I don't disagree at all and sometimes the Mothership can provide real surprises. The point is that they don't throw away the spare parts after the 10 year period, they sell out. Thus, I once was able to get - from Nikon Japan - the eyepiece ocular lens for a finder to the 2.1 cm Nikkor-O f/4, a lens discontinued in the '60s ... Arrived in a nicely wrapping with specifications hand-written to it (this obviously had been in store much earlier than the bar coding system).
Good points, Bjørn, that helped me decide to buy the sample. Of course it also helped that the lens is in outstanding condition
. Also bought a Wimberly tripod foot for the lens.
The softness went away with a fine tuning value of +8. I might send it to Fotocare in Oslo for an adjustment together with my cameras (or can you "live with" a lens needing this level of fine tuning?).
Thank you all for your response!