Cleaning innards of Tamron 17mm lens

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My precious 17mm Tamron Adaptall (bought used most of a decade ago) has always had a visible "smudge" on one of its inner lens surfaces. I suppose this was from some previous owner who exposed it to the elements in some bad way. This lens only knows how to take great pictures, but I'd still like to have it looking like new one of these days. Where can I send it to be disassembled and cleaned?

-- Joseph N. Hall (joseph@5sigma.com), December 19, 2000

Answers

Any good camera shop should be able to help you. Where are you, that would help in recommending a shop?

Also, look closely at the smudge. Does it look hairy or have a filment like look? If you you have a patch of fungus that has probably eaten into the coating. If so, they can clean it, but the smudge will remain.

BTW figure on $80 - $200 to have the lens cleaned. Is it worth it?

-- Terry Carraway (TCarraway@compuserve.com), December 21, 2000.


When I had my Tamron SP 90 2.5 cleaned for fungus some years ago, I had it sent back to the factory, and it cost about $60, and they did an excellent job. I'd get in touch with Tamron to see if they will service it.

Recently I sent a Canon FD 400mm/4.5 S.S.C. to Professional Camera Repair in New York for a cleaning, and they charged $80, and did what seems to have been a competent job (the lens had an old fungus problem, so there was some coating damage, but it's still quite sharp--definitely worth the cost of the lens ($150) plus the cleaning).

In the past I sent Professional a Tokina 17mm lens for cleaning and it came back broken, and they didn't seem inclined to acknowledge responsibility. Lesson: Don't send them a 3rd Party lens, they won't take it seriously, but they are great for original Canon FD stuff.

-- David Goldfarb (dgoldfarb@barnard.edu), December 22, 2000.


David,

I have had problems with Professional Camera Repair. It seems as if their work is spotty. I have a Canon 35-105 f3.5 that was on an A-1 when they fell off a table. The mount separated from the lens body.

They repaired it for something like $30. But a couple of months later, the mount was loose again. I took it to Strauss in Washington, DC and they charged a bit more to fix it, but 2 years later it is going strong and the shots are VERY good.

-- Terry Carraway (TCarraway@compuserve.com), December 23, 2000.


Thanks, Terry. I've been looking for an alternative for a while. They're just not what they used to be, and the guy who is usually out front is somewhat unpleasant to deal with.

-- David Goldfarb (dgoldfarb@barnard.edu), December 24, 2000.

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