Re: Lens Coding
John Milich does excellent work, send him your lens flanges.
I sent John three lens flanges (35 cron, 21 elmarit, and 90 cron) last Friday, priority mail. I got the flanges back yesterday (Thursday) priority mail, so a six day turnaround including shipping.
The flanges are exactly as before, just with six small pits milled into them. The pits are very cleanly and uniformly cut. The ends of the pits are semicircles, while the Leica pits are more squared off. Otherwise, they look just like the Leica pits.
I filled in the pits as described in Carsten's guide with flat black and gloss white paint last night (it's what I had on hand), let it dry for an hour or so, and scraped off excess with a box cutter blade. I used trimmed down 29 cent paintbrushes to apply the paint. I let it dry overnight, and reinstalled the flanges.
One point---on many lenses, if you just tighten down the flanges, you get some slight binding on focusing. Tighten the flange snugly, and back of each screw a quarter turn or so. Focus the lens through its travel several times, and without touching the flange, snug up the screws, and then tighten them fully. No more binding.
Anyhow, all the lenses are recognized just as if they had Leica flanges. The coding is clean, professional looking and effective. Coding for three lenses cost me $75, plus $20 for insured priority return shipping (regular mail shipping costs nothing extra), and took exactly one week start to finish. It was almost too easy.
And to top it off, my 55 IR filter arrived while I was writing this message. My 21 is very happy.
Email jm at milich dot com for details. He's responsive, and his work is highly recommended.
--clyde
|