Fake Schneider lens?

[Songyun]

OK, OK, I did some research... And Arne, this is for you
More puzzle...

[Songyun]

It has NO serial number!

[Oren Grad]

Very interesting! If you google Symmar-Krishna, a bunch of links to Chinese and Korean pages come up.

There are other focal lengths. Look at this one, a 210 in a Copal Press:

http://new.sy916.net/details.php?ima...232c4588832661

[Arne Croell]

Is it possible that this is an older Symmar that was recoated (maybe only the front element) and with the barrel painted and engraved? I can picture the barrel as being chrome, making it an early Symmar. If they removed the retaining ring on the front cell (which is where the label resides on Symmar-Convertible-era lenses) and replaced it with a generic ring after applying a colorful coating to the front element, and then painted the outer barrel black, they would be able to engrave through the paint the label we see. It would be a real Symmar, with real Schneideritis, and a way for a small optical shop that might make, say, cheapie binoculars to make a quality camera lens with very little investment.

I have a 180mm Symmar Convertible and I ought to look at it to compare the barrel shape.

What I can't figure is why the price went so high.

Rick "who paid less than half that for the 180" Denney

Rick, the shape of the back cell doesn't fit a plain Symmar, the 150mm convertible Symmar (not the 210) had a straight cylindrical barrel as the back cell.

[Arne Croell]

Songyun, thanks! That is great! So now its clear that they were "produced" in S. Korea. I don't think a forger would put that on there?! And after seeing the 210, I am sure, if its a fake they at least based it on the Symmar-S, not the plain Symmar.
But I still think it might be the South Korean equivalent of a "Caltar-S II".
The script for the standard "Symmar" and the "Multicoating" as well as the focal length is very similar to the Schneider one, although the slash between 5.6 and 210 or 150 has a different angle. Of course the Krishna-Symmar script is very different.

[Songyun]

Songyun, thanks! That is great! So now its clear that they were "produced" in S. Korea. I don't think a forger would put that on there?! And after seeing the 210, I am sure, if its a fake they at least based it on the Symmar-S, not the plain Symmar.
But I still think it might be the South Korean equivalent of a "Caltar-S II".
The script for the standard "Symmar" and the "Multicoating" as well as the focal length is very similar to the Schneider one, although the slash between 5.6 and 210 or 150 has a different angle. Of course the Krishna-Symmar script is very different.

I was also thinking about the Caltar-S II. It doesn't have serial numbers. However, it does have the "lens made in germany" sign.

[rdenney]

Rick, the shape of the back cell doesn't fit a plain Symmar, the 150mm convertible Symmar (not the 210) had a straight cylindrical barrel as the back cell.

My theory was already undermined by the pictures of the Symmar-Krishna.

Rick "shutting up now" Denney

[Arne Croell]

I was also thinking about the Caltar-S II. It doesn't have serial numbers. However, it does have the "lens made in germany" sign.

I assume Calumet bought complete lenses off the Schneider assembly line incl. the shutter. If we put any value on the "Product by "R.O.K." line, I interpret it such that the lens cells were put into the shutter in Korea, and probably some of the screen printing on the lens barrel was done there, too.

[Lee Christopher]

This is getting too weird for me ...

Kind of remind me (rather obliquely though) of the ironical situation in China or Korea where manufacturers of imitation goods were peeved that their imitations were being imitated and threatened to take the imitators of the imitated imitation goods to court!

[Robert Hughes]

If this is pushed too much, we'd put the entire Far East out of business... weren't the early Nikons blatant, part-for-part ripoffs of western designs?