TenEleven
Well-known
I first ran into this lens on a popular auction site in 2018 or 2019, I believe. Back then I hesitated to pull the trigger because the price was 500 dollars or so for a completely unknown lens with virtually zero information available anywhere. The copies on offer also lacked an aperture index, another turn-off.
Recently I ran across it again and since the price was reasonable and it actually had an indexed aperture, I went for it.
Here is what it looks like "worn" on a Leica M2. These photos are already post-service, so I am getting ahead of myself.
The lens as it arrived had a slightly oily aperture and infinity focus was well beyond infinity. My Jupiter-3+ also seemed to use quite runny oil for the aperture, which I had rectified recently. I was however very happy to see that the focus scale tracked the rangefinder perfectly from infinity (spot-on on both M and LTM) to about 0.65m when my M2 usually decouples as is the case here.
Focus down to about 0.45m these numbers are marked in red as RF disengages.
In an internet first we have some disassembly pics, nothing too exciting I am afraid.
The construction is aluminum for the lens housing and brass for everything else.
Point of note: the rear group also has a black shim washer around it - most likely to set the correct focal length and optical corrections.
I was happy to see brass studs used for the aperture pivots, together with the brass helical this should make the lens rather wear-resistant. The aperture mechanism construction is typical Jupiter-xx or Carl Zeiss Jena style. If you have seen these lenses you will find no surprises here.
I proceeded with shimming the lens up to infinity (shim size is not shared with Jupiter-3, 12, 8) and seems unique to this lens; so I made some shims from copper tape. It needed c.a. 0.25mm more to not overshoot infinity on my DIY collimator.
Construction wise this lens reminds me of a Biogon 35/2.8 LTM or a Jupiter-12. The front group screws into the focus housing first. Then you screw the rear group into the front group, not the housing, which is a Jupiter-12 style construction. Also the aperture is not indexed to the focus housing, instead it is indexed to the front group. The index does not rotate but the scale does, just like on a Jupiter-12. If you install a filter or hood you will now rotate the filter to adjust the aperture, just like on a Jupiter-12.
The Biogon/Jupiter-12 construction (and the lens being a prototype!) is likely also why after shimming the lens up to spec I can no longer turn focus to the red 0.5m mark. I assume due to the rear group housing hitting the focus mount. Not a huge loss, but points to the prototype nature of the lens.
It is likely someone absconded the parts that constitute the copies floating around from the KMZ factory and made them into "complete" lenses. It is safe to assume that in proper production the housings would have been matched to the lens so that this would not happen. Chan from "Chan's Blog" below seems to have had a similar experience. It's funny how history seems to repeat, isn't it?
From what I could gather from the very few sources I could find (two to be exact):
- It's a lens that was commissioned by Lomography of the KMZ factory in Krasnogorsk
- It's LTM native but rangefinder couples down to 0.6m thereabouts with an M/L ring with the appropriate cutout
- Register appears to be Leica, not Zorki
- Weight is 202 grams
- 35mm long at infinity and 56mm wide at the widest
- takes 46mm screw in filters
- 9 curved aperture blades in a circle - f2 to f22; at f2 the blades are still visible
- the front and rear elements are quite large
- the lens does not rotate upon focus
- I counted 5 reflections in the glass in front and 7 in the back (Double Gauss with extra rear element? 4 groups/7 elements?)
There are two sources I could find about this lens:
One is "Chan's Blog" (Chinese): Post 1, Post 2
An Instagram from "The Latent Image" it appears to be a camera shop. Post
The IG post and "Chan's Blog" speculate different origins for this lens, I think that the IG post might be correct with it stating the lens being "based on" the LOMO OKS8-35-1 due to me counting 7 reflections in the back, which would match the element count of that diagram. Regardless of which it is, the lens has been scaled up to cover full size, since the elements are considerably larger than either of these lenses.
I will report back when the focus test was successful and go and take some pictures with this lens, which I will post here.
Recently I ran across it again and since the price was reasonable and it actually had an indexed aperture, I went for it.
Here is what it looks like "worn" on a Leica M2. These photos are already post-service, so I am getting ahead of myself.
The lens as it arrived had a slightly oily aperture and infinity focus was well beyond infinity. My Jupiter-3+ also seemed to use quite runny oil for the aperture, which I had rectified recently. I was however very happy to see that the focus scale tracked the rangefinder perfectly from infinity (spot-on on both M and LTM) to about 0.65m when my M2 usually decouples as is the case here.
Focus down to about 0.45m these numbers are marked in red as RF disengages.
In an internet first we have some disassembly pics, nothing too exciting I am afraid.
The construction is aluminum for the lens housing and brass for everything else.
Point of note: the rear group also has a black shim washer around it - most likely to set the correct focal length and optical corrections.
I was happy to see brass studs used for the aperture pivots, together with the brass helical this should make the lens rather wear-resistant. The aperture mechanism construction is typical Jupiter-xx or Carl Zeiss Jena style. If you have seen these lenses you will find no surprises here.
I proceeded with shimming the lens up to infinity (shim size is not shared with Jupiter-3, 12, 8) and seems unique to this lens; so I made some shims from copper tape. It needed c.a. 0.25mm more to not overshoot infinity on my DIY collimator.
Construction wise this lens reminds me of a Biogon 35/2.8 LTM or a Jupiter-12. The front group screws into the focus housing first. Then you screw the rear group into the front group, not the housing, which is a Jupiter-12 style construction. Also the aperture is not indexed to the focus housing, instead it is indexed to the front group. The index does not rotate but the scale does, just like on a Jupiter-12. If you install a filter or hood you will now rotate the filter to adjust the aperture, just like on a Jupiter-12.
The Biogon/Jupiter-12 construction (and the lens being a prototype!) is likely also why after shimming the lens up to spec I can no longer turn focus to the red 0.5m mark. I assume due to the rear group housing hitting the focus mount. Not a huge loss, but points to the prototype nature of the lens.
It is likely someone absconded the parts that constitute the copies floating around from the KMZ factory and made them into "complete" lenses. It is safe to assume that in proper production the housings would have been matched to the lens so that this would not happen. Chan from "Chan's Blog" below seems to have had a similar experience. It's funny how history seems to repeat, isn't it?
From what I could gather from the very few sources I could find (two to be exact):
- It's a lens that was commissioned by Lomography of the KMZ factory in Krasnogorsk
- It's LTM native but rangefinder couples down to 0.6m thereabouts with an M/L ring with the appropriate cutout
- Register appears to be Leica, not Zorki
- Weight is 202 grams
- 35mm long at infinity and 56mm wide at the widest
- takes 46mm screw in filters
- 9 curved aperture blades in a circle - f2 to f22; at f2 the blades are still visible
- the front and rear elements are quite large
- the lens does not rotate upon focus
- I counted 5 reflections in the glass in front and 7 in the back (Double Gauss with extra rear element? 4 groups/7 elements?)
There are two sources I could find about this lens:
One is "Chan's Blog" (Chinese): Post 1, Post 2
An Instagram from "The Latent Image" it appears to be a camera shop. Post
The IG post and "Chan's Blog" speculate different origins for this lens, I think that the IG post might be correct with it stating the lens being "based on" the LOMO OKS8-35-1 due to me counting 7 reflections in the back, which would match the element count of that diagram. Regardless of which it is, the lens has been scaled up to cover full size, since the elements are considerably larger than either of these lenses.
I will report back when the focus test was successful and go and take some pictures with this lens, which I will post here.
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