Zenzanon-PE 500mm f/8 (ETR)
Zenza Bronica · Bronica ETR · 1988
Also known as: Zenzanon-PE 500mm f/8 · Zenzanon PE 500mm F8 · Bronica PE 500mm f8 · Bronica ETRSi 500mm f/8 PE · Bronica ETR-Si 500mm F8 LD · Zenza Bronica Zenzanon PE 500mm f/8 ETR · ゼンザブロニカ ゼンザノン PE 500mm F8 · ゼンザノン PE 500mm F8 · ブロニカ ETRSi 500mm F8
Variants & identification
| Variant | Mount | Years | Serial ranges | Production |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Zenzanon-PE 500mm f/8 | Bronica ETR | 1988–2004 | — | — |
- Angle of view, aperture range, closest focus, filter size, 318 × 139 mm and 3,760 g are from Tamron's ETRSi lens table (tamron.co.jp) and Tamron USA's 2004 page, which agree. The construction is 10 groups / 11 elements in Tamron Japan's table and in Japanese Wikipedia (citing プロフェッショナル中判カメラ p.112), the latter specifying two elements of anomalous low-refractive-index, low-dispersion glass. Stronger: those two, against Tamron USA, whose 2004 page prints '6 groups 7 elements' under the PE as well as the E-II while calling the PE 'a completely different optical design from the E-II 500'; the 6/7 figure is the E-II's, copied across.
- Glass. Tamron USA's price line reads 'PE Flourite' and its text 'Low Dispersion (LD) glass elements'; Japanese Wikipedia says 異常低屈折率低分散ガラス, anomalous low-refraction, low-dispersion glass. Fluorite itself is a crystal, not a glass; the Japanese description is the more specific and is taken here, with 'LD' as Tamron's own shorthand.
- Years. The PE series arrived with the ETRSi, released December 1988 (Japanese Wikipedia); no source dates the PE 500 itself, and a lens this costly may have come later in the PE run. It was still on Tamron USA's list in 2004; Japanese Wikipedia says the remaining Bronica lines were withdrawn one by one before the RF645 ended on 20 October 2005.
- Blades and a yen list price were not found; the fields are left empty.
How to tell them apart
- The largest lens of the ETR system: 139 mm across, 318 mm long, 3.76 kg, with a 122 mm front thread and a built-in hood; the E and E II 500s are 100–102 mm across with 95 mm threads at 1.9 kg
- ZENZANON-PE on the name ring and half-stop aperture clicks running to f/64; the E II clicks in full stops to f/45
- Its own Seiko #0 leaf shutter timed by the body and the four-claw ETR bayonet; mounts only with the shutter cocked
- Not the Zenzanon-PS 500mm f/8 for the SQ bodies or the Zenzanon-PG 500mm f/8 for the GS-1, which carry those suffixes and other bayonets
Zenzanon-PE 500mm f/8:
- Engraved ZENZANON-PE 1:8 f=500mm; 122 mm front thread on a barrel 139 mm across and 318 mm long; 3,760 g; built-in hood
- Aperture ring with half-stop detents from f/8 to f/64, the smallest stop in the ETR line
- Zenzanon-PE 500mm f/8: The only version. Tamron's ETRSi table gives 10 groups / 11 elements, 8.1°, f/8–64 with half-stop detents, 8 m, 122 mm, 318 × 139 mm and 3,760 g; Japanese Wikipedia adds that two of the elements are of anomalous low-refractive-index, low-dispersion glass, and Tamron USA that floating elements are used and that it is 'a completely different optical design' from the E-II 500 sold alongside it. Tamron USA listed it in 2004 at $15,107.
Specifications
- Formula
- 11 elements in 10 groups with two anomalous low-refraction, low-dispersion (LD) elements and floating elements (Japanese Wikipedia; Tamron USA)
- Construction
- 11 elements / 10 groups
- Aperture range
- f/8–f/64
- Shutter
- Seiko #0 electronically controlled between-lens leaf shutter, 8s–1/500 plus T and B (B on an ETRSi body); mechanical 1/500 without battery; the speed is set on the body
- Min. focus
- 8 m
- Dimensions
- 139 × 318 mm
- Weight
- 3760 g
- Filter
- 122 mm
- Years manufactured
- 1988–2004
- Country
- Japan
- Coating
- PE multicoating; Tamron USA: 'utilizes PE coatings'
- Original price
- US$15,107 list (Tamron USA, 2004) (today $25,090)
What reviewers say
No reviews aggregated yet — this family is still in the research queue. Written one? We'd love to index it.
History
The Zenzanon-PE 500mm f/8 was the most expensive and the heaviest lens Bronica ever offered for the 6×4.5 ETR bodies, and the one PE lens that did not simply replace its predecessor. Tamron’s specification gives eleven elements in ten groups, two of them, per Japanese Wikipedia, of anomalous low-refractive-index, low-dispersion glass, with floating elements, an 8.1° angle of view, f/8 to f/64 in half-stop clicks, closest focus at 8 m, a 122 mm filter thread, a built-in hood, 318 mm by 139 mm and 3,760 g. The Zenzanon-E II 500 it was sold beside is a seven-element lens of 1.9 kg with a 95 mm thread; Tamron USA called the PE “a completely different optical design” and quoted them in 2004 at $15,107 and $4,380.
The price tells the story. The PE series that came with the ETRSi in December 1988 brought half-stop aperture detents coupled to the AE-II and AE-III prisms, new coatings and, as a 1998 Medium Format Digest poster put it, lenses reformulated on MTF theory; at 500 mm Bronica went further and built an apochromatic-style telephoto with LD glass, in the way of the long lenses of the 35 mm makers. Tamron USA’s copy promises the LD elements reduce internal flare and aberrations and the floating elements add sharpness, which is the maker’s claim rather than a test: no review, measurement or sample set for the lens has been found. Its 122 mm filters are shared with nothing else in the ETR line.
The same page is the source of a mistake worth knowing about. Tamron USA’s 2004 comparison prints “6 groups 7 elements” under the PE as well as the E-II while insisting the PE is a different design; Tamron’s own Japanese table and Japanese Wikipedia give 10 groups and 11 elements, and that is the construction here. The glass is called fluorite in the American price line and LD in the text; the Japanese description, anomalous low-refraction low-dispersion glass, is the more specific. Like every ETR lens it carries its own Seiko #0 leaf shutter, electronically timed from 8 s to 1/500 with the speed set on the body, B on the ETRSi, and a mechanical 1/500 without a battery; it mounts only with the shutter cocked.
Few were sold, and used examples are correspondingly scarce; a dealer asked about $1,380 for one in 2025, a tenth of the list price and several times what the E II fetches. For a buyer it is a tripod lens at 3.76 kg, and the checks are the shutter at all speeds and on T, the diaphragm closing to f/64, the floating-element focusing running smoothly across its long throw, and the built-in hood sliding freely. Whether its drawing justifies the premium over the E II on 6×4.5 film is a question nobody has published an answer to.
This history is AI-written, from the sources listed at the foot of the page. Where the record is silent it says so rather than filling the gap — but no human wrote these sentences.
Example photos
Sample photo wanted — shot with a Zenzanon-PE 500mm f/8 (ETR)? We'd love to feature it (with credit).
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