Hi Michal,
Maybe I can help. This is really simple enough that no table is required, since the very large number of fields in such a table would be filled with a lot of redundant information. Hopefully some more expert Pentax users can correct me if I make any mis-statements below. Easiest approach, I think, is to think of the lenses and bodies separately. I know this is the opposite of what you wanted to do, but this approach works for me.
(Apologies in advance to the rest of the list for the length of the reply. Bill Casselberry's much more concise comment -- just posted -- probably sums up everything I state below. Are the excruciating details below -- assuming I got it all right -- worth appending to the the PDML web page? Might be useful to some prospective or new ZX/MZ/30 or 50 owners.)
LENSES:
(1) All of the K-mount bayonet lenses will physically fit into the K-mount bayonet fittings on all K bodies. (I think some other users have pointed out dimensional incompatibilities with certain combinations of lenses and teleconverters, and this might be covered on Boz's site, Stan Halpin's site, the URL http://w3.one.net/~georgek/pentax/lenses/g0018.html, the URL http://gemma.geo.uaic.ro/~vdonisa/lensgal.html, or elsewhere. I believe this only has to do with the teleconverters and lenses, but has nothing to do with the bodies. I'm not real familiar with these.)
(2) All K-mount lenses have two linkages related to the aperture. One of these linkages is moved by the capable camera body to control lens aperture (e.g., open all the way for metering, stop down for the actual exposure). The other linkage is connected to the aperture ring on the outside of the lens body. The camera user sets the aperture ring, and the capable camera body merely reads the position of the linkage. (My KM manual suggests that there are a small number of very long primes without this first linkage, which only allow for stopped-down metering. Again, not sure about these.)
(3) Some K-mount lenses have one or two additional features. AF lenses have a little rotary feedthrough to allow movement of the lens groups and focusing of the image. Power-zoom lenses have extra electrical contacts which allow a power-zoom-capable body to provide voltage to the zoom motor in the lens. I think the lens nomenclature is pretty clear in order to allow identification of autofocus-capable lenses (F, FA, FA*). I don't know much about power zooms, but I think the nomenclature may not be as straightforward.
Thus, everything's physically compatible (except for the few things I noted), and the features you get depend on the lens attached -- and of course, the body's capabilities.
BODIES:
You can generally take advantage of as many of your body's features as the attached lens will allow -- I don't think there are any particular compatibility issues. The notable exception is the ZX/MZ-30 and 50 bodies. Since these bodies do not have the ability to sense the position of that second linkage I noted in (1) above, they have problems with any lenses that don't have an "A" setting. (They can only sense the second linkage when it's set to the extreme end of its travel, at the A position.) Lenses with the original K mount are problematic, but lenses with the newer KA, KAF, or KAF2 mounts are fine with these particular bodies, since these later lenses all have an A position on the lens aperture ring.
If you put a K lens on a ZX/MZ-50 with the aperture ring set to anything other than wide open, the body will meter the shot wide open, then underexpose the shot when it stops down to the aperture ring setting. The more this ring is stopped down by the user, the more serious the underexposure. If you leave the aperture ring at the wide open setting, everything works fine. The ZX/MZ-30 is even worse, since it apparently won't even let you activate the shutter if one of these old K lenses is installed. Glad I didn't buy one of these!! I think this was a "feature" that Pentax implemented to prevent calls from irate users complaining of severely underexposed shots. Maybe they got a lot of calls from ZX/MZ-50 owners? Don't know.
That said, I use old K mount lenses -- and telescopes coupled through T-adapters -- on my MZ-50 with reckless abandon. For most night shots, I don't even use metering -- I work with the "bulb" setting. For more conventional shots, I just take care to either shoot with the aperture wide open, or adjust exposure compensation to make up for any stopping down I do at the aperture ring.
Hope this helps.
Bill Peifer
Rochester, NY
-----Original Message-----
From: Skorepa Michal [SMTP:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: Friday, January 05, 2001 8:52 AM
To: '[EMAIL PROTECTED]'
Subject: Compatibility table
Hi all,
I have been watching PDML for some time now and have come across already
quite a few questions regarding the compatibility and communication between
various lenses and various bodies. Usually, quite a few knowledgeable
pentax-users reply (sometimes in slightly different ways). Would it be too
time-demanding for one of you, long-time pentaxers, to produce and put on
the web a table with bodies in the rows and lenses in the columns ? Each
cell would then contain symbols for "does not fit at all", "TTL metering
impossible" etc. After that, others could have a look at the table and
suggest corrections or additions. I would love to do it myself but I am much
too new to Pentax. (Bojidar Dimitrov's Pentax K-Mount Equipment Page is
surely great but it lists lenses and bodies separately).
Such a scheme would help answer once forever most compatibility questions in
advance!
Thanks,
Michal
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