Curtagon 60mm f/3.5 (6000)
Schneider-Kreuznach · Rollei 6000 · 1988
Also known as: Schneider-Kreuznach Curtagon 60mm f/3.5 HFT Rollei · Rollei Curtagon 60mm F3.5 HFT PQ · Schneider Curtagon 3.5/60 HFT PQ · Curtagon 60mm f/3.5 Rolleiflex 6008 · Rollei 6000 Curtagon 60mm 3.5 · Curtagon 1:3.5 f=60mm HFT · シュナイダー クルタゴン 60mm F3.5 HFT ローライ · ローライ クルタゴン 60mm F3.5 PQ
Variants & identification
| Variant | Mount | Years | Serial ranges | Production |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Curtagon 3.5/60 HFT PQ | Rollei 6000 | 1988 | — | — |
- What is known comes from two listings. Rolleigraphy: Curtagon 3.5/60 mm HFT, PQ, 7 elements (groups left blank), 67° diagonal, 49° horizontal, Bayonet VI filter and hood. Japanese Wikipedia: クルタゴン60mm F3.5, 7群7枚, 最短撮影距離0.6m, アタッチメントはシリーズVI. The group count therefore rests on the Japanese source alone. No weight, length, diameter, aperture range or price has been found, and the lens is not in Rollei's 2003 brochure, the Wikipedia list or Greenspun's 1997 review (which names Schneider's 60 among the system's lenses in its comparison table, without an aperture).
- Date: the family year is the PQ line's introduction of 1988, since the lens is listed as PQ only; no source gives an introduction or discontinuation date. Muth names 'the f/3.5 60mm Curtagon' among the Schneider lenses he has never tried, in 2021.
- Relationship to the Zeiss Distagon 3.5/60 HFT: every published figure (7 elements, 67°/49°, 0.6 m, Bay VI) is the same, and the Distagon's 7 groups match the Japanese count for the Curtagon. Nothing found says whether Schneider computed its own lens, built the Zeiss design under its own name, or replaced the Distagon at some date; the two are listed separately by both sources.
- Confidence is lower than for the rest of the Schneider line: a lens attested only in two secondary lists, with no maker's document.
How to tell them apart
- Schneider-Kreuznach, not Zeiss, on a 60 mm f/3.5 lens for the Rollei ten-contact bayonet: the name Curtagon is Schneider's, used on its retrofocus wide-angles for 35 mm and on the PC-Curtagon shift lens for the Rollei SL35
- Bay VI filter mount and the 'PQ lens' marking; no PQS, EL, AF or AFD version is recorded
- Not the Curtagon 35mm f/2.8 or PC-Curtagon 35mm f/4 for Rollei's 35 mm SLRs, which have no shutter and a QBM bayonet, and not the Zeiss Distagon 3.5/60 for the same mount, which reads Distagon and 'Made in Germany by Rollei'
Curtagon 3.5/60 HFT PQ:
- Schneider-Kreuznach Curtagon 1:3.5 f=60mm HFT on the front ring, with 'PQ lens' by the aperture scale (Rolleigraphy lists it as PQ only)
- Bay VI filter bayonet and 67° diagonal field, the same figures as the Zeiss Distagon 3.5/60 (Rolleigraphy; Japanese Wikipedia)
- Curtagon 3.5/60 HFT PQ: The only version recorded. Rolleigraphy lists it among the Schneider lenses as a PQ 'compact moderate wide angle lens, alternative standard lens'; Japanese Wikipedia lists a クルタゴン60mm F3.5 among the system's Schneider lenses with 7 groups, 7 elements, 0.6 m and Series VI. Neither gives a date, weight or catalogue number, and the lens is absent from Rollei's May 2003 brochure and from the Wikipedia list drawn from Rollei's 1984–93 brochures.
Specifications
- Formula
- Curtagon (Schneider's retrofocus wide-angle name), 7 elements; 7 groups per Japanese Wikipedia
- Construction
- 7 elements / 7 groups
- Aperture range
- f/3.5
- Shutter
- Electronically timed leaf shutter in the lens, linear-motor driven: 30 s–1/500 s
- Min. focus
- 0.6 m
- Filter
- Rollei Bay VI
- Years manufactured
- 1988
- Country
- Germany
- Coating
- Rollei HFT multicoating
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 Curtagon 3.5/60 HFT PQ is the least documented lens of the Rollei 6000 line. Two listings attest it: Stutterheim’s Rolleigraphy table of the Schneider lenses, which calls it a compact moderate wide-angle and an alternative standard lens, PQ only, with seven elements, a 67° field and a Bay VI filter mount; and Japanese Wikipedia, which gives seven elements in seven groups, 0.6 m closest focus and Series VI. Greenspun’s 1997 comparison table names a “Schneider 60” among the system’s lenses, and Muth in 2021 lists the Curtagon among the Schneider lenses he had never handled. Rollei’s own 2003 brochure, Wikipedia’s list from the 1984–93 brochures and every dealer page found carry only the Zeiss Distagon 3.5/60.
Every figure published for the Curtagon is also the Distagon’s: 60 mm, f/3.5, seven elements in seven groups, 67° and 49°, 0.6 m, Bay VI. Schneider used the Curtagon name on its own retrofocus wide-angles for 35 mm cameras and on the PC-Curtagon shift lens for Rollei’s SL35, so a Schneider-computed 60 for the 6000 is plausible; a Zeiss design built under Schneider’s name would be unusual but not unprecedented in a system where Rollei itself built Planars under licence. Nothing found settles which it is, or when the lens was sold.
As a PQ lens it would run on every body from the SLX to the Hy6 with the usual limits: shutter priority and manual on the SLX, 6006 and 6002, all modes on the 6008 and later, manual focus on the Hy6. No review, price, weight or catalogue number has been found. A copy in hand, with its engraving and a weight, would say more than the two lists do.
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 Curtagon 60mm f/3.5 (6000)? We'd love to feature it (with credit).
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