Maybe the worst lens of the world Hanimex Hanimar 28mm 1:2.8

janandhiscamera · Joined: 18 Jul 2014 Posts: 3

The Hanimex Hanimar M.C. auto f=28 1:2.8 is a wide-angle lens for the M42 to screw mount, with the worst sharpness I have ever seen.

There is also a video version of this review on Youtube:
http://youtu.be/fiZAnU2FDdY

Sharpness:
At F/2.8 the images are so blurry that everything is out of focus. It gets better if you step the lens down, but it never reaches a good sharpness. In sunlight flares also reduce the contrast.
All Images are 100% crops.

Image center @ F/2.8

Image center @ F/5.6

At maximum aperture there is a huge amount of ghosting.

Image center @ F/2.8

To show you how bad this lens is, I compared it to the well known 25mm CCTV lens which can bought for 25$ new. Even at the image borders this cheapo is sharper than the Hanimex Hanimar.

Hanimex Hanimar, image border @ F/8

25mm CCTV lens, image border @ F/8

PhantomLord · Joined: 08 Apr 2013 Posts: 476 Location: Szczecin, Poland

Hi and welcome.

Simple post to overcome anti-spam of the forum and allow us to see your photos.

Pancolart · Expire: 2013-11-18

Did you consider a defect? Can you show a lens photo?

TAo2 · Joined: 09 Mar 2012 Posts: 319 Location: Scotland

Looks like a loose element in the lens,or , the lens has been disassembled for cleaning and re-assembled incorrectly. The flower shot looks like it's inside the minimum focus distance as well... Question

h00py · Joined: 17 Jul 2014 Posts: 16

i don't know if this is same lens (wide angle)
but this is one i have and a few shots of,not great but way better than your own,so maybe an element is in back to front
mine is minolta md fit and used on a nikon3100 with adapter with a glass element

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Basilisk · Joined: 21 Mar 2013 Posts: 356 Location: UK

Don't know if you intended this thread to be about the worst lenses in the world, maybe just the worst 28mm lenses. I have a Sunagor 28mm f2.8, which in later versions looks quite like your Hanimex, though I have an earlier M42 version. It is pretty bad, but I might use it for retro flary effects. The coatings are either poor or non-existent.

GillCrin · Joined: 03 Apr 2014 Posts: 7 Location: Scotland

Well back in the early 80's when I was in the retail trade, Hanimex was commonly referred to as "Ham 'n' Eggs" or "Hamster Eggs".

They were the worst things we sold by some distance, and they were the only thing we would'nt take back in as trade-ins.

The rep though was a nice guy, and they were as cheap as a Hoya filter wholesale, so heaps of them were bought by head office. The primes were bad, but the zooms were truly dire.

iangreenhalgh1 · Expire: 2014-01-07

Nothing surprising to me here, I've had a few third party cheapo primes that were as rotten as this one. Hanimex is a brand to avoid, it was cheap and often nasty stuff.

scsambrook · Expire: 2011-11-18

There were indeed some pretty poor Hanimex lenses but, to be fair, many of the earlier ones from the 1960s were actually quite good -so I think it's a brand to approach with caution rather than automatically avoid.

Aanything · Expire: 2014-05-30

However, I too think this lens has issues, rather than being this bad by itself.
Not that I am a fan of third party cheapo stuff, but this is just too bad, according to my experience with similar level lenses.

GillCrin · Joined: 03 Apr 2014 Posts: 7 Location: Scotland

Yip the time I'm talking about exactly matches the livery of this lens black with the almost neon green line rear the front rim. they came in glossy Green and Black boxes with a shot of the lens on the front if memory serves me right.

At that time the only new m42 lenses we sold were these, Sun and Hoya (and adaptall II mounts).

The Suns were all primes and old but fast designs, but were probably the best of the fixed mounts - they were Grey imports from the Malaysia I think, so not general European stock - they had Gold boxes. Not seen any since though, batch of probably 250-500 across all m42, nikon, canon, and pk.

Amateur Photographer liked Hoya's so they went like hotcakes, we didn't know why.

However, we never had any problem selling anyone up to a Tamron.

iangreenhalgh1 · Expire: 2014-01-07

Hoyas, with a couple of exceptions are Tokinas. Some of them like the 2.8/24 and 2.8/28 are pretty good, but some like the 3.5/200, 4.5/300 and 5.6/400 were poor. The zooms were very mixed, the better ones like the 3.5/35-105 were quite good, but many were pretty mediocre, the 75-260 springs to mind.

Excalibur · Expire: 2014-04-21

My mint Hanimex 28mm f2.8 is also crap on a film camera...avoid

janandhiscamera · Joined: 18 Jul 2014 Posts: 3

janandhiscamera · Joined: 18 Jul 2014 Posts: 3

woodrim · Joined: 14 Jan 2010 Posts: 4060 Location: Charleston

Lots of little bits of money can be spent acquiring cheap lenses when just a little more can get you a very good lens.

nukemall · Posted: Thu Jul 24, 2014 3:05 am Post subject:

This 28/2.8 is a first lens manufactured by Samyang at the end of 1970s.
It's always bad and any who try to use it "considered a defect", like with other early Samyang lenses(35/2.8, 135/2. Cool

.
This lenses selled under over the 9000 "garbage" trademarks like "Eagle", "Underground" etc etc, also as "Rokinon", "Hanimex", "Sears" and "Revuenon".

Other worst lenses manufactured by Samyang:

"Chinon" 35/2.8 (ordered by Chinon USA)

Real japanese Chinon 35/2.8, see "Japan" on the nameplate ring:

Other 28/2.8(late model)

35/2.8

And worser 135/2.8 ever produced:

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Briefly: if you see on the old lens "Made in Korea" - throw it away. Samyang start to manufacture good lenses at 2009 with 85/1.4, any earlier is crap.

Excalibur · Expire: 2014-04-21

It always amazes me when you pick up a mint lens made in the 70's/80s and get bad results, e.g. Osawa 28mm /f2.8 as the formula for the lens elements were well known.....so it's either crap glass used or the elements were badly made or incorrect assembly in the factory or combo of all. In mass production you'd think they would get it right and any 28mm lens should be at least decent.

Pancolart · Expire: 2013-11-18

iangreenhalgh1 · Expire: 2014-01-07

The only Korean made old lens that is any good is the common 2.8/135, lots of people have had good copies, myself included. The 28s and 35s are very common and crap.

Gerald · Joined: 25 Mar 2014 Posts: 1196 Location: Brazil

iangreenhalgh1 · Expire: 2014-01-07

jamaeolus · Expire: 2015-08-20

I got a hanimex 135 with a "lot" of other camera junk I was interested in. The mount (exakta) was bent and it rattled when I picked it up.so I thought I'll dismantle it to see what is inside. Pure crap. PVC tubes, slot in inner tube as helical. plastic everything except for a few (very damn few) screws. My guess is the weight of the lens bent the mounting plate. Amazingly shoddy. The Yashica DSB 50 1.9 on the broken ML 1000 though? Very nice indeed.

philslizzy · Joined: 07 Aug 2012 Posts: 4748 Location: Cheshire, England

Your Minolta/Nikon adapter has got a lens in it. That reduces image quality somewhat at full aperture, making an already bad lens worse. I use a silmilar adapter but I use Rokkors on my D3200, 2 stops down they are fine but yours....