The rocketing price of the 35mm Summicron eight element

[ejd]

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Here, a propos of nothing, is a picture of an M3 with a 35mm Summicron with goggles.  The lens seems to have been made in 1959.  I bought the lens and camera from a friend around fifteen years ago, and had the lens cleaned and the body serviced by Leica UK. One of the shutter curtains needed replacing.  I didn't think about this much until last year when suddenly the 8-element Summicron started to attract a lot of interest.  Until then this old lens seemed to be rather disparaged.  Interesting how things change.

 

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Edited October 1, 2021 by ejd
a post script, as it were

[fotografr]

I wish I hadn't seen this thread. I sold my mint copy four years ago to a friend in Singapore for a ridiculously low price. Probably the only time I've sold a Leica lens and immediately regretted it. 😥

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[6bit]

On 2/9/2018 at 10:56 AM, colint544 said:

I used to have the 35mm Summicron v1 eight element lens. It was lovely on the M6 I had at the time. Bought the lens in 1998 for £350, advertised it on eBay in 2011, and was astounded to get £1650 for it. I thought it was a nice lens, but it sometimes flared a bit, and at F2 the out of focus background could be rendered nervously rather than smoothly, especially if it had any points of light in it. Beautifully built though. I now have a Summilux ASPH FLE and a Summaron F2.8.

 

Anyway, I've just looked at Red Dot Cameras in London, and they're selling a version 1 eight element for £2200. That's a lot more than for a nice chromed brass 35mm Summicron ASPH. What on Earth is going on?

That is roughly an increase of 5.5% per year. An argument could be made for keeping up with inflation. 

[lenticularis]

On 10/2/2021 at 2:07 PM, fotografr said:

I wish I hadn't seen this thread. I sold my mint copy four years ago to a friend in Singapore for a ridiculously low price. Probably the only time I've sold a Leica lens and immediately regretted it. 😥

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 I have exactly the same story.

I bought a newly-serviced one from an APUG member for only Cad$1350 in April 2015. I used it mostly on an M9, occasionally on an M3 and even more rarely on a Sony A7R(!). Mine was from 1959 with s/n 1672378

It gave me everything I wanted and I loved the beautiful build quality and handling. I very stupidly sold it to a local dealer for the low price of Aus$1400 in Aug 2018 after purchase of some medium format gear caused a cashflow issue in retirement!

Yesterday I took delivery of a Light Lens Lab 35 f2 clone and so far I like what I see, however I wish I had kept the original Summicron.

Photos show it on my first M3 and a panorama taken on my M9.

Edited October 21, 2021 by lenticularis
Photos added

[fotografr]

7 hours ago, lenticularis said:

Yesterday I took delivery of a Light Lens Lab 35 f2 clone and so far I like what I see, however I wish I had kept the original Summicron.

Photos show it on my first M3 and a panorama taken on my M9.

 

Well, at least you don't have to deal with the goggles anymore. The Light Lens Lab 35 looks interesting.

[Jean-Michel]

Mine is from 1962, with goggles. It is sitting on a shelf as I purchased a current version a couple of years ago, mainly because of the added precision requirements of a digital body and much larger prints which necessitated the larger rangefinder patch. The smaller patch due to the goggles does make focussing a tad more difficult. I did prefer viewing the 35 view through the 50 mm frame as I wear glasses, and did so for decades with M3, 4, and 6. I am thinking of trading that, plus other film bodies and older lenses, for a set of SL2 stuff, but keep holding back, especially in the case of the 35. 
 

As for performance,  between the old and new versions, the old one has markedly lower contrast at f/2, which makes for interesting images, as soon as you close down to f/2.8 the contrast becomes similar to the new one. The new one does appear to be ‘sharper’ across the field, but once printed one would be at a loss to distinguish between prints from one or the other. There!  My own argument to keep it!

[egrossman]

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There is a beautiful example for sales on Fredmiranda.com for $2,000 now.

https://www.fredmiranda.com/forum/topic/1724521/0?keyword=Leica#15741613

I should add that I have nothing to do with this item for sale, I just saw it browsing the site.

Edited October 21, 2021 by egrossman

[fotografr]

6 hours ago, egrossman said:

There is a beautiful example for sales on Fredmiranda.com for $2,000 now.

https://www.fredmiranda.com/forum/topic/1724521/0?keyword=Leica#15741613

I should add that I have nothing to do with this item for sale, I just saw it browsing the site.

I actually thought about that one when I saw it a few days ago but I'm not comfortable buying from Malaysia in general and specifically from someone who has had a negative feedback.

[egrossman]

27 minutes ago, fotografr said:

I actually thought about that one when I saw it a few days ago but I'm not comfortable buying from Malaysia in general and specifically from someone who has had a negative feedback.

I just checked the listing and the seller isn’t in Malaysia, but Lovinia, Michigan.

Edited October 22, 2021 by egrossman

[fotografr]

2 hours ago, egrossman said:

I just checked the listing and the seller isn’t in Malaysia, but Lovinia, Michigan.

You're right, that was my mistake. When I clicked on your link it jumped to a comment about the lens that was from a guy in Malaysia. The seller's user name is The Leica Way, and he is someone I know and have purchased from previously--an M10-P and two M10Ms. He's a great guy and connected to LHSA.

The serial number of that lens would indicate it was made in 1960, the same as the one I had. Mine was a Wetzlar version and this one is made in Canada. 

I checked Ken Rockwell's site and it seems possible Leica were making that lens in Wetzlar and Canada at the same time. Naturally, the Wetzlar versions are more prized.

The one listed on the FM Forum is certainly gorgeous and probably identical to the Wetzlar versions optically.

Edited October 22, 2021 by fotografr

[Al Brown]

Just did a test of the late 35 8-element (1969) against its clone, the Light Lens Lab 35. Will publish soon.

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