Definitely Not a Trioplan.

[Bosun Higgs]

US made projection lenses come up very rarely on this side of the pond, so I always look forward to getting one, and when I recently bagged an 83mm Wollensak Cinema Raptar, I was very chuffed.

Note this is a "Cinema" Raptar for 35mm movie projection, not the much more common "Cine" Raptar, these are usually 16mm cine taking lenses.

I took the lens out for some test shots and I was very surprised by the results produced from specular backgrounds:-


Trioplan outlined bubbles, but note the very untriplet-like catseyeing.

I think that the Gods of lens design may be taunting me a bit here as I have recently done a post on my newly acquired Trioplan, and this Raptar is showing some pretty impressively outlined bokeh bubbles.

It is pretty certain that this is lens is not a triplet, and the strong catseyeing in the corners argues against this also. Plus, I have never seen a triplet design used for 35mm movie projection.

That said, none of my Petzval and Planar lenses show this degree of outlining.

I think that this is going to be an interesting one :O)

 

[simple-joy]

US made projection lenses come up very rarely on this side of the pond, so I always look forward to getting one, and when I recently bagged an 83mm Wollensak Cinema Raptar, I was very chuffed.

Note this is a "Cinema" Raptar for 35mm movie projection, not the much more common "Cine" Raptar, these are usually 16mm cine taking lenses.

I took the lens out for some test shots and I was very surprised by the results produced from specular backgrounds:-


Trioplan outlined bubbles, but note the very untriplet-like catseyeing.

I think that the Gods of lens design may be taunting me a bit here as I have recently done a post on my newly acquired Trioplan, and this Raptar is showing some pretty impressively outlined bokeh bubbles.

It is pretty certain that this is lens is not a triplet, and the strong catseyeing in the corners argues against this also. Plus, I have never seen a triplet design used for 35mm movie projection.

That said, none of my Petzval and Planar lenses show this degree of outlining.

I think that this is going to be an interesting one :O)

Congrats - I'd certainly love to try one of these as well. I've seen one or two appear but they were too expensive for me.

The Cinema Raptars are usually 6 elements in 4 groups designs, but there could be variations... (I don't think there were many though)





There are of course a number of 6 element lenses which can produce some bubble bokeh under the right circumstances. The Meyer Domiron is one of them, although they don't appear as regularly as with the Trioplan and they're less round towards the edges:

--
Experimenting manual lens enthusiast.

simple.joy

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[Bosun Higgs]

Well, the new Raptar was very reluctant to reveal its inner secrets, the retaining rings at both ends would not budge when subjected to considerable torque, and even imaginative cursing failed.

24hrs with my own patent penetrating brew also produced zero movement :O(

All was not lost however, this lens is rare in that it has a shiny aluminium finish with no paint or plating. This meant that a blowtorch could be used on the tube directly over the threads with no resulting cosmetic damage.

Now this procedure is not without risk, as if there are any cemented elements in the design the resulting thermal shock may induce separation.

Contrast on my example was not as good as I would like, therefore access to the interior for cleaning and blackening was strongly indicated...

So it was a case of hammering around the rings using a drift and then - Flame On!

The flame grilling worked like a charm, and there were no separation problems.

Here is what was inside:-


The internal doublet joints are based on those in Simple Joy's diagram, the actual profiles in this lens may be different.

So, very close to the optical diagram posted by Simple Joy, a 6:4 Planar(ish) design.

One interesting thing is that the doublets in my lens have flush edges, whereas those shown in SJ's diagram have a stepped profile.

I have only seen stepped doublets like that once before, in a Bausch & Lomb Super Cinephore. Perhaps this type of construction is a US thing, it is very inconvenient to the lens restorer however, as vee blocks cannot be used to align the elements when recementing.