35mm Summicron

Thank you everyone for replying and providing info. I will be sending it out to someone (not sure who yet) to hopefully get lucky and have it improved good enough so I can actually use it. Pretty bummed that I wont have frame lines. I had a iiia a few years ago and learned zone focusing with it. So I will likely just get a external viewfinder for it and use it that way.

I'm curious on what makes this lens so special? Is it because of the 8 elements within it?

Once I have the lens back I will update this post with the results. Hopefully magic can be achieve so I can take it out and give it a go.
 
Hello everyone, have some updates. So i took the lens to my friend who works at a local camera repair shop and who does the repairs himself. First the M3 body.

He opened it up and stated that there was a gear that was tampered with by someone not knowing what they were doing and said that, what would happen is that when you advance the film this gear will continue to get worse and then eventually slip and will need to be replaced. He mentioned that the gear may last a long time or it may not. I chose to leave the gear as is and that I'd use it like that as I don't have the money to repair it.. He offered me a newly serviced M4-2 Leitz Wetzlar for a trade if I was interested. I declined and drove home with the worry that this M3 may have issues or even break leaving me with a brick and no money to repair it. Or I can have a very nice looking M4-2 with the proper framelines for the lens. Upon arriving home after a long thought I figured I'd be more happy and worry free with the M4-2. So I drive back to meet him and traded the M3 body for the other. I feel way better with this since I do not have to worry about anything with it messing up. Onto the lens..

He took he lens apart and did what he could with the high amount of haze that it had. Upon polishing the glass it was revealed that there were a lot of scratches on the 2 center elements that could not be fixed unless it was recoated. It was explained to me that, how it would work in the recoating process is that a layer of the elemement would be ground off and then the recoat would be applied and so on. As you can see in the pictures below the scratches are many. I figured what the hell, I threw in a cheap roll of film and unfortunately, all the images appear to have this very strange glow effect to them which I'm am obviously assuming is the result from the scratched up inner elements. So needless to say I'm trying to decide what to do with the lens now. I'm in contact with A local man who repairs leicas and who also can recoat leica lenses as he has the machinery and equipment for it. (he's retired). With that being said I have not decided what I will ultimately do with the lens. I really do want to revive it, but there are a few different factors involved in that decision.

The amount scratches would likely cause this glowwy look right, and not something else that I'm not aware of?















 
I can see that the lens performance is totally under common standard of the "Summicron"

Another option is to contact Chinese Light Lens Lab, who make 8 element replica and check it they can do the re-coating service?
 
xasthur said:
I'm in contact with A local man who repairs leicas and who also can recoat leica lenses as he has the machinery and equipment for it. (he's retired).
]
Click to expand...

There are probably many here who would be very interested in obtaining the name, contact information, and background of this person. If you could add that to a post, it would be helpful to everyone. On the other hand, there are others here who, if they knew who this person was, could probably advise you as to whether he was qualified or not to do Leica lens repair and recoating.
 
I don't currently feel comfortable of giving this mans info out to the public without asking him first. If I choose to have him recoat my lens and depending on the results, and if he gives me the okay to give out his number or whatever I'll be more than happy to provide people with the info.
 
A bit cruel joke - it is now a "soft focus lens" (it has its applications). All you need to do is to change the name from Summicron to Softicron and sell it to appropriate crowd for a premium.
 
I've been trying to think of creative ways to use the lens in it's current state since I don't have any others to use with it. I'm thinking that it may be pretty cool with maybe P3200 at night in some way. Until I can get it fixed of course. From the test roll, the images are sharp, but very glowwy.
 
Send the lens to DAG first. It is worth it. My Summicron does not seem to have haze issues. Congrats on this purchase.
 
I emailed DAG with a good amount of pictures of the lens and got a reply back that he would not be able to do anything to the lens as the haze/scratches are permanent.
 
Hello everyone,

I wanted to update this post with the decisions and results I've made and got. I decided to go with my good friend who introduced me to the retired gentleman to have him look at my lens to see if he could recoat it, and to get his opinion on the glass itself. He was very shocked with how I acquired the lens and said he could recoat it for me no problem.

He showed me the equipment he uses which literally looks like some sort of space gizmo, very cool! He explained the steps and what happens during this process of taking extremely precise measurements to see if the glass is the correct measurement on both sides of each element. He continued to explain that if someone attempts to polish a element by hand and not using a machine, that they can make the surface of the glass uneven which adds more work for him. He also mentioned that he uses a machine which measures the depth of a scratch to know how much he must polish. Needless to say he went on with a ton more very interesting steps to which I was very fascinated with how complex this process is.

My friend asked him if there are possibilities that the glass can break as the 'space gizmo' heats up the glass to I think he said 350 degrees or more (can't remember). He said yes, but its very rare as he heats up the glass very slowly in order to avoid this from happening. This process of heating up the glass is for applying the coating to the elements. Once the glass heats up to a certain temperature the space gizmo then disolves the coating and it basically rains or sprinkles on to the element. There's also a vacuum chamber involved somewhere in this process, but I forgot where. Anyways, onto the results!








 
Needless to say that I was completely blown away by the results after he was done with it and couldn't believe my eyes really and double checked my serial number to make sure it matched what I gave him hehe. Also for everyone that asked me for his info, I did mention this to him and asked him if he was comfortable with me giving his info out to people who may need work. He said that he typically only works for collectors for Leica related gear. He joked around and said he will not work on cheaper lens or gear as the work he would do would likely cost more than the lenses worth itself. Which made complete sense to me as I was shown the extremely precise process that is done to recoat a lens. He is a very kind man and loves what he does. As I want to be respectful to his time I have his info for people interested, note that I will not be giving his info out to a ton of people because I wouldn't want his phone exploding.
 
What an amazing story. You were very lucky twice, finding this gem in the first place for the great price you paid and then finding this gentleman who offers these extremely rare and sought after services. Well done, enjoy this amazing lens. Never sell it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

E
Slight focus resistance at 1–2m on my Summicron 50 V5 — normal?
Replies
4
Views
233
Endzeit
E
brothernature
35mm Summicron ASPH II Flare
2
Replies
21
Views
2K
Freakscene
Freakscene
D
Comparing CZJ 272 Sonnars
2
Replies
21
Views
1K
dexdog
D
blacksaphier
Did the Nikon S3 Olympic exist before 632 0001
2
Replies
23
Views
751
NIKON KIU
NIKON KIU
Harold Yastaka
Zorki３M
Replies
12
Views
535
skopar steve
skopar steve
Back
Top Bottom