Any Schneider 210XL owners here?

[John Layton]

I've always thought that any such shims are always only behind the front element group...as the necessity of removing a rear group in order to mount to a lens board would make it too risky to place a shim in that (rear) location, due to its potential to get lost/misplaced. At any rate...the only shim's I've ever noticed in my lenses to date have always been mounted behind the front lens group.

[Lachlan 717]

Check verticality of the front standard. It’s got a very heavy front element that might be torquing the standard forward, effectively adding tilt.

You might find that you have a horizontal and or good focus where Scheimpflug kicks in to soften the upper and lower areas of the image circle.

[Joshua Dunn]

Can anyone that owns this lens confirm that there is a shim between the shutter and front element? I don't have the 210 XL (I might buy one) but I have the 210 Super Angulon. It does have a shim for the front element.

-Joshua

[Michael R]

Can anyone that owns this lens confirm that there is a shim between the shutter and front element? I don't have the 210 XL (I might buy one) but I have the 210 Super Angulon. It does have a shim for the front element.

-Joshua

The extra warning from Schneider not to disassemble the XL lenses suggests they have been factory-adjusted with shims etc. See attached extract from Schneider's lens catalogue when these were current:

[Oren Grad]

Can anyone that owns this lens confirm that there is a shim between the shutter and front element? I don't have the 210 XL (I might buy one) but I have the 210 Super Angulon. It does have a shim for the front element.

I don't know that it's possible to answer that question - AFAIK, we don't know whether the lens was engineered to require all samples to have a shim, or whether only some samples need one to perform within spec.

[domaz]

The extra warning from Schneider not to disassemble the XL lenses suggests they have been factory-adjusted with shims etc. See attached extract from Schneider's lens catalogue when these were current:

So that suggests you could never mount the lens in a new lensboard without going to the factory? Or maybe it simply suggests you should never unscrew the front element.

[Michael R]

So that suggests you could never mount the lens in a new lensboard without going to the factory? Or maybe it simply suggests you should never unscrew the front element.

It’s the front element-shutter assembly they are referring to.

[David Lindquist]

See post #5 by Bob Salomon in this thread: https://www.largeformatphotography.i...-Copal-shutter

He indicates that shim/shims/absence thereof is specific to a particular lens (front and rear cells) and shutter combination (he is speaking here of Rodenstock lenses.) So if I have, say, a 210 mm Super Symmar XL and it has a shim of a given thickness, that doesn't necessarily mean that your 210 mm Super Symmar XL needs the same shim to work best with the shutter you have.

Also it seems to me that if one is swapping a "shimmed" lens from a "bad" to a "good" shutter, one doesn't know if the shim should follow along. So I suppose you'd try it with and without and see if one way is better and hope for the best. Which is to say if it's better with the shim, hoping it wouldn't be even better with a shim of a different thickness...

I have five lenses I've bought new beginning in the 1990's. One had a shim (behind the front cell), a 120 mm Super Symmar HM (1997). This was the first time I became aware of shims; nearly dropped and lost it.
The four lenses that did not have shims: 58 mm Super Angulon XL, 110 mm Super Symmar XL, 200 mm Nikkor M, 210 mm Apo-Sironar S. Of course there may be other examples of these lenses that are shimmed.

David

[Tin Can]

I have a fine lens, I dropped the shim as I was unaware

They are not wide, may be VERY thin and hard to replace

I shimmed test Diesel Liners to 0.001"

Often, but the liner was 6" wide brass ship

Custom


My lens works fine for ME, but I know OP is VERY particular

[Mark J]

I think that the rear asphere in these is correcting a lot of aberration from the front group. Hence the tolerance in positioning of the two sections relative to each other is likely much tighter than some earlier lenses.

Yes T.C. I can believe that the lens shims are thin, might be a 'thou' or slightly more, to make a useful step in the air gap.
I spoke to Schneider about my Componon-S 210 a few weeks ago and they warned me to look out for a shim when I took it apart to alter the mount. It didn't have one, but they said some have one, some don't.