Have any of you here ever seen a Sears mirror lens? Sears did offer 500mm mirror lenses in their catalog for several years in the 1980s. But they seem to be scarce, so they probably didn't sell very many. That's not surprising considering the asking price for a 500mm in the 1982 Fall-Winter catalog was $269.99. Adjusted for inflation, that would be $722 in 2020.
Early Sears 500s were re-badged Tokinas (
review link) which came with a fixed mount offered in the major mounts of the time. Later, there was a re-badged Samyang 500.
A couple years ago, I actually found a cheap (Tokina) Sears 500 on ebay! But it was cheap for a reason...
Two reasons, actually.
First, it had a Minolta SR mount. And second, some of the interior glass was actually fractured! Still, I'm a sucker for unusual lenses - and especially when they're selling for bargain prices. And I was genuinely curious to see how the lens might perform in spite of the damage.
My lens came with matching hood and front cap. The hood is designed so it will thread on in the reversed position for storage. And the front cap fits onto the hood.
Curiously, the accessory thread diameter of the lens is about 75mm, rather than the common 77mm. A former custodian of this copy labeled the hood as being 77mm, but it isn't. And if you're thinking about buying a (Tokina) Sears 500, hope that the matching hood is included. Because finding a replacement might be difficult.
So I've had this lens for a couple years now, but it was only recently that I bought a Sony camera which made it practical for me to use Minolta mount lenses digitally. With its 1.5m minimum focus distance, it's actually useful as a close focus lens. Except my copy is really soft at MFD. I'd never used a Tokina mirror lens before I bought this one, but I'm sure the fractured glass must reduce sharpness and contrast. Even so, considering that this lens was sold as a basket case, I've been pleasantly surprised with some of the results I've seen.
Here's my lens and some recent sample shots: