Ricoh SLX 500

Ricoh · M42 mount · 24×36mm on 135 film (Ricoh) · 1975

via machine translation — corrections welcome

Also known as: Ricoh SLX 500 · Ricoh SLX500 · Ricoh SLX-500 · リコー SLX500 · リコー SLX 500 · Sears 500 MX · Sears 500MX · Sears TLS 500 MX · Sears TLS 500MX

Variants & identification

Variant	Mount	Years	Serial ranges	Production
Ricoh SLX 500	M42	1975	—	No production figure published by Ricoh or found elsewhere
Sears 500 MX (TLS 500 MX)	M42	—	—	—

Ricoh says the design was contracted out and does not name the firm. aperturepreview's remark that Mamiya helped with some later Sears TLS models concerns the Sears Auto TLS and Auto CS, not this camera, and the Mamiya MSX 500 of 1974 is a different body (spot meter, SX lenses with an aperture pin for open-aperture metering, MS76 cell, per camera-wiki). The maker is unknown.
camera-wiki quotes McKeown's price guide calling the SLX 500 'a simplified version of the Ricoh Singlex TLS'. The TLS has a Copal Square metal shutter to 1/1000 (Ricoh) and Ricoh says the SLX 500's mechanism is outside its own line, so the description is about its place in the range, not its construction.
No launch price: Ricoh's list gives none and says export only, and no Sears catalogue price for the 500 MX is on record.
No serial-number table or production figure is published for either badge.

How to tell them apart (expand)

RICOH on the prism and SLX 500 on a front nameplate = Ricoh; 500 MX on the prism and SEARS on the front = Sears (instruction-book illustrations)
Shutter dial with only B and 30 to 500: no slow speeds below 1/30 and nothing faster than 1/500
No self-timer and a large preview lever: the Auto TLS EE on the same shell has a smaller stop-down lever and a self-timer lever on the front (Ricoh)
All-over matt black finish; no chrome version is recorded

Ricoh SLX 500:

RICOH on the front of the prism housing and a separate SLX 500 nameplate on the front of the body beside the lens mount, on the shutter-dial side (cover of the Ricoh instruction book)
Ricoh's own identification note: painted matt black all over, so unusually black that it earned the nickname 消し炭 (keshizumi, charcoal)
Angular top plate with no curves; textured black paint on the top and base plates (John Margetts)
Shutter dial on the top plate marked B and 30 to 500 only, 60 in red with an X; film speed set by lifting the same dial (Ricoh manual; John Margetts)
No self-timer lever on the front; a single black preview/meter lever on the side of the raised mount housing (Ricoh manual's parts list; John Margetts)
Hot shoe on the prism and an X-only PC socket on the left end of the body (Ricoh manual; John Margetts)

Sears 500 MX (TLS 500 MX):

500 MX on the front of the prism housing where the Ricoh says RICOH, and SEARS in small letters on the front of the body (parts diagram in the Sears instruction book)
Same controls as the Ricoh: B and 1/30–1/500 dial, side preview/meter lever, hot shoe, X socket, no self-timer (Sears instruction book)
Sold with an Auto Sears 50mm f/2.0 rather than an Auto Rikenon (Sears instruction book)

Ricoh SLX 500: The camera as Ricoh sold it. Ricoh's list says it was shipped with the same range of lenses as the Singlex (シングレックスと同品種); the cover of the English instruction book shows it with an Auto Rikenon 1:2 f=50mm, and John Margetts's example came with that 50mm f/2. The book calls the lens a 50mm "Practica type screw mount" lens and prints a table of Auto Rikenon and preset Rikenon lenses from the 17mm f/4 to the 800mm f/8 and a fisheye, all usable on the body.
Sears 500 MX (TLS 500 MX): The Sears version. Its own instruction book calls it the "Sears 500MX 35MM SLR Camera" and gives the same specification as the Ricoh book: cloth focal plane 1/30 to 1/500 and B, X sync at 1/30 and 1/60, through-the-lens stop-down averaging meter, ASA 25 to 800, fixed pentaprism, microprism spot, and an Auto Sears 50mm f/2.0 of six elements in five groups. Camera-wiki's Sears table and aperturepreview call it the TLS 500 MX and map it to the Ricoh SLX 500; neither the book nor the body in its diagram carries "TLS". The book gives no year. Camera-wiki's table also lists a Sears TLS 1000 MX, which it identifies as a Mamiya MSX 1000, not a Ricoh.

Specifications

Format: 24×36mm on 135 film (Ricoh)
Finder: fixed eye-level pentaprism; Fresnel screen with a plain ground-glass ring and a central microprism spot, no split image
Shutter: horizontally travelling cloth focal plane (Ricoh; John Margetts) · 1/30–1/500, B · flash sync X only, at 1/60 or 1/30, through the hot shoe or the X socket; flash bulbs cannot be used (Ricoh and Sears manuals) · no self-timer
Film advance: single-stroke lever, about 180°, not ratcheted; frame counter to 37, reset by opening the back (John Margetts)
Back: hinged, with its own latch on the left end of the body; rewind button on the base stays in until the lever is worked again (John Margetts)
Meter: Through-the-lens CdS, averaging, read at the taking aperture: hold in the preview lever on the side of the mount housing, which stops the lens down and switches the meter on, and turn the aperture ring or shutter dial until the needle sits between + and −. One mercury cell (Eveready EPX625, Mallory RM625 or equivalent; John Margetts gives 1.3V) powers the meter. ASA 25–800 per the Sears manual and John Margetts. All per the Ricoh and Sears instruction books unless stated; Ricoh's own camera list says open-aperture metering (see Disputed).
Weight: 690 g
Dimensions: 143 × 92 × 51, body only (Ricoh); weight_g is body only (Ricoh). John Margetts measured 143 × 82 × 50 and weighed his at 800g with the 50mm f/2 mm
Country: Japan
Accessories: Auto Rikenon and preset Rikenon M42 lenses from 17mm to 800mm, three zooms, 60mm macro, 135mm bellows lens and fisheye (table in the Ricoh instruction book) · Bellows attachment A, deluxe bellows B with slide copier and focusing track, automatic extension ring set of three · Close-up lenses No. 1 and No. 2, microscope attachment, copy stand · Dioptre adjusters −3 to +3, 2× eyepiece magnifier, cable release, deluxe folding hand grip

Meter needle on the right edge of the screen, centred between + and − marks (Ricoh manual; Sears manual; John Margetts). No finder magnification or coverage figure is published.

Where sources disagree

Meter

Open-aperture metering (解放測光) — Ricoh's camera list
Stop-down metering: hold the preview lever, which closes the lens to the taking aperture and switches on the meter — Ricoh's English instruction book, the Sears 500 MX book ('stop-down metering system'), John Margetts

Better supported: Stop-down

Both instruction books describe the stop-down operation step by step, and the Sears book's specifications say 'stop-down metering system'. Ricoh's list uses the same 解放測光 wording for the Singlex II, whose instruction book also describes stop-down metering; no source explains the wording.

Meter film-speed range

ASA 25–800 — Sears 500 MX instruction book; John Margetts, from his camera's dial
ASA 25–1600 — camera-wiki

Better supported: ASA 25–800

The Sears book's ASA–DIN conversion table runs to 1600, but its specifications give the meter's range as ASA 25 to 800.

What reviewers say

John Margetts, John's Cameras (oldcamera.blog) (blog) — A no-frills but very sturdy camera: die-cast aluminium body, simple stop-down metering of the Spotmatic kind, a convenient rewind button, and an Auto Rikenon 50mm f/2 kit lens about which he found only positive comments. His example's mirror-buffer foam and back seals had decayed and needed replacing before use; he notes that a 1.5V alkaline cell fits in place of the banned mercury cell, perhaps with a little overexposure.

History

The SLX 500 is the plainest of the three low-priced M42 reflexes that Ricoh’s list describes as planned for export, with the Singlex II and the Auto TLS EE, and the odd one among them. Ricoh’s own camera list says the design was contracted out to another firm, so its mechanism and its looks sit outside the rest of the Ricoh line; it does not name that firm, and nobody has shown who it was. What came out is a plain, solid camera: a horizontal cloth focal-plane shutter with B and 1/30 to 1/500 only, a fixed pentaprism with a hot shoe, a microprism spot on a Fresnel screen, and a CdS match-needle meter. Ricoh lists it as export only. Its Japanese nickname, 消し炭 (charcoal), comes from Ricoh’s own note that the whole camera is painted matt black and looks unusually black.

The meter works at the taking aperture. Ricoh’s list calls it open-aperture metering, but both instruction books, Ricoh’s and Sears’s, describe the stop-down procedure: hold in the lever on the side of the mount housing, which closes the lens and switches the meter on, and turn the aperture ring until the needle sits between the + and − marks. That is the Spotmatic method, as John Margetts points out, and it means every M42 lens with an automatic diaphragm meters the same way. The cell, an EPX625 or RM625 mercury type, powers the meter. Flash is X only, at 1/60 or 1/30. There is no self-timer and no speed slower than 1/30. Camera-wiki quotes McKeown calling it a simplified Singlex TLS, which says where it sat in the range rather than how it was built: the TLS has a Copal Square metal shutter to 1/1000.

Two badges are recorded. The Ricoh has RICOH on the prism and an SLX 500 plate on the front of the body, and was sold with an Auto Rikenon 50mm f/2. Sears sold it as the 500 MX, the name on its instruction book, with 500 MX on the prism, SEARS on the front and an Auto Sears 50mm f/2.0. Camera-wiki and aperturepreview list it as the TLS 500 MX; neither the book nor the illustrated camera says TLS. Camera-wiki’s Sears table also lists a TLS 1000 MX, which it identifies as a Mamiya MSX 1000 rather than a Ricoh, and despite the similar name the Mamiya MSX 500 is a different camera, with a spot meter and Mamiya’s SX lenses.

Ricoh says the Auto TLS EE uses the same body, and tells it apart by its smaller stop-down lever and the self-timer lever on the front. Ricoh’s list dates the Auto TLS EE to 1976, but American magazines had it on sale by mid-1973: Popular Science listed it among current shutter-priority SLRs in June 1973, and camera-wiki cites a Popular Photography advertisement of July 1973. On that evidence the shared body appeared first on the EE, not the SLX 500. The EE adds shutter-priority automation with the Auto Rikenon EE lenses. Ricoh calls it the first AE camera on an M42 mount, which does not hold: the Asahi Pentax ES, an aperture-priority automatic on Pentax’s coupled version of the thread, was announced in 1971 (camera-wiki). The Auto Rikenon EE lenses made for the Auto TLS EE also fit the SLX 500: set to a marked aperture, they meter stop-down like any other Auto Rikenon, and their EE setting gives shutter-priority automation only on the Auto TLS EE. The whole M42 Rikenon range fits, from the Auto Rikenon 17mm f/4 to the preset 800mm f/8 in the book’s lens table, and so does any other Praktica-thread lens.

When buying, check the foam. Margetts’s camera had a mirror buffer that had turned to a sticky mess and back seals that needed replacing, a straightforward job, he says, with replacement foam easy to buy. Check that the meter needle moves when the lever is pressed in bright light. Mercury cells are no longer sold; Margetts notes that a 1.5V alkaline cell fits and may give slight overexposure. Work the advance in one full stroke, because the lever does not ratchet. No launch price is on record for either badge: Ricoh’s list gives none and says export only, and no Sears catalogue price for the 500 MX is on record. Neither badge has a published production figure or serial table.

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This history is AI-written, from the sources listed at the foot of the page. Where the record is silent it says so rather than filling the gap — but no human wrote these sentences.

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