Leitz Xenon 5cm f/1.5 Brief Guide - Rumors and Facts

[willeica]

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5 minutes ago, luigi bertolotti said:

Right... I found also a pair on past Westlicht auctions (2008 - sold at rather reanable prices, btw) ; so not a transplant... but the asked price is really silly...

I agree. But you must also have my experience of unrealistic prices where I went to an auction house after an item was not sold and they actually looked for more than the start price which was not achieved during the auction itself. Yes, this price is ridiculous, but the seller will find this out the hard way. I don't mind large prices being achieved during 'real auctions' as they are usually a sign of competition between bidders and thus indicate the desirability of the item being sold.

William

Edited May 5, 2020 by willeica

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[Tears Everywhere]

3 hours ago, willeica said:

Leitz definitely erred on the side of caution in respect of Schneider and , where applicable, TTH. What we don’t seem to know is whether any commercial consideration existed alongside this caution. Or do you know something about this as well?

My evidence is not very solid, but I will say that was an accident.

TTH had been struggled on the patent US2019985 for years, no one expected it could be approved. TTH had stopped the production of Super Speed Panchro. When Leica designed Xenon in 1934, they were based on a free prior art of TTH type.

But surprisingly, TTH made it patented at the end of 1935, very close to the announce of Leitz Xenon. Leica was forced to seek for TTH's license.

[willeica]

4 hours ago, Tears Everywhere said:

My evidence is not very solid, but I will say that was an accident.

TTH had been struggled on the patent US2019985 for years, no one expected it could be approved. TTH had stopped the production of Super Speed Panchro. When Leica designed Xenon in 1934, they were based on a free prior art of TTH type.

But surprisingly, TTH made it patented at the end of 1935, very close to the announce of Leitz Xenon. Leica was forced to seek for TTH's license.

Was that the reason why the Schneider Xenon had a 'free run' earlier? I see some significance in the patents, but not as much as you do. The story of claiming patents on lens designs is almost as old as photography itself, but successful infringement cases seem to be very rare. The main significance is that Leitz considered it necessary to mention the TTH situation by marking their lenses. We don't know whether Leitz paid consideration to either Schneider or TTH or whether Schneider did the business with TTH on behalf of Leitz. There seem to be some unexplained loose ends here.

William

[Tears Everywhere]

1 hour ago, willeica said:

We don't know whether Leitz paid consideration to either Schneider or TTH or whether Schneider did the business with TTH on behalf of Leitz. There seem to be some unexplained loose ends here.

Summarit, the successor of Xenon also engraved with TTH US Patent even though it had no relationship to Schneider. I also have a record of Summarit. The last batch of TTH Summarit was made in 1952, the same year that TTH US Patent expired. There was no any Summarit engraved with TTH British patent, because the British patent expired much earlier. If carried "TTH" on lens barrel had any marketing reason, Leica should continuing do it in the whole life time of Summarit.

[willeica]

29 minutes ago, Tears Everywhere said:

Summarit, the successor of Xenon also engraved with TTH US Patent even though it had no relationship to Schneider. I also have a record of Summarit. The last batch of TTH Summarit was made in 1952, the same year that TTH US Patent expired. There was no any Summarit engraved with TTH British patent, because the British patent expired much earlier. If carried "TTH" on lens barrel had any marketing reason, Leica should continuing do it in the whole life time of Summarit.

The only reason why TTH would be on any Leitz lens would be for copyright reasons, but normally in such circumstances the holder of the patent would look for more than just acknowledgement. I don't believe that marketing had anything to do with TTH being on the lenses.  I am sure that Leica does not allow its name to be printed on the back of Huawei smartphones for no consideration of any form. There is a marketing advantage to Huawei, of course, and Leica would expect something in return. This marketing aspect did not arise in the case of the Xenon and TTH, but TTH had its copyright to fall back on.

William

[sandro]

Tears everywhere and William are far greater experts on this matter than I am, but I agree with William on the last point. I don't see anything else than patent obligations to use TTH on Leitz lenses. Apart from that, it seems to me that Schneider was more deeply involved in the design of this lens, hence the name Xenon. 

Lex

[pgk]

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Just thinking about this, but was the Xenon the first design that Leica used which was not primarily a Leica design (or at least had to acknowledge prior design input)? I ask because I know that Leica subsequently used other manufacturer's designs and lenses, which seems to be quite unusual in terms of a mainstream manufacturer. I can only think of one instance of a Japanese manufacturer buying an existing design and this was Nikon who bought the rights for the Calypsophot camera from J Y Cousteau and then used if the the basis of the Nikonos. 

[luigi bertolotti]

Well.. a thread long as this , or even more, could started about "Where the Elmar came from ?" Lot has been written about Berek "taking something from Zeiss"(*)  .. but Zeiss patents were expired... but don't pretend to know the whole story, surely complex as this one of the Xenon... 😎

(*)(roughly) Zeiss Tessar was 4 glasses... Berek added one - Anstigmat/Elmax... but then removed one, reverting to 4... and was the Elmar.

Edited May 5, 2020 by luigi bertolotti

[willeica]

1 hour ago, luigi bertolotti said:

Well.. a thread long as this , or even more, could started about "Where the Elmar came from ?" Lot has been written about Berek "taking something from Zeiss"(*)  .. but Zeiss patents were expired... but don't pretend to know the whole story, surely complex as this one of the Xenon... 😎

(*)(roughly) Zeiss Tessar was 4 glasses... Berek added one - Anstigmat/Elmax... but then removed one, reverting to 4... and was the Elmar.

Don't get me started on the Elmar. There was said to have been a copyright issue lurking in there which forced the change to the name Elmar. There are many more variants of the Elmar than most people think, even more than are listed by van Hasbroeck in his wonderful attempt to codify all Leica lenses. Jerzy and I started an attempt some years ago to identify all of the Elmar variants and I was not sad when we stopped as the variations just kept growing as we went along. The Richter/Fricke book indicates that development of the Elmar went on long after the lens was introduced with Zuhlcke sending test data on different focal lengths to Barnack as late as 1931. Then there are the numeric codes behind the infinity knob indicating actual focal length and how and why these existed. We could spend the rest of our lives investigating and discussing the humble Elmar, the lens that 'made Leica'.

William

[derleicaman]

I dug out my other Xenon lenses, and am reporting the details of them here:

Serial #288525 DRPa US Patent, 3 Rings, Feet Scale

Serial #288780 DRPa British and US Patents, 3 Rings, Feet Scale

Serial #376012 DRP, No Patents, 3 Rings, Mtr Scale

Serial #426591 DRP, No Patents, 4 Rings, Mtr Scale

[Tears Everywhere]

6 hours ago, sandro said:

Tears everywhere and William are far greater experts on this matter than I am, but I agree with William on the last point. I don't see anything else than patent obligations to use TTH on Leitz lenses. Apart from that, it seems to me that Schneider was more deeply involved in the design of this lens, hence the name Xenon. 

Lex

Dear Lex, as I concluded in the first of this topic, I believed Leitz Xenon was designed by Albrecht Wilhelm Tronnier of Schneider. It has different optical characteristics to Leica designer's work such as Max Berek. Tronnier had modified(copied) TTH designs two times before, he was skilled on it.

But the TTH patent US2019985 surprisingly approved in Nov 1935, making Leitz Xenon only valid in Germany. Leica can't sell similar product in US till 1952. As I know but no solid evidence, Leica paid much high for the license fee due to the word "Xenon". Schneider had very bad reputation to TTH before...

[Tears Everywhere]

30 minutes ago, derleicaman said:

Serial #288780 DRPa British and US Patents, 3 Rings, Feet Scale

This sample is so important!!!
In my record, the marking was U.S.Pat only before #288773 . Then changed to both British and US Patents after #288780.

Your collection might be the first one, at last the 7th lens, of new batch.

 

[alan mcfall]

Thiele, from factory records, lists an early lot of five Xenon lenses at 270001-005, perhaps these would be consided prototypes. I wonder if they were built by  Leitz or with someone else. I have only seen one, 270004 and it is in the Leitz Museum.  Continuous production from 288001.  My earliest Xenon is 288279 and my highest serial is 491889. Reportedly the highest serial was 491897 and the earliest Summarit at 491898.  Including the potential 5 prototypes total production could be 6403.  The 491889 has no engraving other than Leitz Xenon f=5cm 1:1,5 No 491889.  

Some early Summarits had DRP and patent engraving, so it is hard to determine the actual sequence of production, i.e.  some late Xenons may have been delivered after the earliest Summarits. As others have noted, the delivery destination, export or not, will have impacted the engraving.  I have a variety of folding hoods for the Xenon in both black and chrome.

There are some reports of Nickle finish Xenons, they are hard to validate.  If anyone has evidence, it would be nice to add to our knowledge.  Perhaps the rare prototypes?

Early lenses have dots for f 1.9 and 2.9 for the AGFA color filters.They seem to have been deleted sometime in the 289xxx lot.  The x-ray Xenon has also been a topic for some, my recorded examples are all in the late 491xxx lot.

[willeica]

I included the 5 SNs commencing with 288001 in my total of 6505 SNs assigned to the Leitz Xenon. The numbers actually manufactured are almost certainly less than this. 

A Leica Standard X Ray model fitted with a Xenon (SN 288406) is coming up for auction on 21st May next. The front ring of the lens includes the TTH information.

https://bid.flintsauctions.com/lot-details/index/catalog/15/lot/12389?url=%2Fauctions%2Fcatalog%2Fid%2F15

The same auction also includes a Leitz Summarit (SN 740189) marked 'U.S. Pat. Nr.2019985'. The text refers to an engraving 'Taylor, Taylor & Hobson' , but this is not visible in the catalogue photos. 

https://bid.flintsauctions.com/lot-details/index/catalog/15/lot/12408?url=%2Fauctions%2Fcatalog%2Fid%2F15

William

[luigi bertolotti]

The  lens on the X-Ray is interesting... it also has the Agfacolor markings...

[willeica]

1 minute ago, luigi bertolotti said:

The  lens on the X-Ray is interesting... it also has the Agfacolor markings...

Good spotting Luigi. That would be the same f2.9 as on the Summar, I suppose.

William

[Guest JMF]

Please delete post !

Edited May 6, 2020 by JMF
Info about X-Ray Xenon / Flints auction already given above.

[luigi bertolotti]

6 hours ago, willeica said:

Good spotting Luigi. That would be the same f2.9 as on the Summar, I suppose.

William

Yes, 2 marks at f 2,9 and 1,9 (Hektor 7,3 cm 1,9 was announced with the Agfacolor filter) 

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[derleicaman]

I'll take a look at my lenses again, and note which ones have the Agfa Color "dots" on them.

 

[Tears Everywhere]

On 5/6/2020 at 12:34 PM, alan mcfall said:

Early lenses have dots for f 1.9 and 2.9 for the AGFA color filters.They seem to have been deleted sometime in the 289xxx lot.  The x-ray Xenon has also been a topic for some, my recorded examples are all in the late 491xxx lot.

In my record of 200 samples, the "AGFA dot" disappeared from #289000. But some lenses around #289100 still had AGFA Dot. 
I guess the total production of AGFA version Xenon would be 1100.