagel also designed the Retina and, when he was with Zeiss Ikon, the Ikonta. You can see the family likeness to the Ikonta even though the self-erecting struts are different.

It arrived promtly and well packed. The seller said it needed 'tidying up' but when I got it I was pleasantly surpised. Ten minute's clean and polish and it looked 'Excell +'. The shutter works nicely and the lens is clean and clear.

I might have a viewfinder that will fit it up in one of my junk boxes, but if not I expect I'll find one soon if I ask around. It came with a 620 spool, handy; plus another 620 spool and empty backing paper, even more handy.

It's not the top of the range, but it's a Nagel I hadn't got. It's got a 'Kodak Anastigmat Kodar' f.4.5, but it's not the same as the US-made Kodars. This is a German lens (the word "Kodar" has the opening quotes at the bottom, German style). Nagel bought a lot of lenses from Schneider, and I suspect this may be a rebadged Schneider Radionar, a medium-priced triplet.

Anyway, here it is


When I get a chance to respool some outdated FP4 120 I'll see how it performs. I read in one forum that a Vollenda 620 will accept a 120 spool if the diameter of the end flanges is slightly reduced. I tried a spare spool to see, but it won't. It may have done way back when 120 spools were wooden with thin metal end flanges, but with its thicker plastic flanges a modern 120 spool is nearly 1.5mm longer than a metal-flanged 620 and it won't go in. I wonder if the guy who wrote that info had ever tried, or was just relaying out-of date information?

PeterW

[mickeyobe]

Peter,

You might as well face it. You are addicted to the C.C. ailment. Be happy with your lot.
That gorgeous old Kodak is my kind of camera.
And just think - much of it is organic which makes it tres au courant.

Mickey ( A fellow happy addict )

[Randy]

If the bellows has no light leaks you've got a gem. Very nice camera Peter. I use my dual 120/620 camera to respool.

[doubs43]

Peter, that's one of the most interesting Kodak cameras I've seen. The body - as you point out - looks like the Ikonta except for the name on it. Any idea who made the shutter? It looks like a much higher quality camera than the run of the mill Kodak.

Walker

[PeterW]

Hi Walker,

The shutter was made by Alfred Gauthier of Calmbach - you can see their small 'AGC and shutter blade' logo just under the lens. Gauthier made a range of shutters from the three-speed Vario up to the multi-speed Prontor S.

This is their four-speed Pronto, about halfway up the list. There were a number of different models of Vollenda, the 6x9 'upright', the 6x6 'sideways layout' similar in looks to the later Ikontas, and some delightful compact 16-on-127 versions. Top of the range models were fitted with either Zeiss Tessar or a Schneider Xenar in a Compur shutter.

To take th story of Kodak in Europe a little further, not many people realise that almost all Kodaks made in Europe in the 1930s were designed by two brothers, August and Hugo Nagel.

Kodak bought the Nagel camera factory in Suttgart in 1931-32 as a European base for making high quality cameras, and very wisely left Dr. August Nagel with the minimum of interference as technical director to produce what he thought best, provided he came up with the goods. This he did, and designed all the cameras made by Kodak AG in Stuttgart from 1932 to 1939 with his masterpiece probably being the Retina.

He died in 1943 after a career of almost 40 years as a highly respected camera designer. All his cameras were high quality and established Kodak AG as a force to be reckoned with in the German camera industry alongside Zeiss Ikon and Voigtländer.

German Nagel Kodaks are quite sought after by collectors but just now and again, as with this one and a Duo Six-20 which I bought a few months ago, a seller on ebay will list one just as a 1930s Kodak folder and it doesn't attract much attention.

August's brother Hugo moved to Kodak at Harrow, in north London, in 1932 to set up a Kodak design team independent of that in the US, and catering for the lower half of the market. He was responsible for most of the UK Kodaks in the 1930s, box cameras and folders, aimed at the snapshotter and 'moderate' amateur.

He was less well known than his brother August, but was a brilliant production enginer as well as a camera designer, and all Harrow-made mass-produced Kodaks offered excellent value and almost complete reliability at a low price - though with the mass-production techniques, almost everything crimped or riveted together on assembly alignment jigs, they weren't the easiest of cameras to repair. Hugo Nagel is reputed to have said he was more concerned with low-cost reliability than with repairability.

Not very many Harrow Kodaks were exported to the US, but in the UK and, to a lesser extent on the mainland of Europe, Kodaks designed by the two Nagel brothers offered 'something for everyone' and took a quite comfortable share of the market, from snapshoters up to advanced amateurs.

PeterW

[doubs43]

Peter, that post is a history lesson in European Kodak production and the contributions of the Nagel brothers. Both are worthy of being remembered because no matter how much we admire and desire quality gear, it's a rare company that can survive without catering to the masses who take snapshots with inexpensive cameras. Without the rank amatures and the large numbers of people who buy the box cameras and other simple tools of our hobby, we'd be paying a whole lot more for our better quality and more-featured gear.

A great post.

Walker