For Sale How About A 14" Cooke Portrait Lens for Under $100 bucks?

jimgalli · Feb 4, 2014

We might pull it off with a few caveat's you'll have to live with. Just a couple of little tiny items.

Like, it doesn't say Cooke on it any place. But I have other Xerox lenses that do have the Cooke name on them, so we know Cooke was under contract to build Xerox lenses.

Also note it has no flange or threads for one. The enterprising person will figure out some way to mount this beast. Maybe you could drill the clunky aperture rotation device and use it as the flange, turning the whole lens assembly to close the aperture.

It's definitely an f5.6 triplet and as such should produce some very very fine portraits on 8X10 or smaller.

$85 plus $12 for a flat rate medium box in USA.

Small print: Whether or not this is actually made by cooke is of course 60% conjecture and 40% edumacated guess.

analoguey · Feb 4, 2014

Xerox... Lens?! Wow.
And made in England?

Sent from Tap-a-talk

Dr Croubie · Feb 4, 2014

Who needs a mounting flange? Use one of these

I'd love the lens, but that's gonna be huge to post overseas (I'm getting a 600mm apo-tessar from the EU to here currently, blew my shipping budget on that one or I might be tempted by this)

gorbas · Feb 4, 2014

Jim, I think you are right! It can be easily Cooke made lens. I have 2 lenses salvaged from photocopiers, one is marked as Taylor, Taylor & Hobson-Xerox and other as Rank industries-Xerox, both f4.5/8 1/4" or 210mm. Not bad lenses at all!
Back in the day, TTH was owned by Rank Industries.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/26983280@N00/5314871542/in/set-72157625599299969
http://www.flickr.com/photos/26983280@N00/5561057341/in/set-72157625599299969

jimgalli · Feb 4, 2014

gorbas said:
Actually, I have 2 lenses salvaged from photocopiers, one is marked as Taylor, Taylor & Hobson-Xerox and other as Rank industries-Xerox, both f4.5/8 1/4" or 210mm. Not bad lenses at all!
Back in the day, TTH was owned by Rank Industries.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/26983280@N00/5314871542/in/set-72157625599299969
http://www.flickr.com/photos/26983280@N00/5561057341/in/set-72157625599299969

thanks for posting those Gorbas. BTW the 96mm Kodak printing Ektar is an emitter. I wonder if the 87 and 100 have the same radioactive glass in them.

agman · Feb 4, 2014

Will this work on a Crown?

jimgalli · Feb 4, 2014

No. Your bellows wouldn't go far enough for this to focus, plus it's just too big for the poor little Crown. Have a sale pending on this.

agman · Feb 4, 2014

OK, thanks.

gorbas · Feb 4, 2014

Thank you Jim for the info! So far I have 4 Kodak printing Ektars. I just looked at them on light table, still waiting to add Geiger counter to my tool box. I'm afraid that you are right! 127mm is very amber in colour, 146mm and 87mm are less, 100mm is clear. They must be desperate to put those radioactive element in optical glass. What happened with poor workers who made them with all glass dust and particles in the air during manufacturing?

jimgalli · Feb 4, 2014

gorbas said:
Thank you Jim for the info! So far I have 4 Kodak printing Ektars. I just looked at them on light table, still waiting to add Geiger counter to my tool box. I'm afraid that you are right! 127mm is very amber in colour, 146mm and 87mm are less, 100mm is clear. They must be desperate to put those radioactive element in optical glass. What happened with poor workers who made them with all glass dust and particles in the air during manufacturing?

Yes, the plant workers may have been at risk, but the end users like us, unless we sleep with them under the pillow, I think they're a manageable risk. I just noted there were more of them made at Kodak than most other mfr.s Pentax had a few also. We had a 152mm Pro Raptar (70mm film lens) sitting around here for years that no one ever paid any mind to, and when we shipped it to re-app the other day, they shipped it back to us.

gorbas · Feb 4, 2014

As far as I know pentax had two in m42 -1.4/50 and 2/35. Aero Ektars are most well known for it. Some after IIWW Leitz lenses too. So what is application for 152mm Raptar? Picture taking or processing?

jimgalli · Feb 4, 2014

gorbas said:
As far as I know pentax had two in m42 -1.4/50 and 2/35. Aero Ektars are most well known for it. Some after IIWW Leitz lenses too. So what is application for 152mm Raptar? Picture taking or processing?

It was used on a 70mm Cine camera.

eclarke · Feb 4, 2014

Clamp

Dr Croubie said:
Who needs a mounting flange? Use one of these

I'd love the lens, but that's gonna be huge to post overseas (I'm getting a 600mm apo-tessar from the EU to here currently, blew my shipping budget on that one or I might be tempted by this)

A very nice clamp for many purposes, I think. Can't find anyplace in the USA to buy them, though. I have emailed EzyStrut.

Dr Croubie · Feb 4, 2014

eclarke said:
A very nice clamp for many purposes, I think. Can't find anyplace in the USA to buy them, though. I have emailed EzyStrut.

Just google "saddle clamp" or similar. They're used to hold pipes, like PVC downpipes against walls, or metal pipes for water supply in bigger buildings. I've got one around my Jupiter 250/3.5, bolted to a long strut of metal with the camera at the other end, like a manfrotto 'long lens support' but cheaper.

eclarke · Feb 4, 2014

Dr Croubie said:
Just google "saddle clamp" or similar. They're used to hold pipes, like PVC downpipes against walls, or metal pipes for water supply in bigger buildings. I've got one around my Jupiter 250/3.5, bolted to a long strut of metal with the camera at the other end, like a manfrotto 'long lens support' but cheaper.

Yep, I was in the pipe business for a long time. This clamp is a little special

Newt_on_Swings · Feb 5, 2014

Dr Croubie said:
Just google "saddle clamp" or similar. They're used to hold pipes, like PVC downpipes against walls, or metal pipes for water supply in bigger buildings. I've got one around my Jupiter 250/3.5, bolted to a long strut of metal with the camera at the other end, like a manfrotto 'long lens support' but cheaper.

I'm having a little trouble picturing this setup. How did you attach it to the lens board? Do you have a picture? I'd want to try something like this out!

Dr Croubie · Feb 5, 2014

eclarke said:
Yep, I was in the pipe business for a long time. This clamp is a little special

Ah, didn't realise that you already knew about them. Nothing too special about this except that it's "insulated", which I don't care about in itself, but it's got a nice hunk of rubber around it so you don't scratch the lens.
The only time I've used them in real life is when someone wants to lightning- or vibration-proof a manifold (I work with pumps for a day job).

Newt_on_Swings said:
I'm having a little trouble picturing this setup. How did you attach it to the lens board? Do you have a picture? I'd want to try something like this out!

I haven't used one of these for an LF lens (yet), but to mount it on a lensboard I'd just put the clamp around the lens, then either use L-brackets to mount the clamp to the lensboard, or some little tension-hooks all around (I'm not sure if they're called tension-hooks, that's what I call them, I'll see if I can get a pic of them). Either way, with a bit of fluffing around I reckon you could get them fixed together.

The way I've used them so far (like on my Kiev 250/3.5) is with long and telephoto lenses on my SLRs (35/120), especially the heavy ones that don't come with tripod rings. Basically, it looks like one of these (but cheaper, stronger, heavier and uglier)

j-dogg · Feb 5, 2014

IIRC the Soviets had a couple of radioactive lenses for their Leica-clones and subsequent evolutions of it that utilized lanthanum glass.

I want to say one of the 50mm Industar lenses did as well

jimgalli · Feb 5, 2014

The 14" big bertha Xerox is SOLD!

Thanks All!

For Sale How About A 14" Cooke Portrait Lens for Under $100 bucks?

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