Overview of all Zeiss Sonnar 5cm f/1.5 aka 50mm f/1.5 versions

Sonnar Brian said:
The major issue with the 5cm F2 collapsible is finding one with a clean front element. Soft glass was used on the front element, hard glass on the inner group. 9 of 10 have surface damage, many to the point of being unusable. I suspect a combination of cleaning the front element and exposure to air. The uncoated 5cm F1.5- likely 1 of 10 suffers from scratches, hard glass was used.

Find a perfect 5cm F2 Sonnar- Keep it Forever. Mine- found on a Nikon M 20 years ago.
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Sonnar B converted this collapsible Contax mount 5cm/f2 Sonnar to J-8 LTM about 15 years ago. While I Intially wondered why he would suggest this, I figured it was a OK given that I already had a number of Contax mount f2 collapsible lenses in good condition. In general, the LTM mount is easier to use on my Sony digitals given that many/most of the lenses I use are LTM, and it saves me having to haul around a Contax to E-mount adapter . Brian also emphasized the unique look that an uncoated lens gave on digital cameras. This lens is a real treat to use.
 
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Note that the winged Aperture ring of the later 5cm F2 Sonnars as above will fit in the J-8 LTM focus mount. Earlier versions- you must swap the aperture rings.

Rigid 5cm F2 Sonnar, Bertele Sonnar, and my converted 5cm F2 Sonnar- 163xxxx. One of the first with a filter ring and newer body style that can be converted using a J-8 mount.
RIMG0128.jpg

Bertele, wide-open:

L1025591.jpg

And my "perfect-Glass" converted Sonnar:
L1025616.jpg

On the Leica M9.
If we start a parallel thread on the 5cm F2- I will move these posts.
BUT- It's always nice to see a comparison with the "Little Brother". Finding a clean F2 5cm F2 Sonnar is as difficult as finding a clean Summar.
 
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If you had not indicated which was image was the Skylanney Bertele lens vs. the converted Sonnar I don't think I would be able to distinguish between the two. I am of the opinion that the point of focus with these two lenses varied a bit, second pic has more detail in the southern part of the red ribbon. In either case, beautiful rendering.
 
I am looking at the SBS and the "Perfect" and it may be my bias but I most likely could separate the two. The SBS has more bite in the color, it is just a little bit denser. By themselves I do not think I could identify them but alongside each other, yes. When I first saw SBS pics on the Skyllaney website I was struck by the quality of the color. It is a noble lens and fortunate is he who has one. IIRC there were less than ten. Is that right??
 
boojum said:
I am looking at the SBS and the "Perfect" and it may be my bias but I most likely could separate the two. The SBS has more bite in the color, it is just a little bit denser. By themselves I do not think I could identify them but alongside each other, yes. When I first saw SBS pics on the Skyllaney website I was struck by the quality of the color. It is a noble lens and fortunate is he who has one. IIRC there were less than ten. Is that right??
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It might be my monitor settings, but the first image "may" have a slightly better color saturation. Hard to say if the difference is significant or not, or just a small difference in exposure or difference between a coated and un-coated lens. Beautiful rendering in either case.
 
There are a a total of Five of these lenses produced in England. I believe there will be more. Next ones will be from Scotland.
Two of the Five- owned by RFF members.
 
Sonnar Brian said:
There are a a total of Five of these lenses produced in England. I believe there will be more. Next ones will be from Scotland.
Two of the Five- owned by RFF members.
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Brian, I am lucky and grateful to have one. It has that little extra something about it that is/makes magic. You know the details of the deal but for others, Chris at Skyllaney had a few for sale. There was one he offered at a reduced price because it was cosmetically not perfect, there was some brassing from reviewer usage wear. My cash flow is minimal so a deal like that was especially attractive. I am grateful that Chris at Skyllaney was able and willing to make the offer. The lens has never failed me. To steal a line from that great Scots poet, the lens is "The chieftain o' the Sonnar clan", at least for me. Colors seem a bit more solid, skin tones a bit more real. And while the colors seem more "solid" they have never been false in my using of the lens. The team that did the design work on this lens knew what they were doing. I think you know them both. I am thinking now of the Foxglove photo I got last year of a plant alongside my driveway. The color just has that little extra something about it. You know enough about lenses to be able to explain it. I can just say that I really like how it works.

Britain is not generally known or famed for lens work. But the Skyllaney Bertele Sonnar and the Cooke Amotal are two really good lenses. There's not a lot of Amotals, either. But it has its own special magic with its fine definition and glow. They are just two good examples of how it is good to keep an open mind.

And just to show off a bit, again the Foxglove:

L1002853 by West Phalia, on Flickr​
 
Sonnar Brian said:
The major issue with the 5cm F2 collapsible is finding one with a clean front element. Soft glass was used on the front element, hard glass on the inner group. 9 of 10 have surface damage, many to the point of being unusable. I suspect a combination of cleaning the front element and exposure to air. The uncoated 5cm F1.5- likely 1 of 10 suffers from scratches, hard glass was used.

Find a perfect 5cm F2 Sonnar- Keep it Forever. Mine- found on a Nikon M 20 years ago.
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All I have to say on that issue is "Thank you!" 🙂
 
@Räuber I saw that one of my lenses, 2016056 “T” made your list. I recall that a couple years ago you suspected this lens to be some sort of a fake, mainly going by the very early T engraving. You have marked the lens orange in your list, I assume this is for unusual lenses or potential fakes.

I also saw that you yourself acquired a very early T marked lens in the meantime, not sure if it was an f2 or f1.5. Did your assessment of these lenses since change? What do you think these lenses represent? Factory recoating and T engravement?

Love to see your work as always.

IMG_2319.jpeg
 
I can't speak for Raeuber obviously.

However, having seen what seemed to be a legit "T" engraved and coated black and nickel f8 era f/1.5 Sonnar among other such "implausible" lenses I assume that these were likely sent back to Zeiss for coating service where they then either remade or changed the name-ring in accordance with the fact that the lens is now coated. This could very well include your lens as well.

Attacking this from the opposite end, I also have a coated 1.8million Sonnar but it has no "T" - most likely a third party job since the coating colors also do not look like anything Zeiss ever has used, but are of very high transparency.

This is also different from very early (non T) coated Zeiss lenses which me and Brian investigated a while ago, these start around 1.7million or so for the earliest and run up to 2.0million or so. These were likely trial runs for their not yet perfected coating technique and the coating is notably weaker (faint blue, nowhere near as vivid as the lens shown above) and they likely had yet not decided on a the "Transparent" trademark name for this new technology.

Edit: After sleeping on it, the other thing that makes me believe the lens (and others like it) is genuine is, that for scammers there is very little money in adding (or faking) coating and a fraudulent "T" mark. Especially since you need the tools (and spare parts) and take risks for just a tiny bit of payoff.
 
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I'm a bit late to the party but excuse my late writing but I'm on vacation. I was surprised that my guide missed out on this question. So I added it now.

There exist few single copies with way earlier serial numbers that show a red T mark and the typical yellow-brown single coating of Zeiss lenses. The shown example is one of that copies. Soon after the end of WWII CZJ started to apply the anti-reflection coating to all sorts of optical devices like glasses and all photographic lenses. In that time Zeiss offered a service for customers to send in lenses and to apply anti-reflection coating to uncoated lenses. In this process the name ring of those Zeiss lenses were engraved and painted with a red T too. All CZJ lenses with a red T mark and a serial lower than 2.553.357 can be considered to be coated after WWII by CZJ on request.
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I think the answer to this question has enough proof to say with confidence that this early serial lenses with red T are valid coated lenses. But they were coated after the end of WWII by CZJ by request of owners. I can't remember where I read this last time but the source was a CZJ document or very trustworthy source. I should improve and keep track of my sources and information but I have read this explanation multiple times from multiple sources.

One could ask how certain is the origin of the later added coating? Was it CZJ or ZO that applied this coating? That is not so certain to answer. If I come across this bit of information next time I will try to find out. But for now I would guess it was CZJ that applied the post-war coating on request.

The blue coating is difficult to track down. When I first noticed this I thought it was an error of the photograph with a cool white balance. But since I own some Sonnars with a rainbow or bluish effect I tried to look into it if I can see streaks of bluish lenses in the batch overview. But for now I would say there are no such batches of Sonnars with blue coating. All blue coated (or rainbow coated) lenses are single copies. Sometimes a very close serial is uncoated. So I can't find long serial number runs with this optical effect. It is not like the T coating after CZJ started to apply single coating to all Sonnar lenses.

I found this Zeiss-Historica issue very interesting where they reported about the Zeiss coating patent:

 
@Räuber has documented later but this post-war f1.5 Sonnar on eBay is the latest serial # I've observed

www.ebay.com

Contax IIa Color Dial Rangefinder with 50mm f1.5 Carl Zeiss Sonar lens - Ex+! | eBay

This is a nice Contax IIa Color Dial Rangefinder 35mm camera with a 50mm f1.5 Carl Zeiss Sonnar lens in excellent+ condition! The camera shows minor wear from normal use and had been CLA'd to work properly. The viewfinder is clear with working rangefinder including accurate shutter speeds with...
www.ebay.com
 
Major update of Sonnar 5cm f/1,5 guide

vividlyfading.blogspot.com

Zeiss Sonnar 50mm F/1.5 - regular Versions and Specs

This page contains an overview over all regular versions of the Zeiss Sonnar 5cm f/1,5 and some of its Soviet, Japanese and Todays der...
vividlyfading.blogspot.com vividlyfading.blogspot.com

  • added detailed or additional images
    • added images to nickel pre-war f8+ Sonnar [v2b ZJ CR bn11]
    • added images to rare East German post-war Sonnar [v4b ZE CR arbb]
    • added additional images to East German post-war KEF Sonnar [v4b ZE KF cb]
    • added images to West German post-war Opton Sonnar [v5b ZO CR bo]
    • added images to Canon Sonnar 50mm f/1,5
  • added new Sonnar variations
    • added rare prewar and wartime R-Sonnar lenses [v3b ZJ RS rs] + [v4b ZJ RS rs]
    • added rare post-war transition Sonnar [v4b ZE CR abb T]
  • updated some descriptions
    • nickel pre-war f8+ Sonnar [v2b ZJ CR bn11]
    • nickel pre-war black ring Sonnar [v2b ZJ CR br]
    • pre-war Chrome Sonnar [v2b ZJ CR cd]
    • pre-war coated Chrome Sonnar [v3b ZJ CR cbT]
    • wartime Contax R-Sonnar [v4b ZJ CR rs]
    • post-war West German Sonnar [v5b ZO CR bz]
  • updated the production numbers in the description
The Spreadsheets are updated too. You will find all variations in the spreadsheet and guide.


This might be the last major update for a while. I consider the guide as pretty complete now. If you miss some variation in there than it might be that it is not an authentic one. I left out black market, Soviet and German fakes from this guide. Maybe I have not seen the variation in guestion yet. Write me or here if you want to know more about it.

There might be some official variations left. And there is still room for improvements of the descriptions and more information to fill. So I will keep working on this guide further. And then there is the 5cm f2 guide too. And maybe a Sonnar 8,5m guide. Who knows... 😄
 
Räuber said:
Major update of Sonnar 5cm f/1,5 guide

vividlyfading.blogspot.com

Zeiss Sonnar 50mm F/1.5 - regular Versions and Specs

This page contains an overview over all regular versions of the Zeiss Sonnar 5cm f/1,5 and some of its Soviet, Japanese and Todays der...
vividlyfading.blogspot.com vividlyfading.blogspot.com

  • added detailed or additional images
    • added images to nickel pre-war f8+ Sonnar [v2b ZJ CR bn11]
    • added images to rare East German post-war Sonnar [v4b ZE CR arbb]
    • added additional images to East German post-war KEF Sonnar [v4b ZE KF cb]
    • added images to West German post-war Opton Sonnar [v5b ZO CR bo]
    • added images to Canon Sonnar 50mm f/1,5
  • added new Sonnar variations
    • added rare prewar and wartime R-Sonnar lenses [v3b ZJ RS rs] + [v4b ZJ RS rs]
    • added rare post-war transition Sonnar [v4b ZE CR abb T]
  • updated some descriptions
    • nickel pre-war f8+ Sonnar [v2b ZJ CR bn11]
    • nickel pre-war black ring Sonnar [v2b ZJ CR br]
    • pre-war Chrome Sonnar [v2b ZJ CR cd]
    • pre-war coated Chrome Sonnar [v3b ZJ CR cbT]
    • wartime Contax R-Sonnar [v4b ZJ CR rs]
    • post-war West German Sonnar [v5b ZO CR bz]
  • updated the production numbers in the description
The Spreadsheets are updated too. You will find all variations in the spreadsheet and guide.


This might be the last major update for a while. I consider the guide as pretty complete now. If you miss some variation in there than it might be that it is not an authentic one. I left out black market, Soviet and German fakes from this guide. Maybe I have not seen the variation in guestion yet. Write me or here if you want to know more about it.

There might be some official variations left. And there is still room for improvements of the descriptions and more information to fill. So I will keep working on this guide further. And then there is the 5cm f2 guide too. And maybe a Sonnar 8,5m guide. Who knows... 😄
Click to expand...

Meticulous and devoted work. You deserve some sort of honors for what you have done.
 
I recently purchased a Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar 1.5/5 cm lens. Judging by the serial number, this lens was produced at the end of 1947.
It is a Sonnar lens for the Contax rangefinder, with an adapter to LTM.
It seems an original combi, but we haven't actually been able to find any further information about it on the internet.
Does anyone know more about this lens, is this original? Was it sold as one piece, and is there any background information about this lens combi?

Thanks!
 

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Definitely a Post-War CZJ 5cm F1.5 Sonnar, with a beautifully made custom adapter to go with it.
I have seen some custom and low-production adapters done at the time- but this one is beautifully done. The focus mount includes the Contax Mount itself, and it is all internal.
Are there any inscriptions on the inside of the mount?
I do suspect that it was made to match your lens. It looks like a Shim was used as part of the adapter.
 
The lens looks authentic. The adapter shows again the wrong engravings. It is not made by Carl Zeiss Jena. I have never seen this kind of adapter. It is hard to tell who made the adapter. If you compare the numbers on your lens and the numbers on the adapter you will see differences. For example the 4 is different and even the zero. All I can say is that it was made in Germany after the war. But since we have not solved the black market puzzle yet it could be made by everyone inside East- or West-Germany. As Brian already stated a beautiful and skillful piece nevertheless.

About the black focus arrow. Does it have the same size and shape as the red arrow on the Sonnar lens? Zeiss Oberkochen (West Germany) used a tiny bit smaller black arrow on their lenses with rounder corners compared to Zeiss Jena (East German). If the corners are not rounded at all it would point to Soviet or a very early work.
 
Nice adapter, what's also interesting is that the focus throw is almost the full 360 degrees. That's even longer than the Contax (with about 260 degrees of throw from infinity to 0.9m) from which the lens came.
 
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