Historical
Minolta Rokkor
tele lenses
I have collected some information about historical Minolta Rokkor tele lenses on these pages. Historical means a pre-MC lens, without meter coupling and usually also with manual diaphgram control. The information is provided by Ryujin from Japan, who owns an old Minolta brochure. The pics are scanned by him, I have only edited them - the quality of the old printed images is pretty poor, as you can expect.
These lenses have several drawbacks if intended for serious use. First,
the metering must be done stopped-down - which usually is not that bad,
as these lenses are rather slow and therefore used mostly at full aperture.
They can be used in any Minolta manual focusing camera at manual or aperture
priority exposure at full aperture, if the camera has ability to meter
stopped down - look for "which
Minolta mf camera for close-up photography" to find out which cameras
have this ability. The second drawback is the manual diaphgram - it is
slow to use if you must stop down. Of course, the mirror lens does not
have these problems. It is also actually rather fast if you remember the
focal length - 1000mm. The worst problem comes in optical quality.
APO and other special lens materials were not available at the time these
lenses were constructed. I have never used any of these, but basically
the most common problem with old tele lenses is the image quality at the
corners - or outside the very center of the image, to be more realistic.
To get acceptable results by today's standards, even compared to the crappiest
100-300f6.3 zooms, you must stop down - and then the operation of the lens
gets slow. Don't buy these for wildlife or sports photography! I would
not buy them for serious use at all, only as collectibles - but they may
work satisfactorily in landscape photography, or maybe astrophotography,
where I have seen a lot old equipment in use. I don't know as I haven't
done it.
Tele Rokkor 300mm f4.5.
Tele Rokkor 300mm f4.5, scans by Ryujin
This lens has same f-number than the later MC 300mm f4.5, but the
optical construction is different from it, not to mention the MD 300mm
f4.5 IF.
Tele Rokkor 300mm f5.6
Tele Rokkor 300mm f5.6, scans by Ryujin
The pics above are scanned by Ryujin, from an old Minolta brochure,
and it shows a pre-set lens dating back to early sixties. I just saw one
of these lenses for sale - in Kuhmo, eastern Finland. I did not buy it
;-). The structure shows four elements in three groups. The diaphgram is
manual pre-set, minimum focusing distance is 4,5 meters, filter diameter
77mm and agle of view 8°. Looks like a giant rifle scope to me.
Minolta Tele Rokkor 600mm f
Minolta Tele Rokkor 600mm f, scans by Ryujin
Minolta RF Rokkor 1000mm f6.3
Minolta RF 1000mm f6.3, scans by Ryujin
You read it right, it is f6.3! An old mirror lens. The photo and
data are from Ryujin.
Angle of view:
2,5°
Min. focusing distance 30m
Fixed aperture
6.3 (f11, f16, f22 available with ND filters)
In-built filters
There is a turret holding Y48, 056, R60 and UV filters
The structure drawing at right shows 2 mirrors and 6 lens elements.
Sadly the weight and measurements are not given.
Auto Zoom Rokkor 160-500mm f8
Minolta Auto Zoom Rokkor 150-500mm f8
Scans by Ryujin
A lens from the early days of SLR photography, this lens has the
angle of view from 15° at 160mm to 5° at 500mm, minimum focusing
distance of 4,5 meters and filter thread of 77mm - like the old pre-set
tele Rokkor 300mm f4.5. The structure looks pretty complicated, and the
lens has been quite an impressive at those days. Wonder what the image
quality were, as there most likely were not coatings at all. This lens
already had the automatic diaphgram. All information from Ryujin.
Warning: Some of the oldest Auto Rokkor lenses had a diaphgram control
system that worked only with the Minolta SR-2 - check the lens compatibility
with your camera before buying!
Tele Rokkor 135mm f4 TC
Minolta Tele Rokkor 135mm f4 TC
Scans by Ryujin
This is an old preset lens that was also available as a bellows macro lens
with 39mm Leica-thread - I have one and you can see a pic of it here.
This is the information the brocuhre gives about it:
Angle of view:
18°
Focus:
From infinfity to 1,5m (5 feet)
Filter mount diameter: 46mm
Diaphgram:
Manual pre-set
This text is directly from the brochure:
This lens is lightweight for practical use. Coma and flare out of the axis are negligible, and fringe illumination is abundant.
Although spherical aberration and curvature of
field are variable in close-up work, they are greatly corrected in this
lens and especially curvature of field does not vary up to 1,5 m (5 feet).
Thank you, Ryujin, about this information!
My other pages
Home My home page.Tele lenses of 300mm length of longer for manual focusing Minolta
My photos My photo pages.
Minolta XE My Minolta XE pages
Close-up main page Close-up wit manual focusing Minolta
Subjective lens evaluations of some Minolta's lenses
Links Yes, links.