Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2001/05/08

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Subject: Re: [Leica] Canadian lenses: THE MARK OF SHAME!
From: Marc James Small <msmall@roanoke.infi.net>
Date: Tue, 08 May 2001 17:27:39 -0400

At 12:46 PM 5/8/2001 -0700, Herbert & Lee Kanner wrote:
>I bought a 35 mm Summicron labeled "Canada."  It was about half the 
>price of current models.  In general, the lenses made in Canada, 
>e.g., 90 mm Summicron, appear to be somewhat cheaper than others. 
>Are these lenses inferior, and, if so, in what respects?
>

Oh, God.  Now you've gone and done it and Ted Grant will be a-risin' from
his protracted silence to Preach the Gospel of Queen, Motherhood, and Ernst
Leitz Midland until we all cave in in fits of despair.

It is, of course, most obvious that any "Leitz" lens marked "Canada" is
just so much of a pop-bottle bottom in terms of optical performance as are
those lenses marked "Japan".  But, in the interests of NATO amity, no one
has openly admitted this in the past half-century, and suckers have been
allowed to believe that these Canadian "Leica" lenses are just as good as
those made in Germany.  Now that you're part of the LUG, though, we can let
you in on the truth.  BUY GERMAN!  Avoid those clone lenses:  they might
HAVE that "Leica" mark on them or even "Ernst Leitz" but they're NOT real
Leitz or Leica lenses, anymore than is that Oberkochen piece of crap Zeiss
foisted off on the Leitz folks or the Angenieux lenses, or the Minolta
glass.  Buy ONLY Wetzlar/Solms lenses are the REAL THING.

Canadian glass is junk.  Bottle bottoms.  Trash.  Filth.  An embarrassment
which even Argus would have avoided.

(About half of my Leica lenses are MIOC (Made in Ontario Canada) glass, so
I DO know that of which I write!)

Marc

msmall@roanoke.infi.net  FAX:  +540/343-7315
Cha robh bas fir gun ghras fir!