Leica M to Nikon F adapters

[MNS]

Greetings, hope we all had a great Christmas.

I know this is blasphemy for some members but I have been looking around at Leica M mount to Nikon F lens adapters and wondered if anyone has opinions on the best brand or any pitfalls you may have come across using these adapters.

I mainly want to use the telephoto lenses. I'm quite happy to use a straight adapter, knowing full well this means stop down metering, no coupling and I would have to use live view for focusing.

I have a few Nikkor AI lenses 20, 28, 35, 50, 85, 135 and a 200mm.

I'd interested to hear your thoughts.

 

[Timmyjoe]

Happy Holidays to you.

I have almost the exact same bevy of Nikon F mount lenses, and for me, a Leica M camera is the last place I would try and use them. IMHO the biggest advantage of a Leica M is the rangefinder focusing system, something completely negated by trying to mount Nikon F lenses to a Leica M body.

But don't despair, there are many great digital and film bodies that will happily take your Nikon F mount lenses. I use mine on an older Nikon Df, and currently on a Nikon Zf when I want to shoot digital (the Sony A series cameras are also a great choice). For film, I've used my Nikon F mount lenses on every Nikon "pro" film body, F, F2, F3, F4s, F5 and currently F6, and use a Nikon FM2N as a back up.

I've never tried to mate my Nikon F lenses to my Leica M, because it didn't offer me anything I couldn't get another way.

Best,
-Tim

 

[peterm1]

I assume you are asking about using Nikon F lenses on mirrorless. I do this all the time and as I am presently mostly using an L mount camera I do it by stacking adapters - say for example a Nikon F mount to Leica M mount adapter mated also with a Leica M mount to (in the above case) L mount adapter (or previously Leica M to Sony / fujifilm / m4/3 mount adapter when I was shooting one of these cameras)

I found this satisfactory as I often shoot with different lens systems and by adding a Leica M to Fuji mount adapter this makes for a flexible and relatively cheap way to adapt various lens types to different camera types. As to adapter brands. I often use K&F concept adapters as I think the quality is pretty good and the prices reasonable. But truth be told I tend to find the "no name" brand Leica M adapters pretty good too at the moment as they are inherently simple devices that do not require the kind of precision of something that has mechanical rangefinder linkage. All they have to do is to mount the lens securely to the adapter and mount the adapter securely to the camera. The other tolerances I have seen in these adapters (e.g. ensuring they are planar with the sensor plane) have been sufficient for the purpose.

The only slight quibble I notice occasionally with some adapters is that they all have some kind of locking pin to hold the lens in place and sometimes these pins are a tiny bit smaller than the cutout that receives the pin on the lens itself. This means there can sometimes be a tiny amount of circumferential rotation of the lens- almost imperceptible. This movement is so miniscule and is of a nature that does not allow the lens to wobble especially in other dimensions as the actual flanges themselves on the adapter are tight. You can be assured of NOT having this minor issue if you are of a picky nature, but only if you wish to pay a few hundred dollars for any adapter but I am not - so instead I endure the very tiny annoyance that occasionally occurs with some adapters. (As I use many lenses systems I own many adapter types and of necessity buy at the medium-priced end of the market.)

If you are planning to shoot with a digital Leica M with live view which is what I guess you intend of course you only need the Leica M adapter.

 

[Godfrey]

I have a Rayqual Nikon F to Leica M mount adapter (I think ... I'll have to dig it out to be sure). It works very well, within the limitations of use with long lenses
... M-mount is a bit small diameter for focal lengths longer than 180mm or so, shows some vignetting with my 300mm and 600mm F-mount lenses. There's no cure for this other than to use a different camera with a larger lens mount diameter, and proper mount adapter for Nikon F-mount for that, if you're using very long lenses.

G

... I dug it out: Mine is a Kipon. I thought I had a Rayqual, but that adapter is Nikon F to FourThirds.

Note to self: I really have to go through all the shelves, boxes, etc, and sort out all my filters and minor accessories.
They've become scattered randomly all over the place... !

 

[AlanLee]

For lenses longer than 200mm, using an adapter on an M lens is not a good choice. This is because the diameter of the M lens's rear aperture is much smaller than that of an F lens. Therefore, there isn't enough aperture to allow all the light to pass through.

 

[aw614]

It makes me wonder, there might be an adapter to F mount that has rangefinder coupling? I guy local to me ha a C/Y Zeiss lens that he uses on his Leica M5, and it has rangefinder coupling. It looks like it focuses from the focusing tab on the adapter vs focusing on the lens itself. I've only seen him use it on the 50mm.

 

[Oren Grad]

It makes me wonder, there might be an adapter to F mount that has rangefinder coupling? I guy local to me ha a C/Y Zeiss lens that he uses on his Leica M5, and it has rangefinder coupling. It looks like it focuses from the focusing tab on the adapter vs focusing on the lens itself. I've only seen him use it on the 50mm.

The adapter that your acquaintance was using may be one of the ones described at the link below, which were offered for a very short period about 20 years ago, in several SLR lens mounts. You could describe it as semi-coupled to the rangefinder - you focus with the helical on the adapter, then transfer the reading to the helical on the lens - not very precise. Also no automatic setting of the finder frame lines.

Adapters: SLR Coupled to M

 

[WoodallP]

The adapter that your acquaintance was using may be one of the ones described at the link below, which were offered for a very short period about 20 years ago, in several SLR lens mounts. You could describe it as semi-coupled to the rangefinder - you focus with the helical on the adapter, then transfer the reading to the helical on the lens - not very precise. Also no automatic setting of the finder frame lines.

Adapters: SLR Coupled to M

It may be a Shoten-R50, these are currently available and give RF coupling on an M for 50mm lenses with M42, PK, C/Y and Nikon F mounts. Because it actually focusses the lens (rather than giving a transferable distance reading) it will only work on 50mm lenses. I have the M42 and PK versions (and sadly am tempted by the rest); they are around 150 dollars and work pretty well.

 

[Duofold RF]

I’m not sure why you would go through the trouble of adapting a Nikon telephoto lens to a Leica M mount, as the rangefinder system isn’t designed for telephoto lenses longer than 135mm. Using a Leica Telyt lens with the Visoflex II is also a rather clumsy setup. Your best option would be a Nikon DSLR or Z-series mirrorless camera, such as the D800 or Z5—both are readily available on the used market in the $400–700 range.