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Summar 5cm variations


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As I spent this afternoon going through the thousands images - unarranged and even often not captioned -  I digitized when taking my reform, I selected a few "forgotten" ones to share with Leica mates. Here are some of three Summar 5 cm lenses I had in my collection. Everybody will recognize immediately the old rigid nickel version at left, and the "normal" collapsible one at right. More intriguing is the central piece, no? Well, it is engraved like a Summar, but it is a Soviet (it seems that it is wishful today to use that term rather than "Russian"..), and a Wetzlar friend told me that the excellent engraving demonstrates that it is a wartime model, purposely and "officially" produced to harm the (then) Nazi economy.

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My small collection of collapsible Summars. The front 5 are all different and the one at the back is a 'hybrid'.

 

 

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Van Hasbroeck lists 7 variants of the collapsible model. These ones include a black top chrome model, a nickel model and the remainder are chrome models with variations involving a notch at the f 2.9 mark for use with a filter for early Agfacolor film as well as models with and without ‘infra red’ marks.  There are also metre and feet scale variations. The eagle eyed will have spotted a 6th Summar behind. This is not another variant but it seems to be a reconstructed model using the mount of one variant (front  second right) and the front element of another variant ( front second left).  Hence, I have just used this one to ‘model’ the SOOMP ( Leica New York version) hood for the Summar 

 

I have added one more Summar to my collection since taking this photo. It is coated and has a strange red dot on the front ring; perhaps added by the person who did the coating. I can post a photo of it, if anyone is interested.

 

I have not got around yet to collecting any of the rigid models. At first I thought that the tall lens in Pecole's photo might be a Tropen (tropical) Summar but the lens mount looks more like it came from an Elmar or an Elmar copy. It is most likely to be a Russian copy.

 

The Summar is a great lens, often under-rated by people who have just seen worn copies. All of mine are in excellent condition.

 

William

 

 

 

 

 

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Well, the Soviet lens is really an odd fake... the manufacturing looks good, the s/n is even belonging to a real batch of Summars... but of course all the front assembly is CLEARLY not original... all the Summars have a front black ring with white writings.... personally, the explanation of its goal ("harm the Nazi economy") isn't convincing me.... you ought to make thousands of valuable fake goods to scratch a bit the economy of a Nation (nazis pursued the same goal more directly... the famous factory, in Austria, who produced English Sterlings....) : imho, it's more a "lab test" or maybe something related to the (thin) market of Soviet-occupied German zone just after War, and before the establishing of East Germany.

Edited by luigi bertolotti
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William, yes I'd be interested to see your newest Summar lens! About the Soviet imitation of a Summar I agree with Luigi that this could hardly have influenced in any serious way the nazi-economy. I would indeed suspect it to have been part of the first attempts to imitate and copy German produced lenses in a time that it may have been rather difficult to distinguish between original German material from several years back and newly produced imitations of that kind of lenses.

Lex

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Apologies to Sandro for the delay in posting this. Below is a photo of the seventh collapsible Summar in my collection, joining the ones pictured above. This one from 1938 has an unusual red dot on the front ring and is coated:

 

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Below, for purposes of comparison, is a photo of another 1938 Summar which is uncoated alongside the coated version:

 

 

Both of these lenses are the same variant ( ie no f2.9 mark for Agfa film or indentation on the aperture ring and an IR mark on the distance scale) and the only differences are the coating, red dot and the fact that the lens on the left is feet scale, whereas the lens on the right is metric scale. 

 

As far as I know, Leica did not start putting red dots/marks on lenses until the M mount came along and then the dot or other mark was put on the lens mount to aid bayonet mounting rather than on the front ring as is shown here. The red mark is carefully done and is in a slight depression. It is not covering a normal screw hole, as the sole screw is on the other side on both lenses.

 

I would be interested in any views as to why the dot is there. It was probably done at the same time as the coating and it may have just been to indicate that the lens had been coated, but I have seen other LTM lenses that had been coated some time after manufacture and they do not carry a red dot like this. The other theory is that some damage may have been done in the coating process, such as drilling into the ring in the wrong place, and the red paint may have been put there to cover it.

 

For what it's worth, the coated lens is optically good like all my other Summars and it shows greater saturation in colour photos. My own preference in old lenses is, however, an uncoated and desaturated look, as it is reminiscent of early colour photos.

 

William

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Hello William, thanks for posting the photos of that fascinating other Summar. I would say indeed that red dot may indicate that it is coated. And I understand your remark about the colours of the coated and uncoated Summars, but is is fascinating how that coated one would hold up against more modern lenses.

Lex

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hello :),

 

I have a 1938 Summar but I don't know what version or anything about it apart from it has a blue front ring instead of the black one I see a lot of. The lens has seen a lot of use and is brassed around the focus ring; it is also very stiff to extend and collapse. The aperture ring has the normal markings but no click stops and there is no dot in between the 3 and 2 at f/3.2; it simply reads f/32 and there is no evidence of a dot having been there at any point. The measurements on the focus ring are in meters and the s/n is 466709. I don't know anything about these lenses or whether all this is just normal for Summars so any help at all would be valuable!

 

I tried to show the way the front ring looks but it's quite hard to get a good picture of with just the lights in my room. I just wondered if anyone knew any more about my lens and if anyone could help me find out whether it was nickel or chrome or anything at all really. I'm not looking for it to be valuable or rare or special in any way I'm just interested :)

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I can see a slight blue tint on the front ring in the photo above. The front rings on my Summars from around the same period can look slightly blue when viewed at an angle in certain light but from the front they look black. The aperture should be hexagonal with overlapping blades and no click stops. The 3 and 2 at f3.2 are very close together. The dot between the figures is quite small and is sometimes difficult to see. Generally, by 1938 Leica lenses were made in chrome and nickel lenses ceased to be made around 1936. In Leica-land exceptions can occur, however, and it could possibly be in nickel as part of a special order.  Chrome Summars can also 'brass up' a bit when they become worn. A better photo would be needed to judge this. 

 

William

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Thankyou for the info! The aperture is hexagonal and overlapping; it's great to find out more about this lens. One thing though the dot on f/3.2 is definitely not there; I don't have any lenses that can focus close enough to show this (I had to hold my lens off my D700 even just to get the picture above) but it's certainly just 32 not 3.2. Even looking at it with another lens up to my eye I can't see even the faintest sign of anything there at all. Does this mean it might be a copy perhaps? Or just a mistake?

 

Max.

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  • 1 year later...

As I spent this afternoon going through the thousands images - unarranged and even often not captioned -  I digitized when taking my reform, I selected a few "forgotten" ones to share with Leica mates. Here are some of three Summar 5 cm lenses I had in my collection. Everybody will recognize immediately the old rigid nickel version at left, and the "normal" collapsible one at right. More intriguing is the central piece, no? Well, it is engraved like a Summar, but it is a Soviet (it seems that it is wishful today to use that term rather than "Russian"..), and a Wetzlar friend told me that the excellent engraving demonstrates that it is a wartime model, purposely and "officially" produced to harm the (then) Nazi economy.

Can you please photograph the front of lenses at F:5.6 , I am interested in the early models with the multi bladed aperture. Lens testing confirms far better Bokeh results from these early Summar 5cm lenses. Do you have a factory coated model? While variations in models is  important, the results on a modern mirrorless DSLM camera like Sony A7r series has yielded amazing photos from these lenses! 

Edited by eastwestphoto
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...back to Summar immitation shown by Pecole.

This is FED 2/50mm, rather rare lens produced for FED 1 cameras with 1/1000 sec. Produced since 1937, seem to be russian construction (in contrary for FED 3,5/50mm which is Tessar copy). Sample which I have does not have SN engraved. Mechanical construction differs significantly from Leitz Summar.

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Re "real" Summars and their variants

1. Rigid - SNs from 167001, highest SN sighted 190958. Produced in both nickel and chrome plating, with nickel predominating (out of 162 rigid which I have seen just 28 were in chrome). Very early rigid had f18 stop, I have seen 3 only, two of them with faked SN (genuine lens though). Around SN186xxx some lenses had black rim, both nickel and chrome may be found. All lenses which I have seen were in meters

2. Collapsible - some of the rigid lenses were converted to collapsible in factory before shipping, many have been converted by users. Lowest collapsible SN I have seen was 167857. Black rim versions of collapsible may be found in both nickel and chrome, SN around 192xxx. Early lenses did not have neither R (infrared) nor 2.9 marking for Agfafilter.Aperture ring had 2 "ears" (delimiters for aperture) and one additional screw. Agfafilter mark (mark corresponding to f2,9) started to be engraved around SN193xxx (lower SNs sighted, result of conversion). Infrared mark ® sighted from SN 238xxx. Around SN 314xxx construction of aperture ring has been modified, "ears" and additional 3rd screw were gone. 
Around 258xxx font for engraving (mount and aperture ring) was modified to a narrower one

3. Tropen Summar - very rare version, to be found between 410190 and 410355 (SNs which I have seen). In contrary to regular Summar where the first optical element was a single lens the Tropen version has cemented group of 2 elements

 

And finaly two comments:

- Luigi is right saying that all Summars have white paint engravings on black background on the front ring. I have seen only one exception, SN has "a" beind (means double assigned SN)

- red dot on lens from William - Leitz did not mark coated lenses, I am pretty sure that this has been added by the user

Edited by jerzy
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Thanks Jerzy : would be interedting to compare hands-on your Russian Summar with Pecole' fake : the built ,judging by pics only, looks similar... but the front engraving i smuch more "refined" in Pecole's fake... your one not only hasn'd s/n nor Leitz engraving, but also the Summar writing is "wrong" (I think that Leitz, on  Summars, never used "1:2 F=5cm")... maybe was one of the first tentative of faking a Leitz lens... and after having realized to have "mispelled" the Summar writing, they didn't proced with further engraving... :p

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...back to Summar immitation shown by Pecole.

This is FED 2/50mm, rather rare lens produced for FED 1 cameras with 1/1000 sec. Produced since 1937, seem to be russian construction (in contrary for FED 3,5/50mm which is Tessar copy). Sample which I have does not have SN engraved. Mechanical construction differs significantly from Leitz Summar.

attachicon.gif1.JPGattachicon.gif2.JPG

 

Re "real" Summars and their variants

1. Rigid - SNs from 167001, highest SN sighted 190958. Produced in both nickel and chrome plating, with nickel predominating (out of 162 rigid which I have seen just 28 were in chrome). Very early rigid had f18 stop, I have seen 3 only, two of them with faked SN (genuine lens though). Around SN186xxx some lenses had black rim, both nickel and chrome may be found. All lenses which I have seen were in meters

2. Collapsible - some of the rigid lenses were converted to collapsible in factory before shipping, many have been converted by users. Lowest collapsible SN I have seen was 167857. Black rim versions of collapsible may be found in both nickel and chrome, SN around 192xxx. Early lenses did not have neither R (infrared) nor 2.9 marking for Agfafilter.Aperture ring had 2 "ears" (delimiters for aperture) and one additional screw. Agfafilter mark (mark corresponding to f2,9) started to be engraved around SN193xxx (lower SNs sighted, result of conversion). Infrared mark ® sighted from SN 238xxx. Around SN 314xxx construction of aperture ring has been modified, "ears" and additional 3rd screw were gone. 

Around 258xxx font for engraving (mount and aperture ring) was modified to a narrower one

3. Tropen Summar - very rare version, to be found between 410190 and 410355 (SNs which I have seen). In contrary to regular Summar where the first optical element was a single lens the Tropen version has cemented group of 2 elements

 

And finaly two comments:

- Luigi is right saying that all Summars have white paint engravings on black background on the front ring. I have seen only one exception, SN has "a" beind (means double assigned SN)

- red dot on lens from William - Leitz did not mark coated lenses, I am pretty sure that this has been added by the user

 

Thanks Jerzy. I must do a 'class' photo of all 12 of the Summars in my collection. Among the variations and 'add ons' to be noted in my collection are the following:

 

1. Rigid or collapsible

2. Nickel or chrome

3. With and without black rim on both nickel and chrome

4. F2.9 mark for Agfa Colour film (with and without)

5. Ears on aperture ring (with and without)

6. Infra Red markings (with and without)

8. Coated and uncoated. Coating is after market, but I have at least 3 different variations.

9. The one with the red dot on the front. The dot may relate to the coating work

9.  Metres and Feet versions

10. SOOMP hood in Wetzlar and New York versions

11. NOOKY-HESUM for close up work with Summar

12. One 'hybrid' model with the head of one variant and the mount of another one. Possibly done by a technician at some stage.

 

And I have not even begun to link these to serial numbers and the batches set out in Thiele's book or the variants described by van Hasbroeck. 

 

What are missing from my collection are the rarest Summars, the chrome rigid model and the Tropen Summar. Neither do I have the rare and expensive filter for Agfa Colour film. As somebody said recently, you have to be patient when it comes to collecting.

 

I have a similar situation with an even larger group of 50mm Elmars. A lot of my Summars and Elmars came with various cameras in my collection.

 

William

Edited by willeica
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..

2. Collapsible - some of the rigid lenses were converted to collapsible in factory before shipping, many have been converted by users. Lowest collapsible SN I have seen was 167857. Black rim versions of collapsible may be found in both nickel and chrome, SN around 192xxx. Early lenses did not have neither R (infrared) nor 2.9 marking for Agfafilter.Aperture ring had 2 "ears" (delimiters for aperture) and one additional screw. Agfafilter mark (mark corresponding to f2,9) started to be engraved around SN193xxx (lower SNs sighted, result of conversion). Infrared mark ® sighted from SN 238xxx. Around SN 314xxx construction of aperture ring has been modified, "ears" and additional 3rd screw were gone. 

 

 

I have a Coll. Summar with Agfa filter features, uncoated, that does have the "R" mark and is earlier than 238xxx, it is 217254, in meters. I will post a picture to confirm later.

 

Interested also if any comments on the letter series to the rear of the infinity lock, do I recall correctly that this refers to the exact focal length? Mine is an A on this example.

 

 

Pictures added:

 

40952351801_7ced650311_z.jpg

 

 

26079861067_957ab7087f_z.jpg

Edited by chris_livsey
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yes, this is focal length group. Three are known: 7 - 51,6mm, 8 - 51,9mm and A - 52,2mm

 

Quite surprised to discover this thread "revived"! It sent me back to the "Summar" section of my photographic archives, where I selected the following images, capable of interesting someone (?)

First is a nickel rigid Summar nº 167040 with a cap.

Next two compare the rigid and first collapsible "black rim" versions. Observe that the engravings are different : one is circular, other is to be read in two lines.

Then comes an illustration of the very well imitated engraving on a soviet fake, but black on chrome instead of white on black as normal on any original Summar.

Fifth and last compares a rigid chrome nº 190879 with a "normal" collapsible nº 303180.

 

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My father's Summar coated in the Netherlands in 1948 (Jaap suggested the possible name of the company as Oude Delft) also had a red dot, so as William surmises, I suspect this may have been put there by the coating company. When Wallace Heaton recoated the lens, they painted the red dot black for some unknown reason. 

 

My current Summar, 345460, is a UK market one in feet, with an f2.9 mark. 

 

Below is a link to photos of my Summar and the original receipt from Wallace Heaton in 1937 on another thread . https://www.l-camera-forum.com/topic/282909-missing-actuator-arm-for-mooly-to-use-with-iiia/?p=3486697

 

Wilson

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My father's Summar coated in the Netherlands in 1948 (Jaap suggested the possible name of the company as Oude Delft) also had a red dot, so as William surmises, I suspect this may have been put there by the coating company. When Wallace Heaton recoated the lens, they painted the red dot black for some unknown reason. 

 

My current Summar, 345460, is a UK market one in feet, with an f2.9 mark. 

 

Below is a link to photos of my Summar and the original receipt from Wallace Heaton in 1937 on another thread . https://www.l-camera-forum.com/topic/282909-missing-actuator-arm-for-mooly-to-use-with-iiia/?p=3486697

 

Wilson

Most probable you are right about the name of the company that coated your father's Summar, Wilson. Oude Delft was indeed a very famous Dutch lenses manufacturer, and many of his products were adopted by Leica users. It was my case, and I very much enjoyed the results obtained by the 35mm Minor and 90mm Delfar mounted on various screw-mount Leica bodies, and especially with the 40cm mirror telyt mounted on Leica Ig. The 50cm version of this telyt was even attributed a Leitz code in the French catalogues : TDLCA (see copies of documents attached).

 

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