Summarit 50mm 2.4 Possible front focssing issue

[LeicaGuyUK]

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55 minutes ago, Jon Warwick said:

Does your Summarit reach infinity focus? ie, at f2.4, and using a very distant subject, is that distant subject in accurate focus, or is something else in the frame (which is much closer to you) in sharper focus instead?

No, it’s out of focus at infinity, I took some shots with it in london last week and all came out unfocused, I could see objects before infinity being in focus. 

[LeicaGuyUK]

The original repair centre has agreed to take it back to be calibrated again. Fingers crossed it comes back aligned (2nd visit to them).

[LeicaGuyUK]

So I’ve had some feedback from the vendor I got the lens from. They haven’t sent it back for calibration yet but suggest that the lens is perfectly fine and that M11’s are harder to shoot if my shutter speed is under 1/500th! I’m gathering from this that theirs a lack of knowledge or a mis-understanding as the test shots I sent to them are of my m11 on a tripod pointed at a test chart.

Im not too confident that they will be easy to resolve this with if they are not aware of what a potential front focussing issue is or how the rangefinder works!

Any suggestions?

 

[lct]

Same as above. I would try focusing at close, medium and far distance with the EVF. This would allow to rule the lens in or out and see what to do afterwards.

 

Edited August 11 by lct

[TomB_tx]

The Summarit optical section is inserted in the focusing mount from the front and is held in place by a threaded ring accessed from the rear. Fairly common for the ring to loosen making the click-stops feel loose, and also lets the optical barrel move back to front a bit. If it front-focuses it means the optical barrel is too far forward from the focusing cam. Could be mis-shimmed or not aligned and tightened properly after coming loose. A good tech should be able to set it right quickly.

[LeicaGuyUK]

On 8/11/2025 at 7:15 PM, lct said:

Same as above. I would try focusing at close, medium and far distance with the EVF. This would allow to rule the lens in or out and see what to do afterwards.

 

I don’t think they quite understood that but have since refunded me back in full for it. I think maybe they realised in the end… Maybe..

[LeicaGuyUK]

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On 8/11/2025 at 10:56 PM, TomB_tx said:

The Summarit optical section is inserted in the focusing mount from the front and is held in place by a threaded ring accessed from the rear. Fairly common for the ring to loosen making the click-stops feel loose, and also lets the optical barrel move back to front a bit. If it front-focuses it means the optical barrel is too far forward from the focusing cam. Could be mis-shimmed or not aligned and tightened properly after coming loose. A good tech should be able to set it right quickly.

That’s good to know  they have since refunded me, I’m now trying to figure out what to replace it with  maybe just a new cron 50?