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View Full Version : Apo Ronar 240mm for general field work on my 5x4 Tachi?



kev curry
28-Jan-2007, 06:23
Can anyone be so kind as to advise me on the pros and cons of buying a very resonably priced used Apo Ronar 240mm for general field work on my 5x4 Tachi? I do understand it to be a prosess lens and the Image Circle to be small in comparison with other 240's but at a IC of 212mm wouldn't that provide plenty of movements...?
Thanks in advance for any guidance.
Kev

Arne Croell
28-Jan-2007, 06:34
I assume you are talking about a shuttered version of the lens. Not that a barrel one wouldn't work, but it is probably too much hassle to mount it in a shutter. The Apo-Ronar 240mm should be perfectly ok for most 4x5 uses, even with movements. And the 212mm is a conservative number.

kev curry
28-Jan-2007, 06:52
Thanks for the advice Arne, yes it is mounted in a
black copal 1 shutter.
Kev

Richard Kelham
28-Jan-2007, 11:16
I assume you are talking about a shuttered version of the lens. Not that a barrel one wouldn't work, but it is probably too much hassle to mount it in a shutter.


Not that much hassle. I have a 300mm Apo-Ronar which I bought very cheaply mounted in a barrel (actually it looked like it had been used as an enlarging lens) – it took only a minute to unscrew the lens cells and pop them into a spare no.1 shutter. What took a little longer was working out the f-stop scale...




Richard

PS: Kevin, are you after the one that is currently on UK fleabay?

Struan Gray
28-Jan-2007, 12:42
For several years I used an older single-coated 240 mm barrel APO-Ronar as my "short tele". It worked well for portraits and landscapes.

I bought a 240 Germinar-W when Kerry was selling them on APUG, and there are times I use the extra movements this lens allows, even for landscapes. But, the number of photos I have taken with the Germinar-W that could never have been done with the APO-Ronar is very small. Even those are not 'normal' landscapes, but rather abstract scenes where I use a lot of forward tilt on the rear standard, and then even more tilt on the front standard to lay the plane of focus along the ground. I'm not sure your Tachihara would allow this much tilt/indirect rise even if you were daft enough to want to emulate me.

Oddly, when wanted a shutter to put the Germinar-W into, the cheapest I could find came with a multi-coated 240 mm APO-Ronar attached. So now I have two.

Oren Grad
28-Jan-2007, 12:45
Oddly, when wanted a shutter to put the Germinar-W into, the cheapest I could find came with a multi-coated 240 mm APO-Ronar attached.

Not so odd, perhaps - same here.

Struan Gray
28-Jan-2007, 13:18
Not so odd, perhaps - same here.

Snap. I found the same thing when looking for a longer lens: my 420 mm APO-Ronar which I bought on eBay.uk cost about two thirds of what Copal 3 shutters on their own were going for at the time.

Right now, IMHO, it's pretty-well impossible to find a compact longer lens that matches an APO-Ronar in shutter for price/performance. My advice would be to buy one, use it, and 'upgrade' later if you find you really do need more coverage.

archivue
28-Jan-2007, 13:26
If it's an MC version go for it, otherwise you should wait for an other specimen in MC !

kev curry
28-Jan-2007, 13:58
Thank you all thats really cleared things up for me! The seriel no is 1060**** and MC think that places it after 1984 but not terrible certain? Think I'll go ahead and seal the deal... thanks to you all!
ps No it a private sale Richard
best regards
Kev