I really like taking pictures with my Rolleiflex SL66E camera however, I found the maximum speed of F/2.8 of the 80mm Planar lens a bit limiting when shooting indoors. Thus the search for a faster lens began. Most medium format camera system offer no lens faster than F/2.8. Exceptions include:
- the Pentax 105mm F/2.4 for the Pentax 67 system,
- the Contax 80mm F/2 Planar lens for the Contax 645 system,
- the Mamiya C 80 mm F/1.9 N lens for the Mamiya 645,
- the Hasselblad Zeiss Planar 110mm F/2 lens for the Hasselblad 200/2000 Series cameras and a couple of much older lenses like
- the Carl Zeiss Jena Biotar 100mm F/2 and Meyer Primoplan 100mm F1.9 lenses for the Exakta 66,
- the Carl Zeiss Jena Biotar 80mm F/2 and Meyer Primoplan 80mm F1.9 lenses for the Night Exakta, and
- the Schneider - Göttingen Xenon 125mm F/2 lens for the Volk Handkamera.
On some brochures the Rolleiflex SL66 is also shown with a Zeiss Planar 120mm F/2 lens which would be fast enough. However I have never seen this lens in person or on any auction site therefore I had to find another solution. My idea was that I could adapt one of the above lenses to my camera. The Pentax lens is too slow, 2., 3., and most likely 6. cover only the 4.5 x 6 format which is too small. This leaves only the Hasselblad and the 100mm Biotar, Primoplan and the 125mm Xenon lenses are all very expensive lenses plus I given long flang distance of the Rollei SL66 I wasn't certain that they would be adaptable to my camera.
After some time I managed to find a reasonable priced copy of the 125mm Xenon lens. After looking at some images of the camera here, considering the longer focal length and given the fact that it was designed to cover at least 7x9cm film I was confident that I would have enough space to fit an adapter.
I designed the adapter in FreeCAD and printed it using PETG. The lens is very heavy and I don't fully trust the adapter but it is possible to hold the camera in one hand and support the lens with the other. My lens came with a threaded ring the lens is screwed in. I designed the adapter such that I could attach the ring with screws to the adapter.
