Extraordinary 35mm Summicron sell it or keep it ?

[anGy]

Hi Guys,
Just wanted to share my last Leica purchase experience and ask for some advices:
Last month I couldn’t resist buying a 2nd hand Leica M-E with a 35mm Summicron asph at my long time preferred dealership.
The combo is beautiful. However I was unsure about the 35mm that showed some heavy marks as a wobbling and noisy aperture ring. My trusted dealer told me that some play does happens with some samples and that this chrome brass version is more prone to that….
What really sealed the deal was the granted price reduction but above all the fact that the lens was sent to Leica for coding and was heavily recalibrated. My dealer took the lens for its own use during several months before putting it back for sale. He is a long time Leica M devotee and is daily using its 50mm APO. Following his words Leica made some great work with this lens that is 99% as good as its beloved 50mm APO.

Deal !

After using the lens for 3 weeks now I ‘m very impressed by its IQ. I see no default, chroma aberrations are non-existing, it is sharp wide-open and focussing is ultra-accurate. It’s the 1st ever 35 summicron I’m using so no experience with those nice summicrons.
Although I’ve had a monochrome then an m240 with a 35mm summilux asph & an old generation 50mm summilux but never had such great focussing hit rate. The 35 Asph was very nice but showed some optical deficiencies at f1.4 & f2 (chroma aberrations and loss of sharpness f.i.). The summicron clearly offers another level of value for money ratio.

But !

The aperture ring noise and play is worrying me.
I’ve visited another dealer that was selling a 50mm summicron. When testing this 50 on my M-E he took my 35 summicron in his hands and immediately pointed the lack of adjustment of the aperture ring and the possible negative evolution of it. Advising me to send it to Leica for repair.
So I went back to my dealer asking for a solution. The answer was that the repair Leica did on this model is no more under warranty (because he used the lens personally during more than 6 months) and cost a lot of money so it won’t be send back this time.
My dealer then offered me to take the lens back or to exchange it + money against a new one (same model version) he still has in stock.
I’ll meet him next Saturday to get an offer.
As I’m not especially a lucky guy I’m starting to ask myself what to do.
For sure I’ll ask to test the new one to make sure the focus works well in combination with my M-E. But I won’t have the opportunity to use it long enough to see if the IQ is at the same level of my current – wobbling 35mm.
Bad luck could make me spend a few hundred euro more to get the new one and then later realize that the old one really was a fantastic lens…
It all depends on the sample variations and if Leica really did some super extra repair on the model I own to make it an extraordinary one.

I know that the Leica magical repair argument sounds like an easy sale trick but I trust this dealer and my own eyes too. Using a Leica S007 with a 45mm Elmarit for 2 years already I have a good idea of what a nice lens is and this 35mm summicron surely is.

What would you do ? keep it as I’m fully happy with it’s IQ or exchange it to a new one (if the extra cost is acceptable) to get a clean - under warranty - and possibly as good lens ?

(sorry for my bad English and long rant

 

[jdphoto]

I currently have the brass, chrome 50mm 1.4 Summilux (pre ASPH) and the aperture has play. However, it seems like your aperture ring may not be symmetrical in the sense that it binds up while turning. This would indicate to me that it's been dropped. I'm not sure I understand "heavy recalibrating" unless the elements were misaligned which would confirm being dropped. The 35mm Summicron is one of the most popular Leica lenses because of its size and quality. It does not have the shallow DOF or low light performance of a "Lux", but using 39mm filters, it's a perfect combo for most work. Look at the aperture blades with an LED flashlight to determine if the blades are actually touching or binding. This should be obvious if there's any scuffing on the aperture blades. Does the end of the lens look ok and can you screw a filter/hood on? I tend to stay away from any lens that has barrel damage or heavy marks because of the nature of glass elements. Perhaps you can trade it towards another used 35mm Summicron through your dealer, as you'd likely not recoup the same if you tried to sell it second hand with full disclosure on the aperture.

 

[anGy]

The aperture ring took a hit and shows a damage of 3mm on 1mm. It has a tiny play (up & down) of maybe 0,1mm and is noisy. But the barrel is perfectly ok and the aperture blades are symmetrical. I've no idea how its built & if this play will get worse or not. I hope I'll have a good opportunity to test the new model I could get in exchange of mine before having to make a decision !

 

[Frankly]

I'd get rid of it having had a similar experience. They don't fix themselves.

 

[anGy]

I'd get rid of it having had a similar experience. They don't fix themselves.

No dilemma if the lens would have been broken.
My little dilemma is because I don't know if this sample really is better than average and if the clumsy aperture ring is just an anoyance or a repair to be planned in the next months/years (and if so why it hasn't been fixed when serviced by Leica?).

 

[anGy]

Just for the record,
I did test the 35mm summicron of my dealer (new but same model as mine) and checked the images quietly at home.
CA more obvious @ f2 and bokeh more harsh.
Living in a small country I could easily ride to another dealer to test another sample. Same result (more CA, less central sharpness, more contrasty bokeh).
Although a direct comparison on the same scene at the same moment hasn't been possible it really looks like my sample is better than average. It shows less CA, a better bokeh, more centrer sharpness and a focus that matches the telemeter of my M-E perfectly.
So I decided to keep it and enjoy this beautiful lens.
Maybe I'll later let the aperture ring be fixed, hoping this won't modify the spot on focus calibration.

I'll also remember that Leica M lenses also show IQ sample variations...

 

[anGy]

A sample file with my lens @f4, nice:

@f2,4