Fake Schneider lens?

[Songyun]

170431915256

[Dan Fromm]

Eh? Wot? Why do you think it might be a fake?

Who would bother to fake such a common pedestrian lens?

[Oren Grad]

Why do you think it might be a fake?

For one thing, because the labeling on the lens doesn't match the Schneider house style for any generation of any Symmar type.

And the late-model blackface Copal is not contemporaneous for a plain Symmar (though the cells could have been transplanted).

And the front cell looks oddly proportioned, too (although that could partly be a result of photographing it too close with too short a focal length).

I wonder what it is...

[Songyun]

For one thing, because the labeling on the lens doesn't match the Schneider house style for any generation of any Symmar type.

And the late-model blackface Copal is not contemporaneous for a plain Symmar (though the cells could have been transplanted).

And the front cell looks oddly proportioned, too (although that could partly be a result of photographing it too close with too short a focal length).

I wonder what it is...

I have seen a similar lens on Chinese forum. It was believed to be a Korean knock off. If you look carefully on the first image. The letter printed on the barrel is NOT "lens made in Germany" which is how Schneider would print.

[Oren Grad]

If you look carefully on the first image. The letter printed on the barrel is NOT "lens made in Germany" which is how Schneider would print.

That's right. That part is out of focus, so it's hard to make out exactly what it says, but it clearly doesn't match the Schneider standard. On my 135 Apo-Symmar, that part of the labeling says "LENS MADE IN GERMANY" on the top line, and the serial number below that.

[BarryS]

The lens also has a "multicoating" label. I don't believe Schneider introduced multicoating until a few years into the Symmar-S line. The early Symmar-S lenses were single coated, so how would a straight Symmar lens have a factory multicoating?

[Oren Grad]

The lens also has a "multicoating" label. I don't believe Schneider introduced multicoating until a few years into the Symmar-S line. The early Symmar-S lenses were single coated, so how would a straight Symmar lens have a factory multicoating?

That's right too. The whole thing is wrong - wrong wording in several ways, wrong (non-contemporaneous - a couple of decades off) typeface for a plain Symmar, wrong shutter, weird-looking front cell...

[Lee Christopher]

'LENS BY GERMANY' should be a dead give-away!

It apparently sold for US$355!

[Arne Croell]

'LENS BY GERMANY' should be a dead give-away!

It apparently sold for US$355!

Very weird. Under the "Lens by Germany" line there is another one starting with "Product by.." and the last part is not legible. This seems to imply they bought lenses from Schneider and they were then assembled in Korea ?!

It still doesn't make sense to me to copy, counterfeit, or fake a) specifically a large format lens with a decidedly small market and not much collecting going on, at least compared to, say, 35mm Leitz and Zeiss glass, and b) a lens as common as a Symmar! A Biogon 75mm or an Apo-Lanthar fake would have made a bit more sense.

[David McNiven]

Credit where credit is due though - damn good job of faking the Schneideritis...