Does it harm the Graphex Syncromatic shutter when you use the press-focus lever to open the shutter, then close the shutter by tripping the shutter with the shutter release instead of first closing the shutter with the press-focus lever? I recently obtained a reprint of a US Navy manual for the Pacemaker Graphic and it has a cautionary remark that tripping the shutter release to close the shutter (when first opened using the press-focus lever) will eventually damage the mechanism. I have never seen this in any of the books/instruction manuals for the Graphex (Wollensak) shutter. Your thoughts?

When you use the lever to open the shutter for focusing after it's cocked, you are applying pressure on the shutter mechanism to open it and hold it open. The lever is part of a piece that is slotted...moving a post in another slot to the end of the slot, to achieve maximum shutter opening. If you trip the shutter to close it, it has to move this mechanism out of the way to accomplish the task. After about a hundred years of doing this, it may cause undue wear. Bottom line: re-close the shutter with the lever, thereby leaving the shutter cocked...which is what was intended. Fred.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: clnfrd on 2003-04-02 04:49 ]</font>