Reading how pleased we all can be about focusing tabs, made me remember of two lenses I own with focusing tab locks (Summaron 35/2.8,and SA 21/3.4); nice pices of glass, I even had gotten used to live with the locked tabs, but after useing newer lenses those have become a pain to use, any sugestion on how to solve that.

-- R Watson (al1231234@hotmail.com), April 10, 2001

Answers

The lenses I own that have the tabs have little or no focusing ring on them. I would think that without the tab, you'd have to really fuss with them to focus. By the way, as a "tab advocate", I can say that after having a chance to shoot with the current 50mm recently, the tabbed 50 is faster to focus, but I think I was able to fine tune the focus better on the newer lens for shots where I had a moment to do so. My wide-open in-focus success rate for more leisurely shooting was definately better with the current lens, where I feel I have more control over small increments of barrel rotation. In reading what I just wrote and thinking about all the other posts recently about the focusing tabs etc., I am coming to wonder if we all going nuts or what?

-- Andrew Schank (aschank@flash.net), April 10, 2001.

It's possible to grind down tab lock so that the tab no longer clicks in at infinity. If I had one of these lenses, I would get rid of the lock in an instant. They're a pain and they've never made any sense to me. Bear in mind that grinding down the tab lock is equivalent to removing the ear tag from a Beanie Baby. You make the item more functional, but you kill the resale value.

-- Robert Schneider (robslaurat@earthlink.net), April 10, 2001.

They already donīt worth much in a resale value, specialy the 21 that is so beat up no one would give a cent for it, but cristal is clean as well as mecanicaly, I have fix the tab lock problem with crazy glue, gum and pieces of wood, but it hasnīt been a definitive solution, Iīm thinking now in disasembling it and get rid of the locking sistem, just donīt know how.

-- R Watson (al1231234@hotmail.com), April 10, 2001.

Sherry Krauter told me she'll remove the locking mechanism from the tab during a CLA and send the parts back to you in a little plastic bag. I forgot to put a note in with my 50 Summicron so she'd do it.

She apparently uses her locking tab lenses without the locks in this way.

-- John O'Connell (boywonderiloveyou@hotmail.com), April 11, 2001.

Sorry, I wasn't paying attention to the question carefully and thought you were asking to remove the actuall tab and not the lock. That's what I get for logging on when I haven't totally woken up yet! I have an infinity lock on my 35 f2.8 I'd love to have removed as well.

-- Andrew Schank (aschank@flash.net), April 11, 2001.

Funny, my SA 21/3.4 #2292xxx, Wetzlar, has a tab, but no lock.

-- Bob Fleischman (RFXMAIL@prodigy.net), April 11, 2001.

Mine is the 2035559, glad your lens arrived late to tabs distribution, and as if it were little it got chromed too.

-- R Watson (al1231234@hotmail.com), April 12, 2001.

I took the lock mechanism off a Nikon 28/3.5 LTM. I just unscrewed the screw-in post from the back, and pulled off the housing and spring. It could easily be put back on. It's still easy to focus, it just doesn't lock. I haven't messed around with any of my Leitz lenses, though.

-- John Fleetwood (johnfleetwood@hotmail.com), April 12, 2001.