Is This The Most Underrated Legacy Lens Ever?!?
This is the Tamron SP 35-80mm f/2.8-3.8 CF Macro Adaptall-2 Zoom Lens. To be honest, I had never heard of it. I stumbled across it while researching information on a different Tamron Adaptall-2 lens, but after reading about this lens I started looking for a good copy to possibly add to my growing “legacy lens” collection.
The extremely useful website I discovered this lens on, adapted-2.com, has this to say about it: “Tamron’s SP 35-80 F/2.8-3.8 zoom lens is, without question, the best zoom lens ever manufactured within its class and price point.“ Well…that got my attention. I started doing more research on this lens. Production of this model, the 01A, started in 1979 and only lasted until 1985. Shortly after this lens went into production, a lot of companies, Tamron included, started manufacturing 28-80mm zooms which proved more popular with their wider zoom range. This makes 01A a tad bit more rare than other, more popular Tamron zooms. You can definitely find them out there though – I found my copy in just a few days. The Adaptall-2 line of Tamron lenses is based around a modular concept where the lens is manufactured with a rear section that accepts the Adaptall-2 mounts which are available in various lens mounts. It’s a clever concept that proved very successful for Tamron through the years. You could buy one lens and via different mount adapters use the same lens on various camera bodies in your collection.
I started looking at my usual places for old lenses – eBay and Etsy. Etsy didn’t have any, but eBay had a few in various levels of condition as well as prices. I made a mental note to start checking for this model whenever I got on eBay. In just a few days, I spotted what looked like a mint copy that even included a Nikon AI Adaptall-2 adapter, and even more exciting was it’s low Buy It Now price. It was such a good price that I really studied the listing and pictures to make sure I wasn’t reading it wrong! It had only been listed for a couple of hours at the time I saw it which is probably why no one had snagged it yet. $30 with free shipping and what looked like excellent condition…I pulled the trigger.
Once the lens arrived a mere two days later, I was excited to rip into the box. I was extremely happy to discover a MINT version of the lens and quickly slapped it on one of my Fuji X-T1 bodies via a Fotodiox Pro F/NEX adapter and went out to look for some test shots.
The 01A lens is part of Tamron’s SP line…their “Super Performance” line. The SP designation was given to lenses that displayed superior sharpness and contrast due to an advanced or unique optical design, low dispersion element(s) for apochromatic or near apochromatic performance, internal focusing, superior macro performance, and a larger maximum aperture compared to similar lenses. It also features Tamron’s CF technology, which some confuse as Close Focus…it’s actually Continuous Focus. This means that the lens has the ability to continuously focus from infinity to it’s macro range. It’s a feature that really interested me as soon as I read about it and was one of the main reasons I wanted to hunt one of these lenses down for myself.
The minimum focus distance for this lens is 10.6″ from the “film plane” (i.e. sensor). That is wonderful for a “standard” zoom lens! I initially bought this lens to use as an adapted legacy lens on my Fuji bodies and Sony A6000, but I have no doubt I’ll use it on my Nikon bodies as well.
Wild Geranium shot with the Tamron 35-80 SP CF lens on the Sony A6000.
The 35-80mm lens turns into a 52.5-120mm lens on the crop sensor bodies I use, which is still a very usable range. Would it be great if it was wider at the small end? Of course! But I’m definitely happy with it’s “standard to short telephoto” range on the crop bodies. It’s a great lens to put on one of my cameras and take with me when I go on a walk – I am lucky enough to basically have my backyard backup to a state park so I often go out for a walk and often take a camera with me…sometimes I use it, sometimes I don’t but it doesn’t hurt to have it with me! It’s awesome macro ability is nice to have too and makes you wish that all lenses had this close up ability.
It also is a very useful range for portraits and I have taken a few with it already. It’s 2.8-3.8 aperture is fast enough for nice depth of field / bokeh but also enough to make sure that both eyes are in focus if the head is turned slightly…something that isn’t a guarantee with a lens with a 1.4 or 1.8 max aperture.
Portrait of Nathan; Sony A6000 with Tamron 35-80mm SP lens.
A lot of info on the 01A can be found at THIS link, but the basics are:
62mm filter size, 9 elements in 8 groups, @3″ in length and is fairly light weight (for an old legacy lens) at 13.6 oz.
You can also use Tamron’s 01F 2x SP Tele Converter with this lens – they can be found used, but prices can vary wildly…at the time I got mine on eBay for $20, there were some listed around $100 and even one at $199! Average seems to be $30-$40 so don’t pay too much.
PROS:
Usually reasonably priced when you find one; EXCELLENT macro ability; optically excellent at all apertures; ability to use on different camera bodies via Adaptall-2 mount adapters; small size.
CONS:
Other than sometimes being hard to find, I don’t really have any Cons! The 01A is simply a great lens to add to your legacy glass collection.
I really love this lens. I paid a bit more for it than the majority of my legacy lenses, but IMO $30 was a steal for such a great, high quality lens.
Another Legacy Gem!
Tamron 80-210mm f/3.8-4 CF Tele-Macro 103A Zoom Lens (L) and Tamron SP 2x Tele-Converter 01F (R)
The Tamron 103A…in my opinion, another wonderful legacy lens from years gone by.
The zoom range on the 103A is 80-210mm with a starting aperture of f/3.8-4. It is also a CF lens meaning it has continuous focusing into it’s macro range, has the great BBAR multi-coating, and exhibits the same great build quality of the 35-80mm SP that I wrote about HERE.
I initially discovered the 103A while researching that 35-80mm (the Tamron 01A) lens. I love the 01A so much, I started looking at other highly rated Tamron Adaptall-2 lenses and one that kept coming up with well above average optics and build was the 103A. Introduced in 1981, the 103A is considered one of the best tele-zoom lenses Tamron ever made. I went to my usual places to look for one and started searching. I came across an 80-210mm lens but it wasn’t the one I was looking for…it was an older model. The older 03A lens, which is a two-ring zoom, is not nearly as great optically. 1987 was the last year for the 103A and it was replaced with the 46A which is a 70-210mm zoom and is also not as highly regarded optically as the 103A.
I did a few days of looking and found a couple that looked decent, so the next step was to email the sellers and inquire about “zoom creep”. Sometimes a push/pull designed zoom lens will develop what is called zoom creep – the zoom mechanism will actually slide up or down by itself when the lens is pointed up or down. Not the end of the world if you intend on handholding the camera/lens while shooting, but for a couple of reasons it’s something I try to avoid – 1) I intend to use the lens for some macro shooting on a tripod and the lens will most definitely be pointed down a lot of the time, and 2) I just have a pet peeve about buying a zoom-creeping lens!
After hearing back from the sellers I asked, I decided on one that looked to be in fantastic shape that was listed for $20 plus $12 shipping. I offered $20 total and got it at that price – it never hurts to ask! Coming from the west coast, it took a few days to get to me, but it came packaged very nicely in a zippered neoprene sleeve, complete with both caps and also a Nikon Adaptall mount.
During my initial research, I found that the 103A has a minimum focusing distance of 35″ which only sounds “pretty good” until you remember that the lens adapter that allows the lens to mount to a Sony body (or one of my Fuji bodies) reduces the minimum focusing distance…while still allowing infinity focus! A quick test of the lens on my Sony A6000 revealed that the 103A showed great potential for a pseudo macro lens!
I shot around home for a couple days to get familiar with the lens and see how the images looked and was pleased with what I was seeing, but I wanted to get it out “in the field” and give it a good testing. I decided late on a Thursday night to wake up early Friday morning and drive up to Cox Arboretum in Dayton to test it out. During the middle of the night, I occasionally woke up to a big rainstorm moving through, which I figured would at least give me decent light as long as it quit raining eventually! Well, it did and I got to the arboretum around 7:00 am, not realizing that the park doesn’t officially open until 8:00 am, but since there is no gate or anything I went on in since I knew I had no need to go into the main building and would just be out on the trails.
There wasn’t a ton of wildflowers blooming at the time – the wild geraniums that were everywhere a couple weeks earlier were gone, and the few wildflowers that were here and there weren’t in the best of shape. I found some daisies that were in good shape, and while not a flower I’d normally go out of my way to shoot, I was there to test the 103A mainly.
Daisy With Fly – Sony A6000 w/ Tamron 80-210mm f/3.8 103A lens.
The nice wide and smooth zoom/focus collar on the 103A in combination with the focus peaking feature of the A6000 makes manual focusing the lens a breeze. My thought of the lens having great macro potential was proved correct once I got it out in the field and started shooting…I rarely had to “back up” because I was too close to a subject to be within the minimum focusing distance.
I had also picked up a mint copy of Tamron’s 01F SP 2x Tele-Converter that is recommended for the 103A (as well as the 35-80mm 01A lens), so I decided to pop it onto the lens and test it out as well. This requires taking off the Adaptall mount off of the lens as the converter attaches to the lens the same way the Adaptall mount does, and you then attach the Adaptall to the rear of the converter…though in my case, the converter has it’s own Nikon Adaptall mount already on it, so I just have to remove the mount on the lens. This effectively makes a 240-630mm lens after considering the 2x converter plus the 1.5 crop factor of the A6000 body! At this point, one thing I would love is if the lens had a tripod collar! Having the camera/lens combo mounted to the tripod head from the area-swiss L-plate on the camera body means there’s an awful lot of lens hanging out there when you factor in the lens to camera adapter plus the tele-converter. It’s not a huge problem when shooting because I normally utilize a remote control to operate the shutter when using a tripod, but it does make focusing a little bit tougher because when you are touching the lens to focus, you do make the image bounce around a bit in the viewfinder. I’ve just ordered a Adaptall/NEX adapter that has a tripod mount from eBay, so I am thinking that might help a little bit.
This Miridae (leaf bug) was only about 3/8″ long. Sony A6000 w/Tamron 80-210mm f/3.8 103A lens and 01F 2x Converter.
Obviously, the 103A lens can double as a nice macro lens on a crop sensor body, especially when using the 01F 2x converter.
After looking over the images when I got home, I knew I had a keeper in the 103A lens. It does have slightly less contrast than a modern lens will have, but truthfully I like that as I feel it gives a more film-like look to the images. I loved the way the lens felt and operated in the field. Actually, I love the lens enough that when I spotted a newly listed one boxed in new condition on eBay for $19, I bought it too. My plan is to leave the 01F tele-converter attached to one of them all the time…I’ll just switch lenses and not worry about wear and tear or the risk of damaging anything trying to attach the converter in the field.
PROS:
Inexpensive for a quality lens; great macro ability; solid build; being such a popular lens in it’s day makes finding good used ones fairly easy; only drops from f/3.8 to f/4 at the long end – most lenses drop to f/5.6.
CONS:
Slightly less contrast than a modern lens (though I personally don’t think of this as a con); heavier than a modern equivalent lens (though again, this ads to the solid feel of the lens); occasionally a little tricky getting the 2x converter attached smoothly.
Anemone – Sony A6000 w/Tamron 80-210mm f/3.8 103A lens.
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