50mm Summicron Lanthar???

[Beyder28]

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I was looking at this lens and was wondering if anyone has any info on it? It is described as having the glass made of lanthanum earth material which makes it optically better than the other collapsible Summicrons. Is this the best collapsible Summicron? Is it worth the extra dough? Is it noticeably better than the others? Thanks in advance.

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[lars_bergquist]

All Summicron lenses (and all lenses designed from that time) use the high-index-low dispersion glasses that became available at that time, and that use rare-earth oxide additives to the glass. The most used has been lanthanum oxide, as in the Leica-developed LaK9 glass that was used in the Summicron, Summaron and Summilux lenses of that epoch.

 

Other manufacturers used rare-earth glass too, such as Voigtländer who actually christened one of their lens designs 'Lanthar'. There was also an Apo-Lanthar. Today of course all optical glass is made from recipes that would have been regarded as very exotic in the 1950's. The lens you have is in no way exceptional.

 

The old man from the Age of the Elmar

[luigi bertolotti]

Any seller that describes a Summicron 50 as "Lanthar version", for me has to be considered a not too serious one... : the Summicron 50 collapsible had several small improvements during its life but the most significant modification in glasses' type underwent during the transition phase marked by the well known "Summitar * " (aka "Summitar Star") which indeed moved some glass elements from Thorium-based to Lanthanum-based (the Thorium oxide glass is also known as the "radioactive" one).

 

All (afaik) Summicron lenses used from the start the Lanthanum based glass (LaK9 - originally developed at Wetzlar, today a formula still commercially available from Schott as N-LaK9), but the quality of the refinement of Lanthanum from other elements (Ittrium, and Thorium too) was not so consistent in the first years... so the Summicrons in the batches under # 1.000.000 (roughly... just an easy to remember "divide") often show the typical yellow hue in the front lens... and someone likes to identify them as the "radioactive Summicrons".

The transition in glass types is well depicted in the excellent Marco Cavina' site :

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So there is nothing strange in a "Lanthar" Summicron... and the term is very misleading, being in itself a brand name used by Voigtlander... a collapsible Summicron 50, under 1.000.000 and in VERY good cosmetic conditions (which isn't common) is a very appealing collector - user item, even if not rare,

[lars_bergquist]

Right, Luigi!

 

The old man from the Age of Flint and Crown

[Beyder28]

Thank you guys. That really clears things up. I guess those kinds of people who make a big deal about the term, "Lanthar," in the Summicron that they are selling, are just trying to prey on the less knowledgeable Leica users (when it comes to history of lens design anyway) and charge them a premium for it.

[someonenameddavid]

Any seller that describes a Summicron 50 as "Lanthar version", for me has to be considered a not too serious one... : the Summicron 50 collapsible had several small improvements during its life but the most significant modification in glasses' type underwent during the transition phase marked by the well known "Summitar * " (aka "Summitar Star") which indeed moved some glass elements from Thorium-based to Lanthanum-based (the Thorium oxide glass is also known as the "radioactive" one).

 

All (afaik) Summicron lenses used from the start the Lanthanum based glass (LaK9 - originally developed at Wetzlar, today a formula still commercially available from Schott as N-LaK9), but the quality of the refinement of Lanthanum from other elements (Ittrium, and Thorium too) was not so consistent in the first years... so the Summicrons in the batches under # 1.000.000 (roughly... just an easy to remember "divide") often show the typical yellow hue in the front lens... and someone likes to identify them as the "radioactive Summicrons".

The transition in glass types is well depicted in the excellent Marco Cavina' site :

[ATTACH]274843[/ATTACH]

 

[ATTACH]274844[/ATTACH]

 

 

 

So there is nothing strange in a "Lanthar" Summicron... and the term is very misleading, being in itself a brand name used by Voigtlander... a collapsible Summicron 50, under 1.000.000 and in VERY good cosmetic conditions (which isn't common) is a very appealing collector - user item, even if not rare,

 

I took a look at my M3 (just an excuse to fondle it) and the body serial number is 737 XXX and the lens is 123XXXX so it is a 1954-55 camera and already the Summicrons were way past the 1 000 000 mark: surely there can't be many collapsible Summicrons under 1 000 000

 

IMHO 1954 was a golden year for cameras: the M3, the "color-dial" (and last) Contax IIa, Land Cameras that took sharp pictures. Hasselblads...

 

David

[luigi bertolotti]

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I took a look at my M3 (just an excuse to fondle it) and the body serial number is 737 XXX and the lens is 123XXXX so it is a 1954-55 camera and already the Summicrons were way past the 1 000 000 mark: surely there can't be many collapsible Summicrons under 1 000 000

....

David

 

More than 10.000, indeed... not so many within the global figures of Summicrons 50, but don't forget that they were the golden ages of Leitz... numbers were anyway high and 50 was the standard lens...