Anyone tried The Kobalux lenses lately?

At the risk of offending the Leica OT police, does anyone shoot

with the Kobalux screwmount lenses? I'd love to see some

results from these lenses, if you have any to share. I'm

interested particularly in the 21mm. I'm finding my VC 21 just a

touch slow, and would love to move up to a 2.8 lens. Problem is,

I know I can't afford a Leica 21, new or old. So I'm wondering

about the image quality of the Kobalux (especially the new third

generation currently available) and how it stacks up against the

various Leica 21 lenses and the VC I currently have. I know

Dante Stella posts here occasionally, and I understand he built

the website for kobalux which you can find <a

href="http://www.kobalux.com/" >here,</a> but I wonder if anyone

can tell me more about these lenses first-hand. Anyone done

comparison tests? Thanks in advance.

I believe that Dante's said somewhere that they're no longer in production. I was thinking about getting one, too.

 

CHandos

The 21 and 28 lenses (probably an older generation) [called Adorama lenses] were tested by popular photography and rated as excellent lenses, good value. Kobalux lenses (aka Bower) have not gotten nearly as much interest among Leica users on this website as have CV lenses. Perhaps due to better marketing by Cosina and/or the use of the Voigtlander name. The Kobalux lenses were sold by Adorama as essentially no name Japanese lenses for Leica, apparently not a good marketing strategy.

I do hope there are no "off topic" police around here. As far as I'm concerned, any discussion relating to anything invloving Leica or Leica applications, however remote, should be acceptable here.

I use a 28/3.5 from adorama .All the photos in my street photo attempts folder were taken with it. When handheld metering does not get me, I think it works great. I use it mostly at f8 - f11 with tri-x. The viewfinder is nice and bright, however the eyepiece does tend to scratch my glasses a bit.

I just purchased one of the 21mm 2.8 lenses from Adorama. I haven't taken any photos with it yet, but it seems very well made. From the descriptions I've read about the Kobalux lenses, it seems to be the third generation variety (.75m minimum focusing distance and eight diaphragm blades). It has nicely detented half stop settings and the focusing action is smooth. Mine is the all chrome variety. I'm looking forward to trying it out - I think it will work well for my uses.