At 05:00 PM 4/3/05 -0700, Richard Knoppow wrote: > I think you are assuming something that is not backed up=20 >by the evidence. I think the main reason Zeiss-Ikon used the=20 >Contax type shutter is that they had the design.=20 Richard=20 Emmanuel Goldberg designed the ur-Contax RF shutter. (He was Jewish and Zeiss Ikon shunted him off to France after the Nazis took control and, when the Germans conquered France, arranged to have him shipped off to Palestine with a nice stipend. The Zeiss Foundation did not treat Goldberg or Ernst Wandersleb as kindly as they probably should have done, but, at the least, the Foundation rose above the sort of treatment being accorded most Jews in that era in Germany and in Europe. Faint praise, in the end, is better than none.) I do not believe that there is a whole lot of shared design theory between the Mirotar's shutter and that on the Contax. K=FCppenbender, the ultimate Zeiss wheeler-dealer and, arguably, the only senior official of Zeiss to ever understand market dynamics, simply inherited the Goldberg shutter and kept it in place with modifications from 1932 until 1960. You are absolutely correct to ponit out that, in 1932, 1/500" was a decent top speed -- most Compur shutters of the era only topped out at 1/250". =20 Marc msmall@xxxxxxxxxxxx=20 Cha robh b=E0s fir gun ghr=E0s fir!