Strange "Asahi NC Takumar 3,3/300mm Pentax M42" on Ebay

[Brendan MacRae]

----- Original Message ----
> From: Anthony Farr <farranthony at gmail.com>
> To: Pentax-Discuss Mail List <pdml at pdml.net>
> Sent: Sat, July 3, 2010 3:58:31 AM
> Subject: Re: Strange "Asahi NC Takumar 3,3/300mm Pentax M42" on Ebay
> 
> "The mounting the tube seems also an original."

Are you sure about 
> that?  Compare the pictures at 
> AOHC:

http://www.aohc.it/cameras/nocta.jpg
and,
http://www.aohc.it/images/sp40.jpg

to 
> the picture at the 
> auction:

http://i.ebayimg.com/11/!Bw0VCdQBGk~$(KGrHqIOKioEwPgB+i)hBMKt40,WIw~~_12.JPG

You 
> can see that the historic pictures show a much shorter tube
between the wide 
> part of the lens and the body of the image
intensifier, with no obvious 
> tapering or visible bright metal.  The
ebay lens doesn't have any place 
> where an image intensifier could be
placed according to the old 
> pictures.

regards, Anthony

The Nocta is described pretty well in Oosten's "The Ultimate Asahi Pentax Screw Mount Guide 1952-1977," pgs 255-256. From the three pictures in this book, it appears as though the eBay lens is complete minus the larger focusing handle. A rare unit indeed.

The description of lens from the book:

"The lens is a highly specialized Takumar 1:3.3/300mm for Infrared photography. The minimum aperture is f/22, the angle of view is 8 degrees. It was supplied with a 256X Neutral Density filter (42mm) for use under daylight conditions. The actual front of the lens measures 300/3.3 = 91mm in diameter of which only the central part is used in daylight." - pg 255.

-Brendan