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Modern silver wide angle M lenses - a rare breed?


Al Brown

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2 hours ago, Al Brown said:

Would you mind sharing the Hartmut Thiele list as a facsimile for educational purposes - just the parts relevant to 24 Elmarit ASPH?

Nothing would be gained for the purpose of this thread because Thiele also cannot clearly distinguish between black and silver chrome versions. 

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On 9/29/2023 at 10:09 PM, Al Brown said:

How rare are modern silver M wide angle lenses below 35mm? Specifically the Elmarit 21mm f/2.8 ASPH and Elmarit 24mm f/2.8 ASPH? What is the total count of the two? How about Summicron 28 ASPH? The latter is apparently not brass...? How many silver chrome Summilux 28's were made before they were discontinued? Any silver Summilux 24's? Was there ever the SEM 21mm Super-Elmar ASPH f/3.4 in silver? What about Elmar 24 f/3.8 ASPH? I have also seen a silver MATE but no WATE? And the silver Elmarit 28mm f/2.8 ASPH was finished in 775 pieces only?

I haven’t come across any records that give an accurate number of lenses produced for the 21 and 24 asph versions 

From the chrome collection:

21/2.8 asph - brass, not very rare 

24/2.8 asph - brass, not very rare 

28/1.4 - silver anodized - kind of rare 

28/2 - silver anodized - rare 

28/2.8 - silver anodized - rare 

28/5.6 relaunch - brass - not rare 

Rare / kind of rare - if you have enough dealer contacts across the continents, it’s only a matter of time before you get a copy. Price fluctuates based on many factors. 

No silver 21/1.4 or 24/1.4 ever made. 
No silver 21/3.4 or 24/3.8 either.

For the sake of completeness, older chrome lenses: 

21/3.4 silver 

21/4 silver 

28-35-50 silver 

 

 

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5 hours ago, TheGodParticle/Hari said:

haven’t come across any records that give an accurate number of lenses produced for the 21 and 24 asph versions 

From the chrome collection:

21/2.8 asph - brass, not very rare 

24/2.8 asph - brass, not very rare 

28/1.4 - silver anodized - kind of rare 

28/2 - silver anodized - rare 

28/2.8 - silver anodized - rare 

28/5.6 relaunch - brass - not rare 

I would say all but the 28/5.6 re-issue are rare to very rare. None of the above probably surpassed the 800-1000 count, even 21 and 24 Elmarits.
I have contacted the right man for the job. Will report ASAP.

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56 minutes ago, Al Brown said:

I would say all but the 28/5.6 re-issue are rare to very rare. None of the above probably surpassed the 800-1000 count, even 21 and 24 Elmarits.
I have contacted the right man for the job. Will report ASAP.

If you go to the auction site, you will find a couple of 21 and 24 asph silver variants for sale right now 

The 28/1.4 silver keeps popping up every once in awhile, the 28/2 and 28/2.8 silver seldom come up - hence my estimation 

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22 minutes ago, TheGodParticle/Hari said:

If you go to the auction site, you will find a couple of 21 and 24 asph silver variants for sale right now 

The 28/1.4 silver keeps popping up every once in awhile, the 28/2 and 28/2.8 silver seldom come up - hence my estimation 

There are only 300 silver 28mm summilux.

‘Production numbers on the silver 28mm Summicron is about 500 units.

The Summilux is rarer by numbers, (not knowing how many have been damaged or lost), but Hari is right, the Summilux appears more frequently for sale, although market price is higher than the Summicron.

Edited by mdg1371
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I have finally - with huge help from Lars - located the proper official production figures of silver samples (21 and 24 Elmarits) from April 1999 on (marked as 2000 in the table as the yearly line line extends until end of March 2000 and so on for every year in the table).

There seems to be no known diversification data available between black and chrome copies of both lenses from autumn 1996 (start of production) until spring 1999.

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On 10/1/2023 at 5:46 PM, Al Brown said:

As I said, hopefully I will know the numbers of silver 21 and 24 Elmarits soon. In my book anything below 1000 pieces in a production span of 14 years is rare (not as rare as very rare and extremely rare, but still rare.)

So do we consider just over 1000 pieces rare? Semi-rare? Scarce? 
 

Edited by mdg1371
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2 hours ago, mdg1371 said:

So do we consider just over 1000 pieces rare? Semi-rare? Scarce? 
 

I guess everybody should interpret this as they want. M6J with 1640 pieces, M10-R black paint with ~2000 pieces, same situation. There should be a rarity scale from R1 to R10 IMHO.

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4 hours ago, Al Brown said:

I guess everybody should interpret this as they want. M6J with 1640 pieces, M10-R black paint with ~2000 pieces, same situation. There should be a rarity scale from R1 to R10 IMHO.

I would swear I’ve seen a scale like that applied to Leica gear somewhere before. 

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  • 3 weeks later...

Mine is much smaller. All ASPH.

 

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4 minutes ago, Al Brown said:

Mine is much smaller. All ASPH.

 

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Still a very nice collection though! I only have silver 35mms right now but am looking to add at least a 50mm (not yet sure which version though) and I'd also love a 28 or 24 but they are hard to find and probably not within current budget. But no rush either luckily.

Just curious if there is a reason you got black filters btw? I used the silver ones  And didn't you also have the Steel-Rim, does that not count to this collection?

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59 minutes ago, maxpower said:

Still a very nice collection though! I only have silver 35mms right now but am looking to add at least a 50mm (not yet sure which version though) and I'd also love a 28 or 24 but they are hard to find and probably not within current budget. But no rush either luckily.

Just curious if there is a reason you got black filters btw? I used the silver ones  And didn't you also have the Steel-Rim, does that not count to this collection?

The lens caps are also black and my M10-R is black paint so the filters round up the experience neatly.

Steel rim is not in the ASPH gang, no.

Edited by Al Brown
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1 hour ago, Al Brown said:

The lens caps are also black and my M10-R is black paint so the filters round up the experience neatly.

Steel rim is not in the ASPH gang, no.

ah yes missed the ASPH mention, my bad! Interesting btw that the aperture/distance scale numbers are coloured the other way around on your 50, is it a special one?

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  • 1 month later...

Man what a deal was snatched right before my nose yesterday. I was just minutes too late. The full package with all parts & box.

Oh well… someone left the website very happy.

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12 hours ago, Al Brown said:

Man what a deal was snatched right before my nose yesterday. I was just minutes too late. The full package with all parts & box.

Oh well… someone left the website very happy.

 

i was minutes too late too unfortunately, that looked like a steal 

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