The 5.5cm/55mm Micro Nikkor, The Building of a Legend

5 Elements in 4 Groups Lens drawing for 5.5cm and 5.0cm Micro Nikkor
The 5.5cm F3.5 "F" lens is a slightly altered version of the rangefinder 5.0 cm Micro Nikkor. For most of its useful reproduction range, especially at 1:10 where it was design optimized, the original design 5.0 cm lens would have worked just fine on the Nikon F. However, when focused on infinity (most closer applications would have worked just fine.), it would have been useful for only one photographic shot before the mirror banging into it would have sent it into the repair shop for replacement of the rear element. As Martha Stewart might say were she to try to hold one of these early beasts, "Not a good thing".

The solution, of course, proved to be both obvious and trivial. Nikon optical engineers merely scaled up all of the physical design parameters of the original rangefinder Micro Nikkor by 10% in order to satisfy the mirror clearance issue. This was a very fortuitous solution since it preserved all of the celebrated sharpness virtues of the original rangefinder 5.0 cm , a lens which was design optimized for 1:10 reproduction ratios (like for mapping an 8 1/2" X 11" sheet of paper onto the 24mm X 36mm format) but proved to be astonishingly sharp over its entire range (A very, very good thing).

BTW, in the rangefinder version as well as in its SLR version, this is truly one of the Nikkor lenses that built the early Nikon/Nippon Kogaku story. That lens was so sharp over its entire range that its optical performance outstripped the efforts of the optical goliaths, like Leitz and Zeiss Ikon, of that era. This was integral in the early building of the Nikon legend that eventually resulted in its dynamic growth from a very small post-war Japanese optical conglomerate into the photographic icon that it has become.

In the earliest embodiments, Nikon made some of its most obviously stupid sets of decisions. One can only imagine the conference room arguments that must have erupted when that set of insipid design decisions was cast in granite, at least briefly,. The lens was designed to be principally a lab or bench lens, with an optically optimized set of parameters around a 1:10 reproduction ratio, employed mainly in copy work or the like. So a number of mechanical economizing parameters were designed in. The lens was design for infrequent bench refocussing so a preset mechanism was seen as overkill since totally manual exposure operation would probably be enough. When the preset ring is operated, the front filter screw (an amazingly shallow thread in its earliest embodiment) also rotates making the use of a polarizing filter so difficult as to render the issue academic unless a Nikon supplied accessory, the M-B adapter, is employed. The lens also obviously has no meter coupling prong.

Lesser known but obvious from the condition of the few examples that survive, the physical lens body, in its early preset version, was not at all intended for the rugged rigors of field use. Of the few that survive, most display wear in the form of lost paint and physical surface deterioration of the soft metal employed in physically worn surfaces.

Only about 2300 of these physical design executions were actually produced and a considerably smaller number in decent mechanical condition probably survive due to the likelihood of a great many of them having been extensively use outside of their design use parameters...and consequentially have been largely destroyed in use.

The author owned one of these lenses and found that using it was a relatively miserably challenging experience. When the comparatively elegant automatic diaphragm close focus exposure compensated very next version was introduced, I rushed out and traded my preset version in for the new one. I recall getting less than $20 in the trade for the preset...HHHMMMM ! AND, these horrific monuments to Nikon's early poor early engineering/marketing decisions go for how much now ?

Version 1:



The photographed accompanying "M-B" adapter is further testimony as to how truly egregious the basic design of the first embodiment was. One horrific limitation is the fact that once a lens is set up for pictures with a polarizing filter and the preset mechanism is engaged, the action of the preset causes a consequent and erroneous rotation of the axis of polarization, often defeating the purpose of the polarizer. The "M-B" adapter (which often jams in place) anchors the polarizer filter to a non rotating member of the lens body, rendering the polarizer usable.

Version 2:





The very next version of this lens (serial numbers 171513 up) was as elegant as its predecessor was clumsy. Of course it was much more ruggedly designed and it had an amazing cunningly designed exposure mechanically compensated aperture mechanism. A less than completely understood set of facts relates to the variability of what an "F stop" really is at very close focusing distances or high reproduction ratios. A lens's stated F stop is typically calculated at infinity and where the the lens has its closest approach to the film plane. This more than adequate for the vast majority of photographic situations where a lens is made to move only slightly further away from the film plane resulting in only a slight negative adjustment to exposure calculations. However, recall that this lens was intended for and employed in reproduction ratios up to 1:1 . Also recall that this lens preceded TTL metering or behind the lens metering systems, which changed this whole game. At 1:2 the lens is physically twice as far away from the film plane as when focussed at infinity. At these distances the usable physical F stop deviates significantly from the theoretical calculated F stop measured at infinity. A convenient pedagogical way to look at it is that when the lens is twice as far from the film plane as it is for infinity, the focussed image has to cover four times the surface area at the film plane (even though we only employ the central 1/4th) so one of the costs of a `1:2 reproduction ratio is 2 F stops in image brightness. Inserting the "M" ring to go to 1:1 costs another two F stops, a very serious set of exposure adjustments.

The mechanical elegance of the design, and it is so marked on the lens barrel, is that so long as the user has stopped the lens down to an appropriately small value or beyond (high F stop number) the lens will compensate during exposure for the mathematical adjustment.

The third version of this lens (2nd of this physical embodiment serial numbers 211001 through 273153), with the compensating aperture, had a black enamel painted rather than silver (frosted chrome) front barrel and the aperture ring went from smooth ridged to a scalloped type.

Version 4 of this lens appeared with onset serial number 600001 and was distinguished by being, along with the 135mm F2.8, one of the very first physical lens bodies that sported the first generation RIFR (Rubber [hard rubber] Insert Focus Ring). Production of this variation ended in May of 1973 with serial number 729138 and the advent of availability of Nikon's version of Multi-Coating or NIC (Nikon Integrated Coat)which was the beginning of a set of evolutionary steps in lens coating technology.



Version 5, serial numbers 730001 through 811928, incorporated a more advanced version of NIC and the smooth ribbed aperture ring evolved to a scalloped version.

Version 6 beginning with SN 850001, eliminated the side engraving scales for reproduction ratios in favor of equivalent and easier to employ information presented on the distance/focus ring. The suggested extension ring that coordinates with the engraved scales is the PK-3.



Version 7: The last non floating element version begins with 940001 and is the AI version.