Hi Everyone! NEW to this forum and need some help with my Canon AV-1 camera and lens. Just bought a second hand AV-1 (everything is working fine with a new battery) and bought a Canon FD 35-70mm F3.5-4.5 Lens. Once the lens is mounted on the camera, I set the lens external aperture ring to a specific F-stop and nothing happens within the lens. I have also take the lens off from the camera to manually check that the aperture is working (via YouTube tutorial). By testing is manually, I can confirm the aperture is working at the various F-Stops. Would be so grateful for any comments or advice on this matter. Thank you!
Hello and welcome Chris, I am not sure what video you watched on youtube, but I think I can help explain. When the lens is off camera you can adjust the aperture ring and see each f-stop. When you mount the lens on a camera the aperture is held wide open so that you can compose the photo looking through the lens regardless of f-stop , if they didn't do this images captured at f/16 or f/22 would be very dark as there would be very little light let through for you to see the scene. You can trip the shutter at slow speed on camera and look through the front of the lens to verify it is stopping down to what it is supposed to; doing this without film is called a "dry fire", its a good way to test mechanics of a camera are working as expected without film when the camera or lens haven't been used in a while. If your lens doesn't adjust to the set aperture when the shutter is tripped, then you have an issue. Older cameras/lens and have issues with lube on blades/shutters and you can sometimes get them working ok just by working them through the shutter or aperture range. Some cameras have a depth of field lever that you can hold down the will hold the lens closed down so you can see how much depth of field you have which would also be a way to check if the aperture is operating while on camera, the AV-1 doesn't appear to have that however.
