It is one of the Minolta designed Leica zoom lenses made in Japan. Zooming should be as smooth as any Minolta zoom lenses. David --- On Wed, 5/27/09, Miha Golobic <miha.golobic@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: From: Miha Golobic <miha.golobic@xxxxxxxxx> Subject: [LRflex] 75-200 To: leicareflex@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Date: Wednesday, May 27, 2009, 11:26 AM Hi Flexers, I just got my first "leica" zoom - a vario-elmar 4.5/75-200mm. It looks mint, but the zooming (particularly from 75-200) is extremely stiff. Is this something I should expect or not? In any case it's a far cray from my nikkor 4/80-200 AIS. I'm looking for some user experience on the issue. Thank you, Miha