Camera,  Olympus,  Tech/Repairs

Olympus Trip 35 Age Explanation

February 10, 2008 /

The humble little Olympus Trip 35 was built between 1968 and 1984. That’s an impressive life span for a camera that remained mainly unchanged during its lifespan.

Want to find out how old yours is? The best way to discover the age of your Olympus Trip 35 isn’t by looking at its top plate serial number as some people mention from time to time, but by looking under the film pressure plate. It’s a very simple process and will only take a few minutes.

First of all you need to remove the pressure plate attached to the film door. It’s the black rectangle object in the centre of the film door you can see in the picture below.

olympustripage1

To take it off you need to slide the metal tabs off the black pins attached to the film door. Do this one side at a time by pushing the metal tab inwards using either your fingers or a flat edged screwdriver. Once you release one side, sliding out the other side is easy and now you can fully remove the pressure plate.

olympustripage2

Now that the the plate off you can easily view the characters printed underneath, these will accurately tell you the age of your camera. The photo below shows that date stamping of one of my cameras that we’ll be using as an example :

olympustripage3

As you can see, there are 3 characters. A Japanese character and two numbers.
This is how to read it :

  • 1st character – The plant it was manufactured in,
  • 2nd character – The last digit of the year of assembly. (so “3” = 1973, “9” = 1979, “0” = 1980, etc..),
  • 3rd character – The month of assembly. (1 – 9 signifies January – September. Then X,Y,Z is for October – December).

Now the observant among you would of noticed that if you had “82” on the pressure plate it could either be February 1968 or February 1978. The way to find out what decade it belongs to is by looking at the shutter button. If it’s the chrome variety you have the earlier model, if it’s the black plastic variety you know you have the later model. I have included a photo below showing the two different types of shutter buttons. The chrome/older variety on the left, with the newer plastic shutter button on the right.

Other age identification details:

  • The first black plastic shutter button models started in the second quarter of 1978.
  • Earlier models had ASA 25 – 250, the latter 25 – 400.
  • In 1969 and 1970 Olympus also produced a number of black bodies with black metal shutter buttons. *These demand a higher price but beware of fakes. One way of checking could be cross referencing the manufacturer year and if it doesn’t wall within ’60 or ’70 you may have a fake. This won’t work of course if they repainted a model from either of these two year but it’s a good start.

olympustripage4

So based on all of this information I can conclude my camera above was built in March 1973. My other trip’s were built in ’69 ’74 and ’76. If you can find one from the 60’s it’s probably worth hanging onto as they’re a little more scarce. Wait a minute, who am i kidding? ALL Olympus Trips are worth hanging onto!!

*New addition! I’m the happy owner of this lovely original Olympus Trip in black paint. I think this is one of the best looking cameras Olympus ever made.

bltrip

Feel free to share the age of your Olympus trip in the comments section below.

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41 Comments

  • Christian

    July 3, 2010 at 1:10 am Reply

    Thanks for the tip. Turns out mine was from October 76. My parents used the camera on all our vacations when I was a kid. We also had a big bulky flash that we had to attach on the top and plug a small cable in to the front of the camera. Then we had to wait for about a minute before the flash was ready.

  • Gareth

    December 4, 2010 at 9:50 pm Reply

    Mine is N19, and I have got the plastic shutter button version, so I was guessing either September 1971 or September 1981. When did the plastic shutter button come into effect? my model number is 4890870, So I guess 1971 would be more correct considering how many were produced.

    Thanks for the explanations.

  • jonathan

    February 3, 2011 at 5:05 pm Reply

    hi um i’m new to collecting cameras and i love cameras but when i looked in my plate i see a faded 8 and a dash and a 7 with a circle around it so it looks like
    8 – 7 with a circle around the seven what does it mean

  • James Stephenson

    March 5, 2011 at 8:59 pm Reply

    Hello

    My Trip has N 66 under the plate and the top serial is 3511023

    How old could it be

    James Stephenson

    • admin

      July 20, 2011 at 1:13 pm Reply

      Hi James. If you look at the guide you’ll see your camera could of been built in 1966 or 1976. You can figure out which year by looking at the shutter button (assuming it’s original). Is it chrome or black? Chrome is earlier than the black shutter button. Good luck!

  • Matt

    July 18, 2012 at 11:35 pm Reply

    Mine has an N but the second two characters are smudges which are pretty much illegible! The middle smudge is narrow so it could be a 1 and it has a black shutter release button so I guess that’s 1981. The last smudge is harder but at a certain angle I think I can make out an 8. The black shutter release and the N rather than a Japanese character implies a later one, so I reckon August ’81 is a fair assessment!

  • Dharma Singh

    February 12, 2015 at 10:37 pm Reply

    The first year of production the pressure plate reveiled this kind of characters: 7 — ⑧ which means 8th month of 1967.
    Also the earlier ones had ASA 25 – 250, the later 25-400. There many more differenances between the earlier and later ones, externally as well as internally, i.e. the red flag change in style, the distantce symbols have different colors, the edges of the hotshoe changes from square to rounded and the shutter buttons are different.

    The first pressure late with a æ—¥is from around september 1968 so that would give æ—¥89.
    The ‘N’ factory became the main one around 1978 till 1983. The pressure plates in 1984 are empty, nothing on it.
    As far as I know the latst serial number of a Trip 35 is 5453231

    @Gareth -> 4890870 is definedly 1981
    @James Stephenson 3511023 shouls really have N86 on the pressure plate not N66. N66 would mean june 1976, that’s completely out of the serial range, but there are quite a few anomalities and there also quite a few pressure plates that have been swapped, i.e. during a repair of the camera.
    @Phillppe Yes the Pens also had the same indications as well as the OMs [but not all of them]

    The first black plastic shutter buttons appear in the second quater of 1978.

    In 1969 and 1970 Olympus also produced a number of black bodies with black metal shutter buttons, but beware there are fake ones for sale as well.
    The fake ones are cleverly black repainted silver ones and its hard to recognized them from photos. The serial number should give them away, unless they repainted a silver one from the same period.

    • Dharma Singh

      May 25, 2015 at 3:28 am Reply

      @Amity
      N84 is April 1978
      The serialnumber on top of the camera must be something like 32 or 33 followed by 5 numbers.
      The N factory din’t start producing before 1978
      In 1967 and the most part of 1968 the pressure plates looked like 7 —⑧
      In the 3rd quarter of 1968 you find the 1st pressure plate with a factory symbol [and the year and month] i.e. æ—¥89

  • Maurizio

    June 1, 2015 at 11:50 pm Reply

    Hi. I have bought a used Trio 35.
    Metal shutter button and under the pressure film plate there is written:
    æ—¥7Z with the japanese symbol inside a circle.
    What is it means?
    December 1967?
    It would be good cause my birth date is August 1967…..
    Serial number is 3110602.
    Greetings from Italy.

  • Bruce

    December 2, 2015 at 11:06 am Reply

    Mine has N83.

    That could mean March in either 1968 or 1978.

    It has a chrome button suggesting 68, however it also has ASA 25 – 400, suggesting 1978.

    Serial No is 3241408, which if they are sequential at all would make 1978 also more likely.

  • Dharma Singh

    December 8, 2015 at 7:38 pm Reply

    @Bruce
    As I’ve explained in my answer just above yours it can’t be 68.
    And yes the serial numbers are sequential; the smallest number I’ve ever seen is in the Olympus Instruction Manual where there’s a photo of a Trip 35 with number 100123.
    I know someone with number 100234 from September 1967 and the last confirmed serial number is 5453231 of a Trip 35 from 1984 in a museum in Melbourne, Australia.

  • Jon

    March 10, 2016 at 8:09 pm Reply

    People are still posting so I’ll ask a question. Mine says 8—4 and the 4 is in a circle. It has a silver shutter release but the ISO only goes to 200. Any help?

  • Paul Ed

    March 28, 2016 at 12:02 am Reply

    Just been given an Olympus Trip 35 by my father in law and not sure if it works yet but looking forward to trying it out! Says N1Z so December 1981 I’m guessing!! Any tips on best ways to use this classic camera?

  • John byrnes

    May 3, 2016 at 5:36 am Reply

    Hi my olympus trip has under the pressure plate N 1 X
    does this mean it’s October 1971
    Plus it’s the silver with black shutter button
    Number on top is 4965398

  • James Spencer

    June 19, 2016 at 3:10 pm Reply

    I have chrome with black plastic shutter
    ASA 25 – 400
    Ser. # 4056078
    pressure plate marking is very faint but I believe it reads “N83” for March 1978
    cosmetically great shape, no issues with the lens or finder at all
    gonna drop in a roll of fresh film and find out, thanks for the info and this site!
    best regards from Texas!

  • Louis

    July 15, 2016 at 11:44 pm Reply

    Hi there I have 2 trips but having trouble working out the dates based on what I can find.
    #1 has the number (N17) under the pressure plate and the number (4958834) on the top plate. It has ASA 400 and a black plastic shutter button and the setting before infinity is red.
    #2 has the number (8-4) however the 4 is inside a circle under the pressure plate and the number (131885) on the top plate. It only goes to ASA 200 and has a chrome shutter button and the focus settings are all the same orange colour.
    Any help would be appreciated 🙂

  • Lani

    September 12, 2016 at 9:53 pm Reply

    Hrmmm… Mine doesn’t have anything stamped on the plate?? My Dad has had it from at least ’82, but does the lack of numbers stamped on the plate mean that it is fake?
    It works really well :/

  • Jonny

    September 16, 2016 at 2:40 am Reply

    I just found one today for £5, not that I need another trip, but its so good. Very happy, mint condition too. (February 1975) metal chrome button.

  • Oscar

    November 29, 2016 at 7:10 am Reply

    Hello
    I have just found my fathers old Olympus trip, every thing seems to be working fine except the back pressure panel is missing. Do you know where i could buy a spare one or get the dimensions and try replicate it.
    Thank you very much.
    Oscar

  • GaryMac

    August 27, 2017 at 12:35 pm Reply

    Hello, I have what looks like an early model, asa 200 max, pressure plate # 8 – 3, the three being in a circle. March 1968!
    Havent tried it out yet, but looks like its working properly. the only anomaly being the hot shoe is clipped on one side. at first look an owner modification but closer inspection looks very factory. why this would be, I dont know. great camera. great blog! Thank You.
    GaryMac

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