I have discontinued this FAQ and will not work on it any more. It will never be posted to rec.photo. But they aren't cheap. Yes, you may take a look on the old, discontinued models. If you are patient enough, you can find them new somewhere or find them used.
Some suggestions follows.
It is robustly constructed with metal and has a vast array of accessories. Uses 2 AA batteries, no expensive and hard to find lithiums. You'll have to advance film manually or buy a motor drive or winder which is attached to the bottom of the camera. Operation is simple and straight forward, but does not offer much automation. As such it is most suitable for the really serious photographer.