I bought this Sonnar on RFF several months ago, and recently picked up a J-3 off Ebay from a US seller at a good price. The latter was used on a mirrorless camera- needed work, the innermost helical was misthreaded and the stop screw was missing. I fixed it. The focus mount was made my KMZ, the barrel was a later ZOMZ. The KMZ focus mounts are the best, smooth, no focus backlash on most, the guide screws are matched to the slots they travel in.
So it ended up as a Sonnar for the Leica and a Jupiter for the Contax.
The "267" Sonnars are fully coated, but use soft coatings for the inner surfaces. Lubricant outgassing tends to infiltrate the surface behind the aperture. This is the second 267 series Sonnar that I've owned, the first- coating was bad enough to require removing. This one- some of the coating is gone, but what remain is functional. Best to leave alone. The Sonnar 5cm F1.5 of this generation is made of an alloy, and has hidden set screws holding the Name ring in place, and the rear triplet in place. Never try to remove the namering of a Sonnar "T" without removing the aperture ring and checking for the set screw. You will destroy the namering trying to remove it if the set screw is in place.
The optical formula is improved over the prior generation Sonnar. Less field curvature, and a bit sharper. The later Sonnars starting around block 272xxxx seem to have improved inner coatings. I've not seen damage to the surface after the aperture as in the 267 series.
test shots, wide-open.
So it ended up as a Sonnar for the Leica and a Jupiter for the Contax.
The "267" Sonnars are fully coated, but use soft coatings for the inner surfaces. Lubricant outgassing tends to infiltrate the surface behind the aperture. This is the second 267 series Sonnar that I've owned, the first- coating was bad enough to require removing. This one- some of the coating is gone, but what remain is functional. Best to leave alone. The Sonnar 5cm F1.5 of this generation is made of an alloy, and has hidden set screws holding the Name ring in place, and the rear triplet in place. Never try to remove the namering of a Sonnar "T" without removing the aperture ring and checking for the set screw. You will destroy the namering trying to remove it if the set screw is in place.
The optical formula is improved over the prior generation Sonnar. Less field curvature, and a bit sharper. The later Sonnars starting around block 272xxxx seem to have improved inner coatings. I've not seen damage to the surface after the aperture as in the 267 series.
test shots, wide-open.
F1.5 and F4
F1.5 and F4
This one- optimized for F2 for the M9, and Orange for the M Monochrom. That means at F1.5, slight front-focus. Infinity is in focus at F2.
The glass on this one is very clean, about 1/3rd of the coating is missing from the one surface behind the aperture blades.
You would never know.
This was about 10 hours of work, mostly getting the focus mount corrected and polished. I use 3m Fiber Optic Polishing Sheets. The barrel must be set to within 0.01mm correct position to attain focus accuracy with the RF. You need to pick the optimal F-Stop, and color filter for B&W use. Of course with Mirrorless and EVF- you just need to get infinity correct for wide-open use. Focus shift is towards infinity as you stop down.
This one- optimized for F2 for the M9, and Orange for the M Monochrom. That means at F1.5, slight front-focus. Infinity is in focus at F2.
The glass on this one is very clean, about 1/3rd of the coating is missing from the one surface behind the aperture blades.
You would never know.
This was about 10 hours of work, mostly getting the focus mount corrected and polished. I use 3m Fiber Optic Polishing Sheets. The barrel must be set to within 0.01mm correct position to attain focus accuracy with the RF. You need to pick the optimal F-Stop, and color filter for B&W use. Of course with Mirrorless and EVF- you just need to get infinity correct for wide-open use. Focus shift is towards infinity as you stop down.
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