Top plate without serial number (M6 Millennium Black Paint ICS)

[tobiasfjp]

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I saw this in a technicians/repairist instagram story and it surprised me. Not so much because there are spare (brass) top plates out there, but because the serial number has been removed like that and more so, because the back side of the plate does have a number, in this case 'ICS 277'.

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I own a M6 Millennium Black Paint ICS 0.85 myself and am pretty sure there were only 200 made. So I did a bit of searching and found another one like this, in this case with the 'M6' before the serial number removed as well. For sale on a Taiwanese website. This one says 'ICS 356'.

https://www.chihtachen.com/products/leica-m6-black-paint-ics-limited-brass-top-cover-356

 

These could of course be 'made in China' but that doesn't make much sense with the ICS xxx engraving.
The original M6 Millennium Black Paint ICS 0.85 looks like this:

Does anyone know more about these top plates? Why would these even exist? Did Leica intend to make 500 of these but changed their minds after they had already made all the top plates so they removed the serial numbers from everything 200+ and those made their way out of the factory somehow? That would be my best guess?

Edited December 29, 2024 by tobiasfjp

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[250swb]

As I understand it Kanto ordered the M6 Millennium so perhaps they had to take all of those made and the ones not sold were 're-purposed' given Kanto are also camera repairers ?

[tobiasfjp]

8 minutes ago, 250swb said:

As I understand it Kanto ordered the M6 Millennium so perhaps they had to take all of those made and the ones not sold were 're-purposed' given Kanto are also camera repairers ?

Yes I believe you are correct in that Kanto and ICS are the same company. Still incredibly strange that Leica would make more than the 200 top plates for the ICS edition and then erase the serial numbers but not the limited edition engraving and number right?
One of these top plates would make for a nice black repaint (by Kanto 😂) to make the 201st ICS M6 body though! 😅

[250swb]

I think when Leica issued a set of serial numbers they either cancelled them if unused them or re-assigned unused numbers to other cameras. They set aside 1000 numbers for the 2002 MP-6 made for the Japanese market but I think under 300 were sold so my early MP has a serial number in the middle of the range given to the MP-6 edition.

[tobiasfjp]

Very interesting, thanks for that!