Sonnar 5cm fakes?

[Räuber]

You can find interesting Sonnar lenses on Ebay and it is one of the greatest places to get a used Sonnars for photographers and collectors. There are a lot of other useful places for buying Sonnars too.

Sometimes I find a Sonnar online that seem to be odd. The details do not match what they should look like. Most people would call this simply a fake lens, other people would call this a prototype, a custom modification, a hacked lens or a Frankenstein lens. This depends on the change.

I have found an interesting case of 2 lenses with the same wrong serial number.

Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar 5cm f/1,5 T Nr. 2866400



This was offered last year on Ebay. The serial is wrong as it belongs to a batch of Kipronar 9cm lenses. The LTM body has an m mark but it has a dot as aperture mark. So it is no authentic CZJ body.

Found this offer on Ebay.

CONTAX Carl Zeiss Sonnar 5cm f1,5 T U4016 ju014 | eBay

Verschluss löst aus - Verschlusszeiten in Ordnung. Optik klar.

www.ebay.de

Same serial number of 2866400. But the body is a Contax mount version of this lens. I first thought that someone had remounted the LTM lens into a Contax body but that is unlikely. LTM Sonnars go for more money. So this would be of no profit.

Both bodies belong to the time of 1945 though. You can see the age of the lenses. They are unique items. But I suspect a moonshiners job here.

 

[Sonnar Brian]

These are most likely made after the war ended, and made in Germany. I have seen a lot like this. The LTM mount looks authentic, but the only way to know for sure is to open it up and look for the serial numbers Stamped on the individual pieces. The lens- look for the SN engraved on the rear triplet. Also look for any taps near the barrel to hold the rear triplet in, and (rare) the name ring in. I've seen ZK lenses with the hole in the barrel for the set screw, but it not used.

 

[dexdog]

Interesting observation. I suspect that these are both what Sonnar B and others refer to as "irregular production" lenses. If one gives credence to the idea that these kinda lenses were clandestinely assembled by CZJ workers using stolen parts, it would be reasonable to believe that double serial numbers would occur, given that people making black market products are not going to be coordinating on details like serial numbers. The lenses look mostly OK, but have differences like the dot for the aperture index and the wider than normal ears on the aperture ring. I recently saw a similar situation on eBay for the 8.5cm f2 Sonnar, same serial number on two different lenses, one in LTM and the other in Contax RF mount.

 

[Sonnar Brian]

Also note the number of Ridges in the Aperture ring "Wings". More than the wartime lenses, more than ZK Sonnars and early Jupiter-3's.
These are made-in-Germany Sonnars, "irregular production" with a best effort after the war left Germany in ruins and the Soviets were occupying the Eastern part of it.
The SN- close to the 285~286 batch of 5000 lenses. I recently picked up a Contax mount 5cm F1.5 Sonnar "T", SN 278xxxx. Thiele 2002 skips over that batch- no entry. I disassembled it- everything checks on it as being original.

 

[dexdog]

Also note the number of Ridges in the Aperture ring "Wings". More than the wartime lenses, more than ZK Sonnars and early Jupiter-3's.
These are made-in-Germany Sonnars, "irregular production" with a best effort after the war left Germany in ruins and the Soviets were occupying the Eastern part of it.
The SN- close to the 285~286 batch of 5000 lenses. I recently picked up a Contax mount 5cm F1.5 Sonnar "T", SN 278xxxx. Thiele 2002 skips over that batch- no entry. I disassembled it- everything checks on it as being original.

The 2011 version of Thiele's book lists one batch of 300 f1.5 Sonnars in Contax mount, 2786801 to 2787100, with a production date of July 10, 1943

 

[Sonnar Brian]

The 2011 version of Thiele's book lists one batch of 300 f1.5 Sonnars in Contax mount, 2786801 to 2787100, with a production date of July 10, 1943

That batch is in the 2002 edition (which you gave to me). This SN range is missing completely.
It is a proper CZJ Sonnar 5cm F1.5, correct SN stamped in the rear triplet fixture, correct number of aperture ring ridges, looks like one of my 272xxxx Sonnars.

 

[Räuber]

Found 2 Sonnar 1,5 fakes for auction in Austria.


First auction

This not only looks strange the serial belongs to a Tessar 7,5cm 3,5. Not only that this one does not resemble any authentic CZJ Sonnar 1,5 ever made the fonts look kind of too big. You see the name ring was made with the right equipment and even the letters match the CZJ font but it looks kind of fake.

Second auction

This one is fake too. The serial belongs to a Kipronar 9cm 1,9. This one looks better than the first one but again it does not look like any other CZJ Sonnar 1,5. The interesting thing is how they build the LTM focus helicoid. They seem to have used a late LTM adapter for collapsible Sonnar f2's. Then they inserted kind of an adapter to fit the 1,5 lens block onto the helicoid.

 

[Räuber]

I found another stange and interesting Sonnar 5cm f/1,5 at Ebay. It is not a fake but I cannot say what it really is.

Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar 1:1.5 f=5cm Camera Lens Clean Optics | eBay

Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar 1:1.5 f=5cm Camera Lens Clean Optics. Condition is Used. Shipped with USPS Priority Mail.

www.ebay.de

Looks like a common lens block of a Sonnar 5cm f1,5. The outer barrel is missing. Something only hobbyists might be interested. First I thought this might come from a donator Contaflex Sonnar. But here is a Contaflex Sonnar without barrel:

Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar 1:1.5 f=5cm (1937) for Ikon Contaflex TLR (not Contax) | eBay

At a guess, only 2300 of these lenses were manufactured, thus they command high prices - the low price for this item is due to the missing barrel part. Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar 50mm f/1.5 Lens. This is iconic lens was the world's first f/1.5 lens in 50mm focal length.

www.ebay.de

They look quite different. What made me suspicious is the front rim of the Sonnar lens in question. It is missing the typical Rändelung / knurling. It is missing a filter thread too. If this was a Contaflex lens it is missing the black dot of the aperture mark.

Can someone shine some light from what Sonnar lens this lens block is? And why is the filter thread missing?

 

[Sonnar Brian]

Interesting- the first lens is missing the mount, aperture ring, and filter ring. The latter- is detachable from the barrel.

 

[dexdog]

A lot of sonnars show up on German language eBay that are not on the English version that I use. Never seen anything like these two lenses

 

[Sonnar Brian]

Seller accepted my offer on the incomplete Sonnar- worth it to me to have the glass and barrel.

The first lens was also out of the US- replace the ".de" with ".com" and the URL takes you to the US Ebay site.

Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar 1:1.5 f=5cm Camera Lens Clean Optics | eBay

Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar 1:1.5 f=5cm Camera Lens Clean Optics. Condition is Used. Shipped with USPS Priority Mail.

www.ebay.com

 

[Räuber]

You rarely see a Contaflex Sonnar without a camera. And they are very expensive too. Here is one example.

Carl Zeiss Jena 5cm f1.5 Sonnar for Contaflex TLR #1865922 ........... Rare | eBay

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for Carl Zeiss Jena 5cm f1.5 Sonnar for Contaflex TLR #1865922 ........... Rare at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!

www.ebay.com

You can compare this to the second Ebay offer. I think the second offer is an incomplete one where the outer barrel is missing. Unfortunately it will be hard to get a replacement for the missing part.

You can learn more about the Zeiss Ikon Contaflex TLR on Pacific Rim.

Pacific Rim Camera Photographica Pages

@Sonnar Brian Good to see that you took the chance. 🙂

 

[Räuber]

Carl Zeiss Jena 5cm f1.5 Sonnar LTM | eBay

It focuses fine and the aperture works properly. Amazingly, (at least for people not that familiar with optics) it still makes a pretty nice image! This is an early uncoated lens with no fungus and only faint edge haze.

www.ebay.de

This one screams fake all over the place. And the glass is damaged. The serial is 1.211.905 and off the table (serial belongs to a Tessar 5cm 3,5). I suspect it is a post-war black market creation.

The interesting thing about this fake is its unique LTM body. The aperture scale and focus scale move in Leica direction and not the usual Zeiss direction.

 

[TenEleven]

A very strange ebay "special" that initially almost passed as a legit LTM wartime Sonnar -- until I started looking more closely.

• What's going on with the anodized mount section - strange but not the strangest thing I have seen
• The black nose is also rare but I have seen legit examples in the 2.84x range with it
• It gets weirder there's the flat-head counter-sunk screw apparently holding the lens into the mount - it looks very close to those used on the 5.8cm "Leica Sonnars" and some 8.5cm LTM lenses out of the same workshop
• Then you realize that the focus scale ring has no delimit screw (strange) and seems to be fixed to the inner focus mechanism with only one single grub screw
• Lastly and the strangest of all - the aperture dot is on the focus scale ring, this means the front has to rotate otherwise that makes no sense at all
• Otherwise the lens is unremarkable, the aperture grip looks correct, so is the font and the general style of engraving are all within the typical variances

Very strange construction... and almost certainly not original

Edit: To be clear, I am quite certain that if disassembled, the optical block will turn out to be 100% Zeiss... the mount portion however... who knows. Irregular production, most likely.

 

[Räuber]

Yes, have seen this one too. Lens block very likely authentic. Name ring is CZJ. Rest of the lens is from the same maker as the 1407k Sonnar 5,8cm f/1,5 lenses. Have a look here and compare it with this 5cm Sonnar.