Hey Ed, nice to see you here.

As I've personally converted and modified about a dozen lenses, I apreciate your efforts to ease any step of that process - especially with well-thought and well-engineered products.
Your 'little collection' of canon-gear sets new standards, to say the least

I can't help you with knowledge regarding the whole mirror-issue, as I own a Canon 50D crop camera.

Concerning your A-list of lenses you mentioned:
I'm not completely sure of the nFD-Version of the 2/35, but the S.S.C.-Version* I converted just ROCKS. Easily one of the best primes I owned. I like the bokeh and it's sharp enough for the demanding crop-sensor like the one of the 50D shortly after f/2.0.
That one definitely belongs to the A-list.
*(the one of the three without radioactive elements)

On a side note, probably related to my copy:
I've yet some problematic front-group mechanics of the floating system to examine on the 2/35, where presumably some degraded plastic parts are responsible for unwanted tolerances of the front group.. I've encountered the extreme version of that issue in a Tamron zoom lens I repaired. There is not much that can be done against this issue, as it purely seems to be natural decay of plastics-related.

Another one of your A-list:
I got the 1.4/50 S.S.C. for a fine price because of stuck aperture blades. While chromatic abberations (showing mostly as purple in f/1.4 photos in bright daylight) are noticeable at f/1.4, those disappear quickly. It deserves a place in the A-list as well - not everybody wants to pay for f/1.2.

Side note: the lens has less problems (especially at sharpness) at close range than another good 1.4/55 for M42 I compared it against.
May have been a special weakness of that lens, but I assume that the 1.4/50 is just thoroughly designed.



I don't have the 3,5/50 Macro, but I've seen the reports of Hinnerker, the MTF graphs and the compared MTF graphs of a Zuiko 3.5/50 Macro I worked with. And those clues say that the 3.5/50 Macro rocks as well and should be thoroughly tested by you