Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1998/06/20
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]In a message dated 6/20/98 7:12:18 AM, you wrote: <<Someone should snap-up this lens. Those marks are absolutely meaningless. There is no possible way to tell the difference between a new front element an one with a few light marks. Especially near the edge. I have a 180 or I'd grab it. $750... great great bargain. >> I don't know just exactly what lens this is since I haven't been looking at this for a few days, but I can testify that a few scratches on a lens make absolutely no difference. My brother had a Nikon (Oh be quiet, it's ok, really) 24mm lens that he used for commercial shoots. The rear element had, not a scratch, but an absolute dig across it -- absolutely astonishing damage, but he said it was of the sharpest lenses he had (before he switched to Swedish large format junk) and I saw the proof in his pictures. I was reading the Leica manual last night on the subject of bubbles in glass, a similar fear, and it said even earlier lenses that had lots of them actually didn't have much problem. I have a summitar -- 1950 -- that has a couple of bubbles and have never noticed any problem with it. These tiny scratches are probably similar in effect. If this is a 180 R lens for 750 bucks i wish i had the money. the horrible truth is that small defects don't make THAT much difference. charlie trentelman ogden utah