Another chipped and mount converted 58 f1.2 :D

About a year ago I became aware of Peter Ganzel's modification of the 58mm f1.2 to AF mount. I'm a huge fan of the approx 85mm equivalent focal length, I love wide apartures and I also believe that old glass just has something special about it, lateral CAs and corner sharpness be damned, so I had to have one.

Peter milled me a ring, I swapped it out with the MD mount and the job was a good'un...

...until the forum became flooded with news of the new adapter chips from James LaoT which added exif info, focus confirmation and functioning anti-shake to the mix. I had to have this too :D

Seeing as I had a perfectly good AF mount lens already, I decided to just order the chip from James, and then to affix it myself. Some of these shots have been posted before, but it's nice to have them all in the same place for the sake of completion.

Here we go :)






The gap that the adapter chip has to fit into.





The chip - pins and rear.




In place!



I had a shelf custom made for the chip to sit on - you can see it here - made out of solid silver it also adds a certain bling to the lens!



The chip sitting on its shelf.



3 pins were driven under the shelf, then the shelf was glued to these 3 pins, with glue also attaching all the other surfaces that made contact with the lens mount.



A space had to be cut to allow the 'jutty outy bit' of the chip to nestle in place. Unfortunately I measured it upside down at first... so a huge gash has been taken out of the flange as a result.



Mounted up on a Dynax 7 - it also works beautifully on my Dynax 7D.



That's something you don't see very often...



And for that matter, so is that!

I'll be sure to put it to good use in the near future - I think it's going to form part of my 3 lens lineup on the Trans-Siberian this summer :)

Incidently, the lady who did a lot of the work for this is keen to do some more - however you'd have to walk her through the stages for anything different. Her rates are very reasonable and she's willing to take on anything, so if you'd like to own a lens like this but don't feel confident doing the work yourself, give me a shout and I'll put you in touch.

Edited by ABramley - 27 April 2008 at 20:55

ABramley wrote: I had a shelf custom made for the chip to sit on - you can see it here - made out of solid silver it also adds a certain bling to the lens!

Lens is on it's way so is the LaoT chip, made a mount from a broken AF lens Now I'm trying to sneak the silver ring of my wifes finger to smelt it into the 'shelf'.