Leica Summicron 90mm f2 Canada Midland

Leica Summicron 90mm f2 Canada Midland

Problem: Rangefinder lever stuck

This is a very rare lens, although the "normal" 90mm Summicron is quite popular and pretty cheep (retaliative to a Leica glass), the Canada Midland is a rare piece. It's quite hard to find any good info on it online. On one site I found that a total of 490 lenses where produced between 1957 and 1962. Based on the serial number it was made at 1958, but I'm not 100% sure about it.

It's a M39 - a screw mount, so I can use it on my Sony NEX camera, it's a crop sensor so I will get something 135mm equivalent of focal length, its quite long for my taste, but can do for half body or head shoots.  



Anyway,

The lens I've got was in quite good condition, you can see it was dropped and the mount if bent a bit inside, but it still can be screwed in fairly easy. The glass is in good shape, as well as the aperture. The problem is that if one really wan't to use it on a Leica camera, he needs to couple the lens to the range finder, this is done via this "prong" at the back of the lens. It's simply moves with the focusing ring, pushing on the range finder lever inside the camera. So this part was stuck, probably due to the hit the lens took.



Basically the disassemble part is easy and minimal, you just need to get the "prong" out. By removing the two side screws.



Next I took the think apart to clean it. Pushing it all the way in, you'll see the end of the spring visible at the bottom. You just need to lift it out of the hole (I used a knife's edge)

And these are the three part, the spring, the moving and static parts.

After cleaning the whole think (I also used some very fine sending paper to really make it smooth) the whole think goes back together, insert on part into the other and then lock everything with the spring.

Next I've tried to unbend a bit the mount as it to close to the "prong". For this I've made a tool which can be useful also for bend filter rings, so its a good think you remember this.

All you need is a piece of wood, I've used a round saw to drill a 40 mm (the mount is M39 - 39 mm) hole in the middle of the block and then cut it in half. Make sure you save the inside piece that you've sawed off.

Next I've placed the lens into the block, and the inner piece inside the lens, and gave it a few taps.

And that's about it. Its not perfect, but it will do.

So I did shoot few test shoots with this lens, and I really enjoyed it, It's a bit on the long side as I said, but it was quite easy to get sharp images even at F2 and the colors and total feel from the lens came out very nice.

(Sony NEX3 - Leica Summicron 9cm f2 @ f2)

Read More

Nikon AF-S DX 18-300mm

Nikon AF-S DX Nikkor 18-300mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR

Problem: Jammed Zoom

Thats a long name for a lens, but its also a long lens, so I guess it makes sense. The 18-300 is the new (2014) ultra-zoom lens from Nikon. As always there is a lot of data and reviews simply but googling the name, so I'll get to the fun part.

I've got this copy in a very nice condition, almost mint, with original box and all paperwork, but - the zoom ring is stuck at about 50 to 100 mm, it works there, but no more and no less.

I hate zoom lenses. I hate modern autofocus lenses. The 18-300 is both, its the state of the art modern engineering, and as you know (or should know) modern engineering is great, but it makes hell for the amateur repairman.

Actually this fix was fairly easy, as you will see most of the dissemble I've made was not necessary, but I'll walk you through it any way.

I've started with removing the mount. First you need to get all 5 screws that are on the side, 3 for the plastic cover and 2 for the connections module.

Next remove the 4 screws holding the mount. Now you can remove the mount, note that the aperture lever is connected, basically its a slotted strip so you can just carefully take it out, just make sure you set the zoom to about 150 mm or anything else mid range.

Under the mount there are the spacer rings, make sure you take them out and note their order.

Now the cover with all switches can simply be pulled off. Be Careful. There is a small ribbon cable going from the switches to the board, you should take it out of the connector on the board.

Next you can take out the focusing ring. It isn't held by anything, but you do need to play a bit with it go get it over the gears and boards.

This is as far as I wen't from this side, feeling a bit stuck I started playing with the zoom and tried to figure out what the hell is wrong. During this I felt something thought the rubber grip on the zoom ring. So we move on and remove the grip, its just a rubber whole ring, so use a flat screwdriver and get under it, and simply pull it off.

Now you see the two parts of the zoom ring and they are held with a tape, There are also few screws sticking in it. Looking around I found the problem of the lens:

A screw (from one of the guides) was bent or something but it didn't glide in the guide as it should, and this is what jammed the zoom. Took the screw out:

As you see it was in good shape. I don't know how it got loos this way. Any way, screwed the screw back in into the guide thought the hole in the lens ring, and put every thing back together. As you might guess, all the initial disassembly of the mount and back part was actually not necessary.

And this is the final think on my old D80 with the zoom at 18mm:

By the way, the VR on this lens is quite impressive, I was able to get very good results at 50 mm with exposure time of 1/5 sec (I'm pretty steady shooter, yet this is very impressive). I've had this lens on my D80 for few days and I quite enjoyed it, I'm not a pixel picker, so I haven't really tested the sharpness of the eye lashes on my portraits, but I've enjoyed shooting with it, and was pleased with the results (or maybe its the Nikon saturated colors I'm not used to?!)

Read More