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Petruk
Tinkerer
Username: Petruk
Post Number: 2
Registered: 01-2012
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, January 03, 2012 - 09:57 am: | 
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Hi Folks,
I found this 500mm lens at a tagsale. I wonder if it is worth having cleaned, and what a fair price would be to clean it. One bid was $125. Worth it? Or paperweight? Thanks very much. (PS I am near Boston if anyone can recommend a repair center.) |
Cooltouch
Tinkerer
Username: Cooltouch
Post Number: 191
Registered: 01-2009
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, January 03, 2012 - 10:45 am: |
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It that stuff inside the lens is fungus -- and it looks like it is -- then it looks bad enough such that it's probably permanently damaged the coating and maybe even the glass.
I've never dismantled a Nikon mirror, but I have dismantled Tamrons. It's dead simple, but requires the use of a lens spanner tool. If your lens has a ring surrounding the lens that has two slots cut into it, then removing it with a lens spanner is the way to go. It isn't difficult cleaning that front element. Cleaning the back one can be tricky. Before you even touch that back element, though, you want to find out which surface is silvered. If its the outer surface, that is, the one facing the inside of the lens, then even a light cleaning can put scratches on it and damage it beyond repair.
People use a variety of cleaners to remove fungus. One that I've heard works great -- but I haven't yet had the occasion to try it -- is cold cream, like Ponds, etc.
I'd say that $125 is a fair price for cleaning it. If it can be cleaned and brought back to optimum condition, the lens is easily worth twice that. |
Petruk
Tinkerer
Username: Petruk
Post Number: 4
Registered: 01-2012
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, January 04, 2012 - 12:08 pm: |
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Thanks so much, Cooltouch. Really appreciate your suggestions and the brainpower here.
CHeers,
DMCG |
Nick_merritt
Tinkerer
Username: Nick_merritt
Post Number: 12
Registered: 06-2008
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, January 06, 2012 - 10:47 am: |
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I have this same lens, with a much smaller amount of fungus. It doesn't seem to affect the images. Since I am a fool armed with a lens spanner tool, I am game to open it up -- but I don't see any slots that allow the use of a spanner.
By the way, HN-27 is the designation of the lens hood, which seems on mine (and on this one too, apparently) to be basically permanently attached. |
Cooltouch
Tinkerer
Username: Cooltouch
Post Number: 198
Registered: 01-2009
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, January 06, 2012 - 11:06 pm: |
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If there are no slots in that front retainer ring -- or maybe it doesn't even have a ring, but just a lip that the lens seats against? -- then it looks like you'll have to open it up another way. Probably from the rear, where you'll start by removing the mount. Sooner or later, I would think, you're gonna run into a retaining ring that will require either a blade or a pin type of spanner wrench to remove the optical groups. |
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