ballsafire Loc: Lafayette, Louisiana

So-- I don't think the lens is worth replacing the mount till I have at least tried the adapter with the glass first then if quality becomes a problem, I would maybe do it. I just like to fool around with lenses! Now -- what adapter I should try next -- I now have a useless M42 to EOS adapter. You know your stuff!

ballsafire Loc: Lafayette, Louisiana

Well, well I may have my problem half way solved short of getting an FD adapter with glass. Thanks!

rehess Loc: South Bend, Indiana, USA

you are very welcome

If your real interest is in "playing" with old stuff, keep the M42-to-EF adapter, and the next time you have a yen to experiment, look for lenses that are specifically advertised as M42. That was the Pentax mount until 1975, and Practika {East Germans} / Soviets used it for some time later, so there are all kinds of fascinating old stuff out there using that mount {there is a reason why I could quickly put my hands on one - I was going to use a Soviet "Mir" lens, but it is funky in several ways, so I thought I should use a "Super Takumar" which would be more like other Japanese products}.

RWR Loc: La Mesa, CA

Sounds like your lens has a bayonet mount, most likely Pentax K, and what looks like internal threads are baffling grooves. An M42 lens mount will have 42mm diameter male threads, and the correct adapter will have corresponding female threads.

Those blades communicate with the camera for diaphragm control and metering. No adapter that I’m aware of will fit inside any lens mount.
Post some clear pictures of the lens mount, side (top) and end views, along with your adapter, and you'll get more help.

ballsafire Loc: Lafayette, Louisiana

I am tired and need to go to bed but I promise that I will post fotos tomorrow. Good night..zzzzzzzzetc

RWR Loc: La Mesa, CA

I was too interested in the ball game while typing and totally missed the later comments. As usual, just disregard!

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

I prefer not to use adapters. A simple solution would be to put those old lenses on ebay, one at a time. Use the money to buy a modern lens on ebay, maybe a zoom in the 28-300 range.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Funny, but when people talk about "the game," I have to think about what season it is and then figure what sport is being played. Not a sports fan. All sports means to me is having to set the TiVo for an extra hour because the game is probably not going end on time.

agillot

is it a T mount lens , or a pentax early screw mount [ before bayonet ].

rehess Loc: South Bend, Indiana, USA

Since you selected "Reply" instead of "Quote Reply", I have absolutely no idea who this is directed at; however you might be interested to know that the screw mount used by Pentax before 1975 was a generic mount used by various other companies, mostly Soviet, and is officially known as the M42 mount.

GENorkus Loc: Washington Twp, Michigan

From earlier chatting on this site, I found out my inherited old Sears analog camera used Richo lenses. One offering kit came with a 50 f2.8 and a 135 f2.8, both M42 screw-on lenses. Richo made them with Pentax mechanics so you're actually adapting a Pentax lens to your Canon.

If you really want to use those lenses, my suggestion would be to find a used Pentax dslr on Ebay or Amazon. Very basically speaking, around the 6 meg Pentax dslr's are going for under $100 (USD), the 10 meg dslr for around $200, the 14 and the older 16 meg are going for $300 to $400, newer for around $500 to $800 and maybe $1200. Those lenses are made for full frame use so if you have the cash the new Pentax-Richo K1 is around $1800. Probably more considering accessories and state taxes.

Pentax prides themselves on being "backward" compatible, (able to use old lenses on new cameras). With a simple M42 adapter on the Pentax dslr, you should have no problems unless someone modifier the lens to fit their other brand camera.

One other thing. When you say it doesn't work, I hope you are not wanting them to auto focus, it was manual focus only. All possible back then was auto aperture. A small amount of lenses didn't have auto aperture either. Those were 100% manual.

ballsafire Loc: Lafayette, Louisiana

Here are the photos I promised -- I hope this helps identifying the mount.

TriX Loc: Raleigh, NC

Ballafire, you're going to need to attach these (first click "choose file" in your reply, THEN click "add attachment")These are simply paths to the files on your computer and can't be opened by us...

amfoto1 Loc: San Jose, Calif. USA

Sears offered lenses to fit all the major manufacturers' cameras, in a wide variety of mounts. "M42 to EOS" is just one of many different possibilities (a threaded screw mount used by earlier Pentax, among others).

If we could see it, we might be able to identify it. Or, it might be marked somehow, somewhere on the lens, perhaps near the base or on the rear... something like "for yada/yada cameras" or "CA/FD" or Nikon F".

"Sears auto multi-coated 1:2.8 f=135mm Dia. 52mm model101737388" is just the basic lens info, I'm sure on the finishing ring on the front of the lens. That just tells us the max aperture, that it's multi-coated, focal length, filter diameter and the lens' serial number.

The good news is that most vintage lens mounts can be adapted for use on Canon EOS/EF mount cameras (Sony mount is also able to handle a lot of different ones via adapters.... In contrast, Nikon, Pentax and Olympus are pretty much limited to lenses in their own vintage mounts).

Incidentally, Sears was a really big source of photo equipment in the 1950s through 1970s... but they out-sourced everything, never actually made any lenses or cameras themselves, just bought from a manufacturer and had the Sears name printed on it. Hard to say who actually made that lens... might be Tokina or Sigma or a few dozen other companies. Might be good... or might not. Odds are that a prime 135mm is a pretty good, capable lens (as opposed to zooms from that era... which were largely crappola... especially most of the out-sourced ones.)




VERY IMPORTANT EDIT: Uh oh! Now I see the photos and can tell you that's a vintage Canon FD/FL mount lens. Unfortunately that's one of the few vintage mounts that's not very practical to adapt for use on modern Canon EOS/EF cameras. You can get Canon FD/FL to Canon EOS adapters.... but those adapters need to have optics in them to be able to focus the lens to infinity, and those optics are usually pretty poor quality, ruining the images made with the lens. The alternative is an adapter without optics (or remove the optics from one).... gives better image quality, but the lens won't be able to focus all the way to greater distances and infinity. Now, maybe you don't need to have that particular lens focus all the way to infinity.... if so, it might be usable.

Another nuance with Canon FD/FL mount lenses is that they "park" and lock the aperture at f5.6 when removed from the camera. To work properly, any adapter has to be designed to press down on a pin to "unlock" the aperture, allowing you to manually control it across its full range (probably f2.8 to f16 or f22). Note: with any adapted lens, you can only use your camera in M or Av mode. You won't get correct exposure in P, Tv or any of the "Scene" presets such as the "Running Man"/Sports.

If you do decide to buy an adapter for it, I recommend the "chipped" type even though they cost a little more. The main advantage of that type of adapter is that your camera will be able to provide Focus Confirmation, which can be quite helpful since manually focusing vintage lenses with modern cameras designed for AF can be difficult. There are cheaper "unchipped" adapters, but the difference is usually only about $10 or $15.

More info about adapting vintage lenses for use on modern Canon EOS/EF cameras, including which mounts are easily adapted and which are not, can be found here: http://bobatkins.com/photography/eosfaq/manual_focus_EOS.html

ballsafire Loc: Lafayette, Louisiana

So -- you provided a lot of good information but I am still not absolutely sure what mount is used and if there is a simple adapter to use this lens on my Canon T1i (cropped 1.6) DSLR camera. I thought from the photos provided someone would know. I'm brave so don't hesitate to tell me bad news LOL.