What is the LHSA M6?
Introduction
In April 2000, the Leica Historical Society of America commissioned a special edition M6 from Leica Solmns. This limited run camera features a black paint finish (rather than black chrome), a black Leica dot on the front panel (rather than red), and special engraving on the top plate rear upper plate. Furthermore, to make the black paint grip better, the top and bottom plates are made from machined brass (rather than the Zinc alloy used for production run M6s).
In August 2002 Leica announced a $US 500 rebate. This is mentioned in this Aug 2002 discussion at <Photo.net: #003eCG> along with how practical the LHSA model is for general photographic work.
In September 2002 there was also a discussion at <Photo.net: #003iyb> about the LHSA models and again how practical they are (or not!) for everyday use, along with the desirability of the matching Abrahamsson black paint Rapidwinder.
PDF brochure
You can grab a copy of the camera brochure from either of the following links:
1. LHSA brochure (PDF - 429k bytes)
2. LHSA brochure (Zip Archive - 418k bytes)
Having trouble viewing the PDF (typically with Windows MSIE)? Download the "zip" version instead. BTW you also need a recent version of the Adobe Acrobat Reader. Download it from <adobe.com/products/acrobat/>
Other LHSA special edition cameras
BTW, there have been a number of LHSA special issue Leica Ms. In Dec 2001, Dr Joseph Yao noted the following:
I have in front of me four versions of LHSA cameras:
1. M6 Classic 0.72 chrome '20th anniversary' released in 1988;
2. M6 Classic 0.72 chrome '25th anniversary' with chrome 35/2.0, 50/2.0 and 90/2.0, released in 1993'
3. M6 TTL 0.72 black paint released in 2000;
4. M6 TTL 0.85 black paint, also released in 2000;
The first two versions were available in small numbers, I believe there were only 151 sets made for the 1993 version. These classic M6 had small shutter speed dials.
The black paint TTL cameras were available in large numbers, with serial numbers running from #254xxxx to #273xxxx. These cameras have the larger shutter speed dials.
In Dec 2001, John Black added the following:
There was a VERY small group (reported to be only 5 cameras) of [black paint LHSA M6s] made up in Solms in 2001 with the 0.58 finder as a factory original.
The first one was given out as the grand prize at the LHSA convention in S.A. in 2001 along with a black paint 35 summicron asph. I won that prize and have been very pleased with it since.
So there really are 3 factory versions of this camera but, unless the society decides to offer new ones, the 0.58 edition is, at least for now, quite scarce.
A note about possible broken links
This FAQ has over 900 external links. Over time it is inevitable some of them will break. If you are bothered by this, see this detailed topic elsewhere in the FAQ.