Leica LTM Rare Sonnar with LTM

Leica M39 screw mount bodies/lenses
collum said:
I just took delivery of a LTM Zeiss 8.5cm 2.0 Jena Sonnar, sn 1167359.
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What does the lens look like, and is it a CZJ lens? I could not find the serial number in Thiele's book, which shows the earliest 8.5cm/2 Sonnar as number 1430351. Just curious.
 
Hi,

Go to my opening opening post and look at/for the ebay item number. There's lots of photo's of it showing still.

Regards, David
 
yup.. aluminum barrel.

... so in the scheme of things.. what does that mean?

jim

PAN F said:
The first series of 8,5cm f2 Sonnars for the Contax I were serial no.1430351-1430550 (200 lenses) completed 08.05.33.and these would have been in Black enamel and nickel finish to match the camera.

"collum"says the serial no. of his lens is 1167359 but this serial no. is too early to be a Contax Sonnar.
However, if one looks at Thieles book for serial no. 1167359 it falls within a series of serial numbers that Carl Zeiss Jena did not use which was 1167001 - 1167500.
It has been shown many times that in the early post-war years these (unused) missing serial numbers were sometimes used by Carl Zeiss Jena (East Germany) for the Soviet reparation lenses and I can only assume that this is one of those lenses if it is in a chrome or aluminium barrel which I presume it will be.
Perhaps "collum" could confirm that the barrel is chrome or aluminium ?.
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PAN F said:
Hi dexdog,
Any sample photo's taken with your rare Sonnar yet?.
I know Johan (buzzardkid)and many others including myself are hoping to see some more photo's taken with your lens.
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I need to scan some of the images and post them. I hope to get to it soon.
 
A few of the less awful pics from a test roll. Very bright but hazy morning. These were taken at 1/1000 at f4, Fujicolor 200, no filter, although I used a hood. I scanned these but did not do any post-processing, as evident from the occasional scratches seen on the images. Also, I see that the shutter on my Canon L1 is lagging on high speeds.

Lens is prone to flare, which is not too surprising given its age. Also, I suspect that these shots are probably somewhat over-exposed :bang:. Lens appears to render acceptably sharp images, and color rendition looks pretty good, too, which does not surprise me given that my old uncoated sonnars in Contax RF mount perform well in that regard.


BTW, the cannon is a bronze Model 1841 six-pounder at Manassas National Battlefield Park, manufactured in 1862 at a foundry in Massachusetts. Oh, and the nearby tree is an American chestnut- I used a taxonomic key to confirm.

Brian S. will be borrowing the lens soon, and he will likely have more, and better, pics to post. Or at least a few fence posts 😀
 
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Saw this new post just now, Dex!

Those shots are everything once could wish for in a pre-war uncoated Sonnar I guess, they are brilliant!

I love the uncoated low-contrast looks from it and the pastellish colors are stunning. Fujicolor has the nicest greens anyway but these are smoooth!
 
I imagine that Brian will post some images with the lens. I tried to post these images from my SmugMug account, but RFF would not allow it. If anyone can tell me how to do it correctly, I could post full-size images instead of thumbnails.
 
Any ideas about this 8.5/2 163xxxx?
Special order or what...

DSC_3197-1-1.jpg
 
PAN F and bowieknife of course are correct. The conversion is in plain sight with the different metals and the serial number that links it to a Contax-mount lens from 1933.

Conversion can have been done anywhere between year of production and modern times but most likely non-factory, since Zeiss would use a Zeiss design on a mount and barrel conversion, not some odd-designed cut-out barrel.

I suppose the cut-out lines up just under the viewfinder window on a III, IIIb, IIIc of IIIf? And wonder why the focus mark does not line up? Maybe that can be seen from the RF window now that it's over to that side? Forget about an M9, I'd like to see the lens mounted on an LTM camera!
 
All said seems to be true, except to me the ltm mount is original, that is the part i dont really understand. Almost like it was damaged above the mount and replaced by non factory or modified for some specific use. I will pull it apart and take a couple pics to post. I could be wrong and it was just pulled off of some random black paint ltm lens....
 
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