Gundlach Radar 8x10 Ext. W.A. Anastigmat f16

[cyberjunkie]

My last lens for a while, crossed fingers, i promise, i promise - that's what i should have told my wife... if only i didn't choose the much easier route of swearing to myself :D
Here is the auction:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rt=nc&nma=true&item=320636441141
I left everything to chance, i did a reasonable bid (IMHO), and eventually won the lens. Only 2 dollars less, and another one would have won.

The subject of the post says it all, it's a 90° wide angle of 6 1/4 inches focal, slow (f16), and covering 8x10".
Cameraeccentric provides the right catalog (2nd "Korona" link), but the only reference to shutters is that all the Radar Ext.W.A. lenses were also sold in Betax shutters. No indication about which No. was used with the 8x10" version.
When i placed my bid i didn't even know that there was a catalog available on Cameraeccentric, my best guess was that an Alphax No.3 shutter with flas sync, just back from a repair session (CLA and two shutter leaves replaced), was a likely candidate. Nothing certain, just a personal guess, but i took the chance.
If i'm wrong, the long wait will give me plenty of time to find the right shutter. The lens comes via USPS First Class, soo sloow, if the destination is the EU.

If somebody owns the same lens in shutter, please come forward.
Any additional infos about the lens would be appreciated.
If you clicked the link, you'll see that the barrel is chrome, not black, so probably it's not so old. Do you know if there is any special mark that helps to identify post-war coated examples? Meyer's have the red triangle, Wollensak the "W", Kodak the "L", and so on, but i don't know anything about Gundlach's.

have fun


CJ

[Steven Tribe]

There was a good thread back in 2007 about the Radar (including the EWA).
No chance of coatings - too early. Post-war must mean WW1! Gundlach lost steam when they were taken over by the Seebold Invisible Camera Company

[ic-racer]

I saw that one but figured finding a shutter would involve buying another lens. This one in a shutter is still out there, but its over priced: http://cgi.ebay.com/Wollensak-6-EXWA-8x10-Wide-Angle-/120667556333?pt=Film_Cameras&hash=item1c1858c9ed#ht_500wt_1156

[ImSoNegative]

i have one of these lenses, no shutter though, i enjoy using it, you have plenty of movemets with it on 8x10. here is an image i shot with it the other day using a lens cap as a shutter. my holder is bad so i got a bit of fogging in the lower corner. pretty sharp lens though. this image was shot 3 sec. at f32. good luck with yours

[aduncanson]

I have got one, S/N 211281, in a self cocking Alphax Heavy Duty Synchro matic shutter with speeds from 1 to 1/100 plus T & B. Mine is certainly not coated and in fact had a chip which the previous owner had blacked. It seems satisfy my requirements, but I have never enlarged any negatives from it.

[cyberjunkie]

There was a good thread back in 2007 about the Radar (including the EWA).
No chance of coatings - too early. Post-war must mean WW1! Gundlach lost steam when they were taken over by the Seebold Invisible Camera Company

Thanks Steven.
I found the thread, should have checked before posting :-(
One of the links reported on that thread gave me the answer about the shutter: reportedly it was in a Betax No.3, interchangeable with a Wollensak 6 1/4".
There are good chances that it will fit my Alphax No.3, taken from some photocopier or monoscope camera, the threads are the same as in an old black Betax, i think i've checked for it some time ago. I just hope for the better about the spacing.
I found out that apparently identical shutters can have very different cell spacing: an Ilex Universal made for Kodak (Ektar f4.5 or Commercial Ektar) can be different from another one fitting an Ilex Paragon or some other lens, sometimes even the threads are different!
Before the Internet came to our rescue, bringing nice deals and a wealth of informations, i knew very little about american shutters.
Not long ago, with a naive idea of standardization in my mind, i found that i needed an Ilex No.4 for two nice lens cells, waiting for a suitable shutter. When i found a cheap Kodak Ektar on sale on the Web, i decided to get it, just for the shutter.
To my surprise, when i had the lens in my hands, i found that the front and back threads were different, and that the housing for the front cell was not so easy to remove as i had figured. There was no way to remove it without opening the shutter!
Since that day, the lens sits unused in a drawer, sending it for a professional adaptation would be way too expensive, and i am still too unexperienced to open a shutters that tickles like a swiss clock. All in all, one more lesson learned the hard way :-(
After that, i have also found that an Ilex and a Wollesak shutter can have the same mounting threads, but a very different spacing. I even found that very old pneumatic shutters, patented at the end of the 1800, can share the same threads with late post-WWII examples, but it's very likely that the spacing would be so different, to discourage any shutter swapping blasphemy :D
In the meantime, much water has flown under the bridges, but i still have an ever growing interest on lens/shutter adaptation. Many new infos were gotten off the Internet, and some the hard way, doing mistakes.
The last thing that caught my interet was making new, nice looking, aperture scales.
I did a few experiments, but the results are ugly. Then i saw the picture of a scale made with a label printer, on laminated tape. Still not perfect, but with a lot of room for improvement.

If other people are interested, or somebody found a nice home-made solution, please start a new thread. I am sure that it would be of great interest for many of us.

have fun

CJ

[ImSoNegative]

that lens will fit perfectly in an alphax no. 3.

[cdholden]

The shutters fit to the Commercial Ektars have proprietary thread measurements (thanks Kodak!) for the cells and do not match a similar model Ilex shutter. I'm not sure about the mounting threads, but a recent discussion with a fellow forum member seems to have him thinking they are also different.

[cyberjunkie]

that lens will fit perfectly in an alphax no. 3.

Nice.
So my guess is confirmed, in the end! :D
BTW, i got my Alphax for very little. It was stuck, and with two badly bent diaphragm leaves.
As other Alphax that weren't made to be used on proper cameras, it lacked a cable release thread. In its place there was a screw-in pushbutton.
Fortunately a friend had a dead Alphax at home, and resurrected my shutter to its former glory. Hey, Alphax shutters are very nice! I was not aware that they were so good, better than other vintage self-cocking shutters, IMHO.

Back to the Radar 8x10 Ext.W.A., i found that at least two different version were made, one is a 6 1/4" and the other 7 1/2". Both with 8x10" coverage and f16 speed (if i remember).
I don't know which one came first, Cameraeccentric has two Korona/Gundlach catalogs: in 1900 the Radar lenses were unknown of, and the catalog from 20'/30' reports the 6 1/4" lens only.
Anybody out there owning a more recent catalog?

have fun


CJ

[ic-racer]

recent catalog?

have fun


CJ
Did you see all the Wollensak files there? They have sixteen posted.
This one has a description of the 50s' coated lens:
http://www.cameraeccentric.com/html/info/wollensak_5.html

[ImSoNegative]

then there must be a third one, mine has a 7 on the back of it, i looked closely to see if there was a 1/2 that maybe got rubbed off but all it has is a 7 in quotation marks. interesting.

[cyberjunkie]

then there must be a third one, mine has a 7 on the back of it, i looked closely to see if there was a 1/2 that maybe got rubbed off but all it has is a 7 in quotation marks. interesting.

I got mine.
It's exactly the same you own. It's a 7 inches.
Everything semm to confirm that a lens with the same name was made in at least three different focals: 6 1/4", 7" and 7 1/2". I doubt that they were made at the same time.
I wonder if the optical prescription was changed at some time, or if the basic design was kept the same for all versions.
In my example each cell shows two very close big reflections, and two very weak ones (one is so small and weak that's quite difficult to see).
That would make three cemented elements on each cel. The two cells are NOT symmetrical, the front element has a much smaller diameter than the back one.

Any further observation is more than welcome.
I will put the lens in shutter very soon, and i'll see how it performs (i am a little concerned about focusing, it's my slowest lens!).
I would be happy to date the lens, the serial is 2110xx

have fun

CJ