Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1998/12/13
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]<sigh> We go over this, time and time again, to no avail. A few of the Leica R lenses and most of the Contax SLR and G lenses are made at the former Tominon facility in Kyoto by Kyocera. The production lines are, I believe, intermixed, though I understand that the final testing is separate. Each lens is inspected by employees of the company responsible for the lens -- Zeiss inspects the Contax SLR and G lenses, Leica inspects the R lenses. Most Leica lenses are now made at Solms, though a few are still made at the old Ernst Leitz Midland facility in Canada, now owned, I believe, by Raytheon. Leica has never made lenses in Portugal. Zeiss manufactures the extreme wide-angle and specialty Contax SLR and G lenses at Oberkochen. Yes, the 8/16 G Hologon is "out of production", but understand what this means: Zeiss makes its lenses in batches, and it simply is between batches at the moment. As soon as it sells off enough of the on-hand stock to justify it, production will be resumed for another batch. And that, my hearties, is the News from Lake Wobegon! Marc msmall@roanoke.infi.net FAX: +540/343-7315 Cha robh bas fir gun ghras fir!