[Silverkarn]

I bought 2 lenses over the past 2 days, first one i got was a Sigma Macro Lens(1:2) off of ebay, should arrive by next friday.

Second one was at a garage sale. A clean, fungus free, 500mm Tamron SP Adaptall Mirror lens marked at 10 and they accepted my offer of 7 dollars. It came with a Nikon and Olympus Adaptall adapters. Now all i have to do is get an Adaptall adapter for Pentax.

Since i've never handled a mirror lens before, the thing that confused me was the price sticker, under the price was written "missing ext. tube". i couldn't figure out what that meant until i got home and realized it meant the lens hood.

Any tips on this lens? Do i mount the tripod on the lens instead of the camera with this thing since its so heavy? Or would a sandbag be better?

I know i need a lens hood for this beast. I cant wait to get my adapter to try it out.

[JeffJS]

I bought 2 lenses over the past 2 days, first one i got was a Sigma Macro Lens(1:2) off of ebay, should arrive by next friday.

Second one was at a garage sale. A clean, fungus free, 500mm Tamron SP Adaptall Mirror lens marked at 10 and they accepted my offer of 7 dollars. It came with a Nikon and Olympus Adaptall adapters. Now all i have to do is get an Adaptall adapter for Pentax.

Since i've never handled a mirror lens before, the thing that confused me was the price sticker, under the price was written "missing ext. tube". i couldn't figure out what that meant until i got home and realized it meant the lens hood.

Any tips on this lens? Do i mount the tripod on the lens instead of the camera with this thing since its so heavy? Or would a sandbag be better?

I know i need a lens hood for this beast. I cant wait to get my adapter to try it out.

Was that by any chance a 50mm f2.8 Sigma? I didn't get signed in quite fast enough.

The good news about the Tamron is you can use just a regular adapter. You don't need the more expensive PK/A adapter for that lens. If you plan on buying more adaptall lenses, it would be worthwhile to get the auto adapter but otherwise no.

There is no extension tube stock on the 500 to my knowledge. You can buy an adaptall 2x TC for it however but that will put you at f16. As it stands, the lens is fixed at f8 and if you got it for 8 bucks, you really got a bargain. It uses 37mm rear filters that screw into the rear lens mount if I remember correctly. To change apertures exposure keeping the same shutter speed (like changing apertures) you'll want to find some ND filters for it. There is a kit floating around out there that comes with an ND2 and an ND4 (and a couple others).

[Silverkarn]

Was that by any chance a 50mm f2.8 Sigma? I didn't get signed in quite fast enough.

The good news about the Tamron is you can use just a regular adapter. You don't need the more expensive PK/A adapter for that lens. If you plan on buying more adaptall lenses, it would be worthwhile to get the auto adapter but otherwise no.

There is no extension tube stock on the 500 to my knowledge. You can buy an adaptall 2x TC for it however but that will put you at f16. As it stands, the lens is fixed at f8 and if you got it for 8 bucks, you really got a bargain. It uses 37mm rear filters that screw into the rear lens mount if I remember correctly. To change apertures exposure keeping the same shutter speed (like changing apertures) you'll want to find some ND filters for it. There is a kit floating around out there that comes with an ND2 and an ND4 (and a couple others).

Sigma was a zoom macro 28-80 3.5-5.6
Thanks much for all of the info, very helpful.

About the "missing ext tube" on the sticker, i wrote that down as a hint as the owner not knowing what they had.

I am also assuming that i need an "adaptall-2" adapter instead of the normal adaptall.

Is there a way to tell the difference between an "Adaptall" and an "Adaptall-2" I'm sure there are some listings on ebay where the seller might list an adaptall-2 simply as adaptall.

[JeffJS]

I'm not really enough of an expert to answer that but I THINK it's the version II you want. There is probably tons of info here on the forums about it. I see these quite often on ebay for around $20. Real early versions of the adaptall were called Adaptamaitc (if I remember correctly). When I had my 500, I used the mount with the contacts but that was completely unnecessary. One of the neat features about that lens is it will also do close focus, to about 8 feet. It has around a ten turn focus throw and the hood that goes with it is nearly as long as the lens.

To demonstrate what a bargain you got, I sold mine 3 years ago, without a mount, no filters, but with the hood and case (no tripod mount on mine either), for $200.

There was a sigma 50 f2.8 Macro on ebay a couple days ago. As I was signing in to do the $45 buy it now, somebody else got it. That's why I asked. Oh well, I need another 50mm macro like a hole in the head...

[excanonfd]

Sigma was a zoom macro 28-80 3.5-5.6
Thanks much for all of the info, very helpful.

About the "missing ext tube" on the sticker, i wrote that down as a hint as the owner not knowing what they had.

I am also assuming that i need an "adaptall-2" adapter instead of the normal adaptall.

Is there a way to tell the difference between an "Adaptall" and an "Adaptall-2" I'm sure there are some listings on ebay where the seller might list an adaptall-2 simply as adaptall.

Any PK/M mount will do, even a third party knock-off mount. Kind of ironic that even a 3rd party knock-off mount will cost more than the lens itself, never mind the original lens hood. No matter how you slice it, still a great bargain. Congratulations.

[Silverkarn]

Any PK mount will do, even a third party knock-off mount. Kind of ironic that even a 3rd party knock-off mount will cost more than the lens itself, never mind the original lens hood. No matter how you slice it, still a great bargain. Congratulations.

So i would be safe buying one of the third party adaptall adapters? Is there any reason besides "authenticity" for getting a genuine tamron adapter?

[Ira]

Try not to get too excited about mirror lens possibilities.

Generally and mostly, the optics are far inferior to "real" lenses.

[Marc Sabatella]

But the Tamron is generally consider one of, if not *the* best of the mirror lenses. And there are practically no "real" lenses of that focal length to compare with - certainly nothing remotely close to that size or price. When you check out the Mirror Lens Club thread on this forum, it's pretty hard not to be impressed by that one.

[excanonfd]

But the Tamron is generally consider one of, if not *the* best of the mirror lenses. And there are practically no "real" lenses of that focal length to compare with - certainly nothing remotely close to that size or price. When you check out the Mirror Lens Club thread on this forum, it's pretty hard not to be impressed by that one.

Yes, I think most people would be surprised by how good the Tamron mirror lenses can be. I took some shots on Sunday afternoon with the 55B + 01A TC, 55B + Pentax F 1.7x TC, and finally with the 55B alone. I really need to find some manual focusing aids like split prism finder and/or O-ME53. Here are some images looking outside from my balcony, these are all jpgs resized from K20D best jpgs to 800x600 resolution.

Thanks,

[TOUGEFC]

I have the version 2 of that sigma 28-80 marco lens you have, it was alright until it feel apart in my hands. Poor poor build quaility.

[Silverkarn]

I have the version 2 of that sigma 28-80 marco lens you have, it was alright until it feel apart in my hands. Poor poor build quaility.

I dont know, the lens feels quite sturdy, and from the scuff marks on the lens it looks like its been banged around quite a bit, so far it takes great quality photos. I just cant wait to get my extension tube and set it up with that. How do you tell if the lens is version 1 or 2?