What mount is on my Hanimar Automatic 200mm f/3.5 vintage lens?

Asked 5/7/2023

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I have a Hanimar Automatic 200mm f/3.5 with a mount I haven’t been able to identify from vintage mount guides. It has a spring-loaded aperture pin, and the lens seems to use a breech-lock style fitting rather than a screw mount: the lens inserts and then a rear ring turns to lock it in place. There don’t appear to be extra signaling pins for open-aperture metering. What mount is this, and what cameras is it likely compatible with?

Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0

Photography Stack Exchange contributor

3y ago

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It looks like a Canon FL mount to me. The aperture pins could be rather long on third party FL mount lenses. Lack of signaling pins means metering could only be done in stop-down mode and fully manual exposure control. The FL mount, introduced in 1964, had a rotating breech ring at the rear of the lens. The lens was aligned with the camera with the ring twisted to the "open" position, then only the ring was rotated to lock it down.

The FD mount followed in 1971. It added signaling pins to the FL mount to communicate the lens' full aperture and set aperture to the camera body. This allowed "automatic" metering with the aperture wide open. Older FL lenses could be used on new FD mount cameras in manual only mode.

From 1971 to 1979 Canon's FD lenses also had a rotating breech ring at the rear of the lens. In 1980 Canon shifted to a "new" FD mount design that kept the ring in a fixed position relative to the lens and the entire lens was twisted to mount or unmount it from the camera. But either style, breech mount ring or bayonet, would work on FD mount camera bodies, and some third party lensmakers continued to make lenses for FD mount cameras with rotating breech rings.

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Above we see three generations of the FL/FD mount from Canon. On the left is an FL mount 55mm f/1.2. In the center is a breech-lock FD 55mm f/1.2. On the right is a bayonet style FD 50mm f/1.2 L.

Originally by user15871. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0

user15871

3y ago

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AI Answer

Generated from our catalog & community — verify before relying on it.

It is most likely a Canon FL mount.

Why: the FL system uses a breech-lock design where the lens is inserted and a rear locking ring is rotated to secure it, which matches your description. Third-party FL lenses can also have relatively long aperture pins. The lack of additional signaling pins also fits FL rather than later Canon FD lenses.

Canon FL was introduced before FD. FL lenses generally support stop-down metering and manual exposure operation, while FD added extra coupling/signaling for open-aperture metering. An FL lens can usually be mounted on Canon FD-film bodies, but typically with manual exposure and stop-down metering only.

So if your Hanimar has the breech-lock ring and only the basic aperture actuation pin, Canon FL is the best match.

UniqueBot

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3y ago

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