Not as good a deal as I thought. 500mm Vivitar.

[Big Dawg]

Cleaning day today. The auction description of this lens mentioned a small mark on the front lens and sure enough one is there. I removed the front outer housing and then the front cemented elements and suddenly there were three chips of glass lying on the table!! YEEEEK! The flint glass had spalled off these chips! Nothing I had done so they must have already been loosened but held in place by the bezel!! Oh well they are on the outer perimeter and probably won't show up if I use the Digital camera anyway. Just aggravating. And ugly. And disappointing. And raising my blood pressure.

So I'll just remove the back cap and clean that lens element.....What's this....a screw on cap?? This is supposed to be a T mount. An early T mount...There are NO THREE SCREWS HERE THAT SHOULD BE HOLDING THE MOUNT ON! The cap should just be a push-on cap....JEEZZ!! It won't unscrew!!! What is this!!!???? Out comes the channel locks and....Darn...This thing is on tight!!! Why didn't I see this when I first looked at it?? Oh yeah...12 o'clock midnight after a hard shift at work....Yeah...just tired and sleepy....Didn't even see it when I took it to work to weigh it....Now with a lot of force it starts to turn......Looks like it is threaded...Slowly it comes off and I look into the rear of the lens.....Well there are the aperture blades waaay down inside......WAIT A MINUTE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! There is no rear lens element!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Now I have a wounded front end and a useless rear end...........You don't want to hear the cussing I gave the seller and myself as well right then!!! My wife came running from the bedroom to see why the cussing and yelling!!!

When she found out why...She calmly said...You should have known ...And then went back to bed....

She was right...to an extent....

Such are the bargains you sometimes get on Ebay...Cheap? Yes! But worthless. I just wish the sellers were a little more informed...This seller said she couldn't get the rear cap off so she had no Idea the rear element was missing. I should have asked more questions in this regard...My fault there. After the effort I had to put into removing it I think she was telling the truth. Since the front glass spalled off the chips when I was trying to clean it I guess I'll just keep it and look for another like it to make one good one from two bad ones.

Just thought I'd share my misery with all.

Forgive me...SOB....I'm still in tears!

When I can gather myself ...I'll... sob....post some photos of it!

[ManualFocus-G]

Bad times

I'm afraid this is all part of the fun, we win some and lose some. Usually lose more, but the ones we win are made that much sweeter as a result

[torbod]

Oh, what a bummer...

I hope you can restore to a better and stronger version of yourself after the anger passes and the tears stop falling.

/T

[scsambrook]

Yes, this sort of thing is always annoying - the silly thing is that our optimism and faith in accepting what others say just goes on and on . . . we should do our best to live by the half-empty glass philosophy and assume that any listing which doesn't describe in detail every important aspect of the item must be suspect, with a capital S. Mrs Big Dawg clearly knows enough about eBay to understand what happens !

But even then . . . I bought a little zoom lens on eBay last week, described as being optically perfect, no fog, fungus or scratches and cosmetically not quite like new. Great, I'd been after one of these for ages, and I got it ohhh-sohhh cheaply.So it arrives (very quickly, beautifully packed) and I unpack it and look through it from front to back and think, "Oh, it must have misted over coming into my warm kitchen from the cold parcel" . . . er, no, there's a heavy veiling on one of the inside elements, plus some threads of fungus. I contacted the vendor via eBay, more in sorrow than in anger, and to my amazement he immediately offered to refund all my money - including the postage - if I sent it back. Many apologies, and I think he genuinely was embarassed at having missed it. In the end I almost felt guilty for telling him. We ended up with the "judgement of Solomon" - I kept the lens and he refunded the greater part of what I'd paid. Who knows, that veiling might just dry out and the fungus might never grow any further

[Scheimpflug]

[casualcollector]

So much of this stuff is coming to the market. Much of it being sold by people abjectly ignorant of what they have and aping what they've read from other auctions. I still buy a piece here and there but approach it with the thought that you pay your money and take your chances.

I think this will turn out for the better for you, Dawg. I think it's a long focus lens, not a telephoto.

[Big Dawg]

My tears just dried up. I've heard of them but never seen one. You may ALL be right...if this is a thread mount T2 lens then I go along with that and will try it out tomorrow as I have a T2 to M42 that I can use.

[Big Dawg]

[Big Dawg]

[Big Dawg]

[Big Dawg]

[Big Dawg]

[luisalegria]

Good luck !

It looks like your 500mm may indeed be a Kawanon long focus type like my (ex) 600mm. I did sell that.

Handsome lens, but hard to use.

[mo]

Errrr I don't know which way to go on this one after reading the highs and lows of this post.... then finding hope...at the end.
I think I will wait and see what happens when you take it out and play with it...
I will sit on the fence and either cry with you or jump for joy

[ManualFocus-G]

Whoop whoop!

[Big Dawg]

Well...I dug out my T/T2-M42 adapter....IT FITS!!!! Plugged the big sucker up to the old K7 and added a 12mm extension tube (30 foot minimum focus distance is too close to the feeders) and shot a few. Still needs better cleaning and Boy is it difficult to focus. Not a lot of light, the sun from the wrong direction, the focus ring is waay too close to the camera and a tripod is a must! I need to play a little more but it is a relief to know it is a working example to add to the collection.

Oh yeah...I was right. The spalled glass is outside of the sweet zone so it does fine with the digital camera. Woop Woop indeed.

[Olivier]

So, better than expected !

[Big Dawg]

[mo]

8)Great news BD, I can jump for joy then !! look forward to the next batch in better sunlight.
I still love those cardinal images...keep them coming.

[visualopsins]

Wow, pretty good results from simple lens formula imho!

Take a look at those wide-open bokeh highlights at 100%/actual pixels -- the effects of spalled glass can be seen there.

Only by closing the aperture do light rays from the front element perimeter get blocked. Consider the mirror lens, with the center of the front element blocked by the mirror; how does the lens image not have a black spot in the center? Because light rays from the surrounding glass fill in the center.

Light (reflected) from a central subject radiates onto the entire front element surface; the front element focuses all of those radiations to the center of the image, no matter what size sensor is used. Thus, "sweet spot" refers to the projected image, not the front element surface.

[Olivier]

[casualcollector]

Color the edges and chips with black permanent marker while you're cleaning the snudge off the glass. That should subdue some flare.

[Big Dawg]

[mo]

I don't know Kylie's songs all that well.We have had enough dramas lately No walls here!

[Olivier]