Old lens haul (1 of 3)

[Rider]

I recently acquired 3 old lenses that I will be experimenting with once I have them mounted in boards.

I was wondering if you can tell me anything about them.

The first one is mounted in a shutter. The shutter is Baush & Lomb, I think. It's got two pistons, one on each side of the lens, and the speeds are 1/100, 1/50, 1/25, 1/5, 1/2, 1, B and T. The 1/100 speed seems to work pretty well; the others stick.

On the barrel, I can make out the letters Serie III D agor. It's 180mm. The f-stops are 6.8 through 64. The diaphragm is not completely smooth, but it works.

The glass is pretty clean on the outside, but there is a lot of dust on the inside.

Besides the experimental value, is this lens worth repair / CLA? What is the lens design? How old is it (it does refer to a Jan 91 patent, but I'm not sure whether this is for the lens or the shutter).

[Ole Tjugen]

That's easy - it's an early Goerz Dagor.
The design is Dagor, 6 elements in two groups, symmetrical. The Jan 91 patent is the shutter; the Goerz Doppel-Anastigmat Serie III (later called D.A.G.O.R for Doppel-Anastigmat GOeRz) was patented in 1893.

[Rider]

Here is a snapshot of the lens (taken real close with my 120 mm Nikon macro ).

What kind of shutter is that? Do you think the lens/shutter are worth restoring, or should I just experiment with them as they are?

[Ernest Purdum]

Many people are fond of Dagor lenses. Yours is certainly worth getting the shutter working. Since it operates on 1/100th, the problem seems to be only a sticky piston, easily corrected just by cleaning.

You are right that the shutter is a Bausch & Lomb, a "Unicum" I think.

[Toyon]

I haven't seen a troll in a long time.

[Uusilehto]

I haven't seen a troll in a long time.

Who exactly are you referring to with that?
While the original poster's question was something he could've easily found out with a little bit of Googling, he didn't do anything wrong as far as I'm concerned.

[Rider]

Toyon--I haven't the foggiest idea what you are talking about. In fact, I'm a little taken aback by your post.

Ernest, you are absolutely right, it does say Unicum on the front. I did not think to connect that with the shutter, but a quick google search confirms that this is in fact a B&L Unicum shutter!

I'll have to mount it in a 4" lensboard (currently, it's in a 3.5" lens board--what camera could that be for?) and take a few pictures. Then I'll decide whether to have both the lens and shutter cleaned or just the shutter. (I assume the contrast will be reduced by the lack of coating and by all the dust on the inside.)

Btw, what kind of remote release do I use with this? I don't think the standard screw-in release works.

Stay tuned for the other two lenses!

[Toyon]

Rider, you've been a member since 2006, you know your way around a Nikkor macro 120 AM, but haven't heard of a Dagor? It's just not credible. All in good fun though.

[Jim Galli]

To release the shutter you need a piece of tubing and a bulb on the piston on the left side. If everything else is freed up and working OK, take the sleeve off the piston on the right and clean all the surfaces. This one gets set at different distances dependent on what speed is set. It has to displace the air inside before the shutter can close. Look through the lens at the sun with all the blades closed. Some of these early shutters don't stop all the light. They did however turn whatever light was getting through to red so it didn't effect the blue sensitive film. It could effect our pan films now though.

[Rider]

That's easy - it's an early Goerz Dagor.
The design is Dagor, 6 elements in two groups, symmetrical. The Jan 91 patent is the shutter; the Goerz Doppel-Anastigmat Serie III (later called D.A.G.O.R for Doppel-Anastigmat GOeRz) was patented in 1893.

Givent that both the acronym "DAGOR" and the designation "Serie III" are used, does that tell you anything more about the vintage of this lens?