Markings on Tessar?

[John Koehrer]

I've got a 139mm/4.5 B&L Tessar with makers marks on it that I'm not familiar with:
After the mfrs. name & city there are two dots side by side, one yellow, one red. After the word Tessar, the letters "IC".
Does anyone out there have any ideas of the significance ot these?
The lens does appear to be coated and is in a Betax #3 shutter.

 

[Dan Fromm]

"IC" is the lens model. That's I as in the roman numeral for one (1) and C. One C. All, AFAIK, of B&L's f/4.5 tessars are ICs. Their f/6.3 tessars are IIBs. Two B.

There's been considerable discussion about the significance of colored dots on B&L, Ilex, Kodak, and Wollensak lenses on the www.graflex.org help board. No consensus ever emerged, but many fanciful theories were presented.