Nikon DP-3 Restoration #believeinfilm

A year ago I bought one of the now well thought after DP-3, the latest and greatest Finder for the/my trusty Nikon F2  – BUT for Non-Ai systems – turning it into a Nikon F2 SB. Not that many were produced, Nikon introduced the Ai-system and with it DP-11 and DP-12 for the Nikon F2 A and Nikon F2AS respectively. The Finder was pretty beat, lacking the ASA knob, having dings and dents and appeared to be non-functional.

Some weeks ago I sent it in for restoration to Sover Wong, the venerable Nikon F2 repair/restoration guru and now it is serviced. 

Sover found “a lot of dust inside” and “some fungus” and corrosion, which meant no electricity reached the electronics.

The fungus was properly eradicated and the finder put back into order. I opted for a new top LED for a brighter display of shutter speeds and aperture selection and for a new ring resistor to replace the old worn one:

old and new:

New top LED:

New contacts added:

Put together and measurements calibrated:

Got me some 250ml brown glass bottles with glass stoppers and put my Kodak HC-110 into them. Flushed out the air with inert gas. That should keep. So far I have used about 125ml and this due to my use of the Mod54/Paterson tank combo (1l liquid each time). The BTZS-tubes reduce that a lot.

Got some plastic stackable containers to keep my chemicals separated and in order (and safe)

I managed to provisionally mount my Rodenstock Grandagon 6.8/90 in a recessed Linhof lens board, though I am waiting for the proper spanner to make the flange really tight enough. I have to work out sth. for my cable release because the recessed lens board has a Linhof Quickrelease   socket. The Grandagon arrived after all against all odds via Sydney, Australia Customs office (!). I got the lens from a seller in the US and it was properly labeled and stuff. 

Things still to do:

Fix cables/electricity in darkroom

Fix the darkroom lamps

Fix big clock for the darkroom (it’s not glowing in the dark but it was cheap)

Fix shelfs properly to the wall

Wait for lens board for my Liesegang (a friend of mine is working on it, might take some time) or try a better temporary one from cardboard

Make it dark in the darkroom ;-) 

Things to consider:

Building an f-stop timer