The Pentax ME II winder was introduced in 1984 and, of the four winders Pentax made, fits by far the most Pentax cameras. It uses four AA batteries—two less than the previous winder—to produce a solid 2-frames a second winding action.
You have to remove a small cover on the camera to mount the Winder. There is a recess to screw the cover into—just to the left of the tripod coupling screw—although this winder didn’t have one and the camera I had was missing the cover already.
The battery tray has a unique way of clipping the AA-batteries in place. It holds the batteries from the sides so the tray can be slid into the winder when it is mounted on the camera. When the tray is out of the winder there is a small recess to hold the remote cable cover installed in the hub of the mode selector. So Pentax has designed a winder that can store both covers!
The handgrip has some controls built into the top. Just back of the shutter button there is a window that shows either 125X or Auto, switched by a toggle tab on the handle. Usually you would set this control to the Auto position. The 125x position is only used when you are using manual shutter speeds. Back of that, there are three positions for the bezel: (from left) C, off and S. They stand for continuous shooting—firing frame after frame until you release the shutter button—and single exposure—when the camera fires but doesn’t wind on until the shutter button is released.
There are some other matters to be aware of. The winder has a drive shaft with a small “claw” at the 1 o’clock position. That claw can be at the 11 o’clock position too. If it is there, the winder won’t cock the shutter. The winder won’t advance the film and cock the shutter if the self-timer or the camera’s shutter release has fired the shutter.
You can restore the winder’s sync with the camera by using the winder’s shutter release. Fired once the camera’s shutter gets wound and the film is advanced, and then the next press of the winder’s shutter button will fire the shutter and then advance the film ready for the next shot. It sound’s complicated, but basically if things aren’t working right, using the winder’s shutter button will get everything working as it should.
There is a red LED that lights when the winder motor is working. If it stays lit you are at the end of the roll. Then you can turn off the winder and slide the rewind button release tab up so you can rewind the film with the camera’s rewind crank. Unlike some motor drive’s, all accessory winder’s I know of don’t power rewind film.
The Pentax Winder ME II is a clever and powerful accessory and adds a lot to their SLR cameras.
Comments