Early Canadian Summicrons

[echorec]

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Hello, this is my first post after reading and enjoying this great forum for a while.

 

I recently bought a pair of Summicrons, one 90mm and one 35mm. Both seem to be from 1959 and made in Canada.

 

What can you tell me about these? Are they as good as the later versions? Common or rare? Any collectors value? (They are certainly not mint condition)

 

Thanks in advance,

 

Gunnar

[Jean-Michel Komarnicki]

Many Leica lenses, were designed and manufactured in their Midland, Ontario, Canada facility. Leitz came to Canada in 1953. Camera bodies were also built there – some like my particular M3 shows "Wetzlar" on the top plate, but that unit was built in Midland. I believe that all lenses made in Canada show the word Canada on them. My 35 Summicron (1960) and 135 Elmarit (1973) were built in Canada; my 50 Summicron (1965 or later) was built in Wetzlar. All 3 are still have pristine lenses and work perfectly. In any case, there would be no particular 'rare' value as there are probably as many Canadian lenses as there are German ones; I do not know if lenses were also made in Portugal (after 1973)

 

If you are intersted in that kind of info, put Leica Canada History int a search engine and check the links that come up.

 

I undersdand that the Midland plant is now owned by Raython and does hush-hush optical work.

 

FYI: check : http://www.cameraquest.com/leicanum.htm for a list of dates and place of manufature of bodies

Check: http://www.forloren.dk/lbf/leica_lens_serial.htm for date of manufacture of lenses.

 

Jean-Michel

[luigi bertolotti]

The lenses you quote are, by collector's standard, not rare (unless the 90 is of the version with detachable hood, named SOOZI, but difficult if it is of '59) and if not mint have to be valued as user and not as collectibles: in my opinion, they are EXCELLENT for use: unuseful to discuss if the new design lenses are better, discuss the MTF graphs... if you like, in the famous Erwin Puts pages (and the book on lenses) you can find lot of deatils on this issues... Repeat: to me, they are simply excellent to use, period.

 

BTW, I think the Portugal factory (Villanova de Famelicao) has never been a lens manufacturing site.

[echorec]

Thanks for the replies!