bouncing ideas on modifying Jupiter 9 options

[jgrainger]

Just looking for feedback / to bounce ideas..

I've had a couple of Jupiter 9's in LTM, with a late black one (sold it) being good, and an earlier 50's example (which I still have) not focussing correctly and being pretty stiff after cleaning and re-greasing.

I have a Jupiter 8 on a Canon 7 but could use the camera (which works well, I just don't love,) more with a good Jupiter 9 / 85mm focal length..
Realistically I tend to prefer my Contax / Kiev cameras, but have the post war 85 Triotar for those cameras - which is a nice lens if a little slow.

I considered / am considering the possibility of trying to obtain a cheap Kiev mount J9 with damaged glass to swap the lenses into the mount, or potentially the option of modifying the LTM J9 to focus accurately.

The J9 could probably by modified by turning the cam surface down, drilling and tapping in 6 places, then making and fitting a brass extension with the correct profile. By also modifying the cam to turn by removing the keyway screw and stopping the cam part from rotating within the part it fits in.

I'm worried that modifying the J9 in LTM would lead to a lens which would be worthless - even if it works.. & do I really need a fast 85mm in Contax mount.. & will I use the Canon 7 because it isn't a Contax / Kiev.

I've got a lens I don't use but which I'd feel bad selling due to poor focusing on LTM bodies, and it is a fairly early (should otherwise be a good) example.

 

[xayraa33]

My factory fresh minty late made LTM Black J9 could not focus correctly on my Canon 7.

But got it working very well by a series of trial and error attempts of shimming the front lens group with Teflon pipe tape and verifying that it is in focus when the RF says so.. by having a ground glass on the camera's film plane and checking the focus with a magnifying loupe.

 

[rfaspen]

According to lens DIY gurus (one being Brian S. I think), it is futile to attempt modification of a J9 to focus correctly on a Leica (or good adherant to Leica standards, such as Canon 7).

Getting a nice Canon 85 lens solves the problem (or nearly any other true LTM lens).

Getting a J-9 in Kiev/Contax mount also works. Not sure about the lens element swapping idea. Maybe?

I wish good luck with whatever interesting idea you pursue.

 

[peterm1]

Given the J9 is shimmed and the entire front group unscrews to release those shims, why would it not work to modify (add or remove) shims till it is focusing correctly, though I acknowledge there may be problems in getting it to focus properly both at infinity and close ranges in which case a choice would be required based on how the lens will be used (portrait distances or long distances). If back focusing for example would it not be possible to swap out a shim for a slightly thicker one to move the elements further away (focus point closer)? Alternatively removing a shim might be what is needed though this may result in too much adjustment.

I must admit I have one but only use it on M43 and have never much bothered on Leica bodies as my experience has been that there are issues in getting such Russian lenses focusing properly and as I had a digital alternative I could not be bothered with the hassle. Though at one point I did consider using aluminium sheeting from a disposable roasting pan to fabricate a new shim assuming I could find one of about the correct thickness. The advantage is it is easy to find (in any supermarket), cheap and can be cut with scissors or even scored with a sharp craft knife to fabricate the shim. When in situ, its relative flimsiness should not matter in principle (in any event it is considerably more robust than ordinary tinfoil).

Also I don't know that I would be overly confident that a Canon 85mm in LTM would necessarily be any better than a J9 on a Leica body. Years back when I owned an M3 I bought a lovely chrome Canon 85mm and found that its focusing was well off on the Leica body (and yes I was using a Leitz LTM to M adapter). Having said this, every 135mm Canon LTM lens I have tried has focused pretty well though. I ended up selling the 85mm as back then it was before digital was around and I was unsure about getting the focus correct at a reasonable cost.

 

[johannielscom]

Peter, the barrel has a thread that is specifically constructed to make the lens focus correctly on a FED or Zorki and those are set to the Contax standard, which differs from the Leitz standard.

That's because after the war the Russians seized the Zeiss factories in Dresden and Jena and relocated equipment and engineers and personnel to Zharkov, which was the capital of Russian cameras before the Germans destroyed it in 1942.
The Contax standard is slightly different from the Leitz standard and while the Jupiter-3 and Jupiter-8 can be shimmed to correct that (focus correctly close-by and let depth of field generated sharpness cover the distant shots) the Jupiter-9 cannot be shimmed due to it's long focus travel. It will either be in focus close-by or in the distance, but never both.

The only solution is finding a real early Jupiter-9, because Zeiss did build a small number of Sonnar 85mm 2.0 lenses to fit Leica cameras in the war and that stock was also relocated to Zharkov and used up before the general re-design to the Contax standard.

I plan to write an article on the Leitz Standard Jupiter-9 lenses soon on my website.


LTM lenses: Jupiter-8 and Jupiter-9 top models by Johan Niels Kuiper, on Flickr

 

[johannielscom]

@ jgrainger, selling your unused Jupiter-9 which with a potential focusing issue on either LTM or Contax is no problem when you list it for use with a Sony A7 series camera or a Fujifilm since these mirrorless cameras have an EVF viewfinder where you focus off the sensor. You might get a good price too, recently there seem to be less good Jupiters around than ever before since all the mirrorless shooters are picking them up

 

[xayraa33]

I say that you got nothing to lose with shimming your J-9 lens to focus properly on your Canon 7, even if it is only set up to work for full portrait and half portrait shots range at f 2

This technique has worked very well for countless J-3 lenses, although I admit the margin of error and focus finess is higher in an 85 mm fast lens as opposed to a 50mm fast lens in the shimming department leeway.

You already own the lens and It is not rocket science, it is perfectly reversible should you not succeed to your liking.

And either way it will be a perfectly usable lens (with adaptors) should you buy a mirrorless interchangeable lens camera in the future .

 

[kotokot21]

The real joy of using J-9 is when it's mounted on a Leningrad. Yes, that's a bulky setup, but you'll get 85mm framelines and correct focusing. Another russian option with 85mm framelines in the vf/rf is the Drug (Друг) camera. Although, they say, its leicavit-style advance isn't much reliable.

If you want to mess with unscrewing and swapping the optical units of different J-9s, maybe it is reasonable to buy a more modern SLR MC Jupiter-9 and put its optical unit into an RF-lens body, be it LTM or Kiev-Contax? Their aperture isn't black like the most early ones, but they are multicoated. I'm not sure however, how much better do they perform.

 

[jgrainger]

In terms of shimming the lens, I'd do that as a partial solution, but owing to the deal with the helical which is matched to the Contax standard, I'm not keen on doing that as a total solution.

One of the 3rd party fast M lenses has a user adjustable angled (rotating type) cam surface, to match the lens to the body. I was thinking about machining down the existing cam then drilling and tapping 6 holes (using 3) to hold on an adjustable cam peice.

As the J9 LTM cam doesn't rotate I figured it could be modified to rotate by fastening into the threaded part - with the keyway screw removed. This would probably reduce some drag too - one less rotating greased thread.

By having 6 screw holes on the cam but using 3 equidistant, I figured the cam may be able to be set in adjustable ranges depending on the set of screwholes used.. And, the cam to cam surface would probably want to be beveled to maintain concentricity between the two parts.

All this would be a lot of work to do on manual machine tools, so it's not an option I'd take on lightly.

The lens is from 56 with the red n mark, and appears to be multi-coated, so it should have some potential. On the other hand, the lens module could go into any J9 Contax mount and focus fine on a Contax / Kiev - which is my favourite body.

Would a nicely customised / corrected focus LTM J9 be desirable if I wanted to sell it eventually?

 

[ForestCap]

There is no multi-coated FSU RF lens. The red P just means it's (single) coated.

The closest thing to multi-coating on FSU RF lenses is the Helios-103's coating, which uses a much more modern, non-tinted coating. But I suspect it is still single coated.

 

[jgrainger]

I guessed it is multi-coated due to the rear element seeming to be coated.. I'll check again tomorrow under natural daylight

 

[Steve M.]

Ignore this if I misunderstood you jgrainger, but a multicoated lens is one that has one or more lens elements that are coated with two or more different types of coatings. Like this (from our favorite photographer to throw bricks at)

https://kenrockwell.com/tech/lenstech.htm#coating

 

[peterm1]

Yep all sounds too hard to get it working on Leica rangefinders. I think I will just use mine on M43 bodies. In my case I only use it now and then in any case. It can produce nice images in the right situation but it is pretty low contrast and not suited to some kinds of imaging.

 

[kotokot21]

There is no multi-coated FSU RF lens. The red P just means it's (single) coated.

The closest thing to multi-coating on FSU RF lenses is the Helios-103's coating, which uses a much more modern, non-tinted coating. But I suspect it is still single coated.

Rf lenses are not, but there are MC slr lenses, the J9 mc, I61-lz mc, some Vegas, some Mirs and some Volnas.

 

[jgrainger]

Multi coated J9, I do know of multicoating but yes, my J9 is not multicoated. For some reason I'd assumed that people may have been saying old Jupiters weren't coated on all lens elements.. not sure what I was thinking 😱🙄

Sorry for any confusion caused.

Back to the topic, I could see about using the elements from a newer Jupiter to potentially gain multicoating but I'm happy with single coated lenses / the elements in my existing lens provided it moves forward in a perfected ltm or contax mount.