photax
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Post by photax on Apr 17, 2010 10:33:49 GMT -5
Hi ! I finished this restoration-project today: A 75cm long ( 29.5 inch ) ca.1918 “Torpedo-Type” projector for 8x8cm glass-slides. Found it for the equivalent of 35.- USD in poor, but complete condition a couple of weeks ago. I disassembled it for the main parts ( pic 2 ), later I disassembled it completely, replaced a few screws, sanded and glued together the wooden parts, polished the metal with a paste that’s used for cleaning motorcycle chrome parts ( took me 3 hours  ), let the brass parts take a bath in the good old homemade salt acid, cleaned the lenses with glasses cleaning clothes and assembled it again. Only thing left is repairing the old broken cord with the porcelain plug. The lens is a “Emil Busch AG Rathenow” F=15cm”. Emil Busch was a German optical industry, founded in 1801. The son of Carl Zeiss had been an apprentice at the Emil Busch Company. In 1948 the company became a VEB ( company owned by the people ) in East Germany. In 1989 the number of employees had been reduced and it still does exist. MIK    |
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PeterW
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Post by PeterW on Apr 17, 2010 20:24:47 GMT -5
A very nice and painstaking restoration, Mik.
I also use an acetic acid (the cheapest of cheap synthetic vinegars) and salt bath for cleaning old brass after I have removed any lacquer with paint stripper. It works very well.
Rathenow, a little to the west of Berlin and almost becoming a suburb, has a fascinating optical history. The Emil Busch company is one of the oldest optical companies in Germany. It was founded by a pastor, Johann Duncker, in the late 1790s. Emil Busch, who eventually took over, was a nephew of Johann Dunker's son Edouard.
The Busch factory was fairly small, and much of the assembly work on microscopes, binoculars and spectacles as well as camera lenses was carried out by "outworkers" who worked from home under contract, sometimes with machinery and other equipment supplied by Busch.
Many of them eventually started their own companies, and about the time of World War I there were nearly 170 small optical companies in the still fairly small town of Rathenow.
Most of them made binoculars, microscopes and steel-framed spectacles using lens elements from Busch and from Carl Zeiss. A few made brass-bound camera lenses, and on rare occasions these turn up with an "unknown" name followed by "Rathenow". They had ready-polished lens elements from Busch or from Carl Zeiss.
In 1927, a year after the formation of Zeiss Ikon, the Zeiss Stiftung (or Zeiss Foundation) bought the majority of the shares in Emil Busch to get control of the company. Lens production stopped a year or so later but production of cameras, binoculars and microscopes carried on using Zeiss lenses.
In the 1960s, Rathenow was firmly inside the DDR (East Germany), and on one of my spasmodic trips "behind the curtain" digging out industrial stories I visited Rathenow hoping to find and photograph the Busch works which had become a VEB. The factory had been bady damaged during the war, and the VEB was operating from what might be described as a patched-up factory shell. Very disappointing.
Unfortunately, photography of it was verboten, and when the East German Volkspolizei said verboten they meant it, so I didn't try to sneak any pictures even though I was carrying a camera and carrying West German and Russian, as well as UK, accreditation as an industrial photojournalist.
I've never been back there, but I understand that after German reunification Zeiss regained control of the factory from the Treuhandanstalt, the (somewhat corrupt) agency set up to privatise the VEBs. The number of employees and outworkers had dropped from about 3,000 to under 800.
Zeiss rebuilt the factory which I believe is still in production making Zeiss-designed industrial optical equipment, but I haven't heard of any cameras being made there. I don't know how many of the smaller optical companies remain.
PeterW
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Post by nikonbob on Apr 18, 2010 7:28:51 GMT -5
Yes, a very nice job of restoring the old girl. You have far more patience and skill for that than I do.
Bob
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mickeyobe
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Post by mickeyobe on Apr 19, 2010 14:07:01 GMT -5
MIK,
That is a very handsome and professional restoration.
Mickey
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), let the brass parts take a bath in the good old homemade salt acid, cleaned the lenses with glasses cleaning clothes and assembled it again. Only thing left is repairing the old broken cord with the porcelain plug. The lens is a “Emil Busch AG Rathenow” F=15cm”. Emil Busch was a German optical industry, founded in 1801. The son of Carl Zeiss had been an apprentice at the Emil Busch Company. In 1948 the company became a VEB ( company owned by the people ) in East Germany. In 1989 the number of employees had been reduced and it still does exist.
