[Leica] Leica lens kit bashing

[Howard Cummer]

Hello Luggers,

One thing I like about old Leica lenses (and other makers too) is the ability to modernize them with a little kit bashing:

I bought a 40mm Summicron on EBay a few months ago for less than C$700.00. I sent the flange off to Don Goldberg
and he had the flange machined with the 6 bit code pits and coded as a 35 Summicron V4. He then machined
the flange to bring up the 35mm frame lines when the lens is fastened to a Leica M body. I tested it on my old black M
4 and the 35 frame lines came up. I couldn’t test it on my M10, of course, because that body is off at the Leica hospital in
New Jersey. They have had the body for 12 days and not a peep out of them yet.

http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/Howard+Cummer/2018+photos/Summicron40flange.jpg.html <http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/Howard+Cummer/2018+photos/Summicron40flange.jpg.html>

Here is a close up of Esther’s hydrangea taken with the 40 cron on my Fuji XT2 - a very
versatile platform, I find, for these old lenses.

<http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/Howard+Cummer/2018+photos/Summicron40hydrangeas.jpg.html <http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/Howard+Cummer/2018+photos/Summicron40hydrangeas.jpg.html>>

I also purchased a Konica 21 - 35 Dual some time ago and Don milled the bayonet and coded it as the Elmar 3.8/24mm.
This is the second time I have done this with a Dual. This time when reassembling the flange I put a
shim of aluminum foil between the flange and the lens body to move the lens 0.63 mils away from the
focus plane. Last night I put the lens on the XT 2 and focused on the night sky at infinity - the stars were
pin pricks at infinity focus so moving the lens forward did improve the focus accuracy. Especially at 21mm
there is (naturally) considerable vignetting wide open on the XT2 but at 35mm it is minimal. 
Two photos - both were treated for vignetting in photoshop.

<http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/Howard+Cummer/2018+photos/Konica-21hutchC.jpg.html <http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/Howard+Cummer/2018+photos/Konica-21hutchC.jpg.html>>

<http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/Howard+Cummer/2018+photos/Konica-35hutch.jpg.html <http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/Howard+Cummer/2018+photos/Konica-35hutch.jpg.html>>

These photos can be looked at large. C&C always welcome.

Howard