michael_ginex1 Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 I had posted this on another forum but thought it might be of interest to all Leicaficionatos here, so here it is: One night at my local camera club's meeting I pulled out my old M3 fitted with a 50mm Summicron. An old timer stepped over to take a closer look and said something revealing, it seemed to me. He said he had the same lens in his Leica outfit, and that his son, who worked for a well known Japanese camera company, was repeatedly asked to bring his dad's lens in to work, ostensibly to make comparisons against. Sort of adds meaning to the phrase "setting the standard". That camera company name starts with a big N....but that's all you'll get out of me. ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pico Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 Funny that a well-known company can't afford to buy an old lens for comparisons. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
raymond_tai Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 Those Nicca lenses must have been real cr@p! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vivek iyer Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 Do they at "N..." have Platinum crucibles to melt the special glass even if they crack the secrets?! Doubtful. Especially, if they are scrounging around for free, used lenses. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
raymond_tai Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 I don't know Vivek. Maybe they were using the "wax on, wax off" method of aspheric polishing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
terry_rory Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 Here is what Canon are doing..... http://www.canon.com/camera-museum/tech/l_plant/f_index.html I don't know if Nikon make their own glass or buy it in. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oceanphysics Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 Leica true-believers will believe just about anything. Including that that a major corporation can't afford a lens costing a few hundred dollars and must do their testing based on some random sample borrowed from an employee. I have this really nice bridge over the East River in New York and I was wondering if you'd be interested in making an investment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dankapsner Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 Hey, OP, don't you go selling my bridge! I paid good money for it and I've got the certificate to prove it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jose_angel Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 Who says Nikon? Michael are refering to Norita... probably this people wanted to laugh at Leica; everybody knows that the Noritar lenses are the only ones who let the summicrons pooped... isn`t it <i>Ocean Phisics?</i> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
terry_rory Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 It seems that (if this fairly up to date Nikon brochure is to be believed) Nikon have their own glass works making 200 different types of glass..... http://www.nikonimaging.com/global/products/lens/pdf/nikkor_lenses_36p.pdf (see page 3) Why would they be wanting to know (after 50+ years) how to make a Summicron? Even assuming this is true then I am sure they can buy some themselves and take one apart and measure everything and do some sort of spectrographic analysis to tell them what is in the glass and in what proportions. Better still I expect someone at Leica would tell them if they asked. There is a lot of free exchange of information between technical folk. So long as the necessary patents are in place there is no harm in revealing stuff like this. I am sure Nikon are not about to launch a bunch of M mount lenses anyday soon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jtk Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 Let's just believe the story. It's fun. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cebes_johnson Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 Oh come on guys.... It may be a story, but it may be true. I think everyone needs to remember the subtlety of situations. Sure anyone can buy a lens to dissect and analyze. But do you want to make it public? Scenario 1: You are one of the top engineers of, well, anything. You are working on problems, you have ideas, wants, etc... Suddenly something comes to your head while viewing a colleague's famous Leica lens... ...so you begin to think more about whatever your idea, goal, or thought/problem is/was and this item becomes more and more a part of the project (off the record of course, and between engineers/researchers on the same project...) You people think any company wants it on record that they are spending $1 on another make/models equip. to research instead of their own development idea or *original* creation?! Shame on you all! You wanna buy *anything* receipts, invoices, etc *ALL* must be created... And the ore people in on it the more people talk and secrets get out...jeezus...look at the CIA for heavens sake these days... It happens all the time in engineering, architecture, design, advertising, etc... A very believable story. Who knows.. regards C Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chad_hahn Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 Cebes I'm not sure if I follow your logic. NASA picked the Omega Speedmaster watch for use in space by going to a local jeweler and buying watches off the shelf. Omega didn't even know that their watch was chosen until well after the fact. Just because Joe Smith goes into a store to buy a watch or in the case Joe Sato goes into a lens store to buy a Leica lens doesn't mean that he's the person who works for Nikon. Chad Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
icuneko Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 Imitation is the highest form of flattery. Or is that flatulence...? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jeffrey_goggin3 Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 and as I understand it, half were disassembled for evaluation and study and the other half were restored and used as a basis for comparison. A friend of mine worked for GM and said they bought one of pretty much every car made, anywhere in the world, for evaluation purposes and ultimately ended up disassembling and/or crushing them afterwards. Reverse engineering is a common practice in other engineering disciplines so why should the camera industry be any different? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dan_fromm2 Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 Jeff, M14 Elites? If so, what barbarians the Mazdas are. Were you perhaps thinking Elans? If so, Mazda learned nothing from the exercise. The Miata doesn't have backbone chassis, doesn't have Herald front suspensions, ... It does look a little like an uglier wider Elan, though. Cheers, Dan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
terry_rory Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 Probably referring to the 1957 - 1962 Lotus Elites.... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lotus_Elite Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jtk Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 Reverse engineering worked, um, in a certain way for the manufacturer of the Escalade and the Avalanche: Ask any shareholder :-) While the Elite was a thrilling object, its engineering didn't rival anything from Mazda, least of all the Miata. It handled beautifully for hours at a time and left a small parts trail as it zipped fitfully along, as was expected of proper English machines. I believe the truth is that the Miata design team kept an Elite and an Austin Healey in their LOS ANGELES studio, along with some other beauties...simply for inspiration. They didn't use them for engineering studies, they just loved the curves. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
terry_rory Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 However the Elan is more likely. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paul_neuthaler Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 What a sweet group we are here. They also borrowed my lens. . .<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ken_jeanette1 Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 "Leica true-believers will believe just about anything." You said a true mouthful OP. Urban legends are born every day. Did you know that NASA borrowed a Sputnik in the middle of the night to reverse engineer our first space flight. SHHHH no one is supposed to know! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jeffrey_goggin3 Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 I'm a German car guy, so perhaps I can be forgiven (although I have a couple of friends and acquaintances who own/race several Elans between them and I doubt they'll forgive me any time soon!). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chad_hahn Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 "Did you know that NASA borrowed a Sputnik in the middle of the night to reverse engineer our first space flight. " That is totally wrong, our knowledge of space travel came from Roswell NM, along with the microwave oven and DVD player the aliens had on board the UFO. Chad Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
terry_rory Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 That's right and Bill Gates invented the computer and binary Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joseph_wisniewski Posted March 6, 2007 Share Posted March 6, 2007 Jeffrey - "A friend of mine worked for GM and said they bought one of pretty much every car made, anywhere in the world, for evaluation purposes and ultimately ended up disassembling and/or crushing them afterwards." That's actually understating it. Back in my GM days, I was at Cadillac's engineering center at Clark and Scotten, on the Allante project. Our group had its own "fleet" of "supercars" for evaluation, including two Lamborghini Countachs (or whatever is the plural of Countach) and the just released Ferrari Testarossa, a Maserati Biturbo, a Calloway Corvette, a Lancia Delta (ugliest thing in the fleet), and several others that I've forgotten. So I was fresh out of Laurence Tech, with a brand new BSEE, and learned to drive stick on a Lamborghini Countach. Man, there was nothing in the world like Detroit in the 80s. And the end result of all that was a Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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