Wow! Something unusual and actually on topic. In a relatively rare
ocurrence I pulled the focusing rail off the bellows and attached the
focusing stage. When the rail was pointed down about 45 degrees with
camera mounted I noticed that the focusing stage had a tendency to slide
down the rail. In order to prevent that, I had to tighten the lock knob
on the stage much more so than the lock knob on the rail.
I tightened the adjusting set screws on the stage and was able to add
sufficient tension that it is now much closer in operation to the rail.
It doesn't slip now but slides smoothly and locks with only a little
bit of tension on the lock knob. But, of course, it couldn't end
happily there. At some point I grabbed the top of the camera and
noticed that, even though locked in place, the focusing stage was able
to rock to one side about 10-15 degrees.
Inspecting the nylon "slideways" (official Oly term) I can see that the
V-cut is the same width in both slideways at their widest point.
However, the angle is different and the width at its narrowest point is
a full 4mm wider than the same nylon slideway for the bellows rail. The
adjustment screws and lock knob allow most of this slack to be taken up
but not enough to prevent the rocking mentioned earlier.
On inspection of the inside of the slideway I can see gouges and scrapes
and what appears to be casting bubbles that have broken the surface. I
think this is a piece that escaped the close inspection of the Oly
inspectors.
I assume that this little nylon block is no longer available and would
be happy to entertain suggestions as to how to rememdy the problem short
of having a machine shop make a new one.
Chuck Norcutt
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