[LargeFormat] Schneider Angulon 120mm

[Clive Warren]

At 12:37 pm -0500 9/6/02, Michael Briggs wrote:
>On 08-Jun-02 Karl Wolz wrote:
snip
>
>I think Chris and Kerry believe that in this era the Linhof selected ones do
>tend to be better--probably Linhof rejected the lemons.  This bodes well for
>Clive (who started this thread) if his lens is Linhof selected.  He said that
>the shutter was marked Linhof--should the lens have also been marked Linhof?
>
>Chris and Kerry's test procedure isn't perfect, but it is very good, 
>and as far
>as I know, the best published on the web.

Yes, a bit of cherry picking there by Linhof. As you say, if the lens 
was a Linhof cherry picked variety then you would probably expect to 
see the word "Technika" in red on the rim of the lens. There seem to 
be a few of the more common 90mm Angulons in Linhof shutters without 
the requisite "Technika" emblazoned on the lens rim. These I am more 
suspicious of as Linhof definitely marked their cherry picked 90mm 
lenses. Seems that the unmarked lenses are more likely to have been 
placed in Linhof shutters to increase their value.

The 120mm is a much rarer beast and Linhof seem to have adopted them 
later in the production life of the lens. I have never seen a 
"Technika" marked 120mm Angulon - the lens I have in a Linhof shutter 
is in fact the first I have come across. Mine was bought from direct 
from Germany so it seems more likely to be the genuine cherry picked 
article. Will let you know how it performs when it is finally mounted 
on a lens board.

Chris and Kerry's lens tests are excellent and are linked from the 
http://f32.net/links.html page. It seems that the earlier in the 
manufacturing run the more likely it is that there will be a 
variability in image quality in a random sample of the same model of 
Schneider Angulon lenses. As Ken suggests, the centering operation 
was probably improved drastically at some point as the later lenses 
all seem to perform fairly well and were improved by this better 
quality control.

Cheers,
        Clive