New Bellows

[billschwab]

I came across this company Gortite while doing a Web search on camera bellows manufacturers. I don't find any reference to them in the forums. Has anyone used them? Any other suppliers someone can direct me to?

http://www.gortite.com/camera_bellows.htm

Thanks in advance,

Bill

[smieglitz]

Bill,

I purchased a large bellows several years ago from Camera Bellows, Ltd. in England. They are probably the premier source. I was very pleased with the product and price. That company also makes the Lee Filter Sytem IIRC. Googling either should turn them up.

Domestic suppliers include Turner Bellows and Western Bellows. I've read reports of varying satisfaction with their product.

Joe

[df cardwell]

Camera Bellows has done work for me over the past 20 years, and has been exquisite every time. They have done very demanding work for friends cameras as well: just great. Great service, nice folks... and they probably made the bellows on your camera in the first place !

Turner and Western have generally been clueless, shabby and expensive.

[billschwab]

Thank you very much Don and Joe! I will look into CB, Ltd.

Much appreciated.

Bill

[pelerin]

Hey,
I have a Korona banquet camera that was refit with a bellows from Western Bellows. It has proven to be a durable high quality product. They do have a rep for being slow but googling the other vendors will show that they have their share of complaints vis-a-vis customer service. As always, YMMV but this is not the only nice one I have experience with that was fabricated by them.
Celac.

[Jim Chinn]

I've had several bellows made by Turner Bellows in Rochester and found the product and service to be excellent. They have a turn around of about 30 days. It is best to send them the old frames so they can attach the bellows for you. the material is a neoprene impregnated material, folds and compresses without a problem. The last one I ordered was for an 11x14 camera with 38" of extension and cost $325.

If you want leather, I don't think there is anyone left but Camera Bellows in England. Very nice but substantially more expensive.

Gortite manufactures bellows and way covers for industrial applications. They use a fairly stiff neoprene that is not really suitable for view camera applications.

I have never heard anything bad about Western Bellows other then turn around time. they were more expensive then Turner. At one time I think they worked with leather bellows.

[eddie gunks]

another vote for turner bellows. did a great job. super friendly and helpful. got mine back in 2-3 weeks.

eddie

[Nathan Smith]

Western Bellows made a beautiful bellows for my Eastman 2D 5x7, but they were indeed slow in getting it back to me. Can't complain about the quality though I'm glad I wasn't in a big hurry.

Nathan

[Paddy]

I've made inquires to all of the above companies; Western Bellows seemed knowledgable and friendly, but I ended up having Bromwell Marketing do the job, since I was having some other work done at the same time. http://www.bromwellmarketing.com/prices/acc.htm
As it turns out, they sent my 4x5 Super Technika over to Camera Bellows to have the job done, and it received a factory replacement from them. A very nice job indeed. So much so, that I'm also going to have CB do the re&re on my 8x10 Ansco. My only complaint is that at times, they've been a wee bit slow on the correspondence