Sonnar 135mm f/4 (Contarex)

The Sonnar 135mm f/4 was one of the six lenses the Contarex system started with. In April 1960, when the Stuttgart factory began shipping the Contarex to the US, Carl Zeiss Inc.’s dealer bulletin listed it at $139, the same price as the Distagon 35. Pacific Rim Camera gives its production as 15,365 lenses between 1958 and 1973, says that no Contarex lens but the Planar 50/2 sold in greater numbers, and says it stayed in production for the whole life of the system. The US price lists agree that it stayed on sale: catalogue number 11.2405 appears in May 1961 at $156, in March 1968 at $185 and in October 1971 at $240, all list prices. Like the system’s other automatic-preset lenses it has no aperture ring (the 21 mm Biogon and the 250 mm Sonnar of the first set had hand-set diaphragms). The diaphragm is set from the wheel on the camera, and the 1960 bulletin describes an automatic preset diaphragm that couples to the camera as soon as the lens is attached. The US catalogues of 1960 and 1961 give 18°, four elements, f/22 and a closest focus of 4 ft, and Kamerastore’s listing gives 1.2 m. Kamerastore is also the only source for the nine blades and the weight of 519 g. The lens takes the system’s 56 mm bayonet filters, 49 mm screw-in filters and the same bayonet shade as the 50 and 85.

The design is old. Pacific Rim calls it “basically the same successful design introduced for the Contax I in the 1930’s”. Pacific Rim and English Wikipedia give four elements in three groups, and the section drawing in the 1960 US catalogue shows the same layout, a single front element, a cemented pair and a single rear element: the arrangement of the Contax rangefinder Sonnar 13.5cm f/4 on this site. That page is kept separate because the mount, barrel and diaphragm are different. Pacific Rim is the only source that ties the two optically, though. Mike Eckman, writing about the system as a whole, says Zeiss Ikon’s specifications meant all existing lens formulas had to be revised for the Contarex, without naming the 135. No Zeiss document cited here says whether Oberkochen recalculated this lens for the reflex. The two lenses also differ in close focus: the Contax lens stops at 1.5 m and this one at 4 ft. The US catalogue copy of 1960 and 1961 calls it a lens “of truly outstanding correction” whose “critical aperture is f/4.5 (almost wide open)”, and notes the short barrel, “a special feature of the Sonnar type”. The other 135 in the system, the Olympia-Sonnar f/2.8 (11.2409), is a separate four-element, four-group lens, and the 1968 and 1971 lists sell both together. The Sonnar 85/2 and the 250/4 complete the original Sonnar trio.

There are two finishes. The chrome lens, the one shown in the 1960 catalogue, has a satin chrome barrel, focusing ring and front ring. The black lens has a black barrel and scale ring with a bright chrome focusing ring and front ring: Leitz describes its no. 4219579, from a Contarex SE outfit it dates to about 1973, as “black with chrome focusing- and front ring”, and the black lenses photographed by Pacific Rim and Kamerastore look the same. No source dates the change. Christie’s 1997 sale of a large Contarex collection had one chrome lens (no. 2619257) and two black ones (nos. 3594628 and 3993783), and a black lens, no. 3645629, appears in a Leitz lot; neither house describes the rings of those three. No source cited here shows a 135/4 with a black focusing ring, though in the same SE outfit Leitz calls a Sonnar 85/2 with a black focusing ring “very rare”.

On the market this is one of the cheapest Contarex lenses. Between July and October 2026, lenses sold on Yahoo! Auctions Japan for ¥7,289 to ¥9,250 and one with filter and caps for ¥14,980, while lenses with faults went for ¥2,500 (balsam separation) and ¥3,100 (sold as junk). Those figures are winning bids, without shipping. Kamerastore puts its average price for a “Certified” example at $117, a dealer retail price. In Europe the lens often comes in lots: Leitz sold no. 3645629 with two Planar 50s for €480 including buyer’s premium. When buying, check for balsam separation, since one of the Yahoo lenses was sold for exactly that, and for the haze Leitz noted on no. 3645629. Check that the preset diaphragm closes when worked from a body or adapter. To use the lens on anything but a Contarex, you need an adapter with its own aperture control, because the lens cannot stop itself down. It fits every Contarex body: the Bullseye, Special, Professional, Super and Super Electronic.