I recently purchased a Deardorff 8x10 camera that has a new bellows
installed. I discovered that with a 400mm lens on the camera, the lens panel
raised to its top position, the camera tilted up about 15 degrees to include
the top of a building in the photograph, and the lens and back brought to
vertical postions parallel to the front of the building, the bellows sags
quite severely and gets in the way of the photograph. I lose about an inch
of the photograph at the bottom of the photograph (top of the negative). The
sag is pretty much in the middle of the bellows. If I use my hand to push
the bellows up from the bottom the problem is reduced but not eliminated (I
still lose about a half inch of the photograph).

Is this something other Deardorff users experience? I used to own another
Deardorff camera with a much heavier bellows material than this one and
never encountered a sagging bellows problem though I'm not sure I ever used
it in this configuration with a lens this long.

I know there are workarounds to sagging bellows but none that I've seen have
ever been very appealing to me. At this point I can return the camera but I
don't want to do that if the problem is one I would encounter with any other
Deardorff and any other bellows material. I'm not sure what the material of
this one is, it feels very light, soft, and pliable so it may be leather.