Photo Tips San Diego Underwater Photographic Society
Photo Tips
San Diego Underwater Photographic Society
| Nikon 8008 / N90 - The Missing F-Stop Mystery by
Randy Morse
This months photo tip is more of a service notice for those who use 8008 or N90 camera bodies. I recently had an interesting problem with my N8008S and thought it would be worth passing it on. The best way to correct this problem would be to take your camera to a certified Nikon repair facility. That said, if you found yourself on a trip and encountered this problem and/or wanted to attempt your own repair the following worked fine for me. But you can't blame me if you screw up your camera. The Symptoms: The camera started displaying an incorrect f-stop from the one selected on the lens. After manually setting an f-stop of say f4.0, I noticed that the viewfinder and display panel still read f11. I then stopped the lens down to f22 and everything was fine. But after opening the lens back up to f2.8 the viewfinder and display read f16. After much frustration I discovered the problem. The Problem: The N8008 and N90 has a small black plastic tab along the top edge of the lens mount. The position of the tab tells the camera what f-stop has been selected on the lens. The black plastic tab mates with a slot on the f-stop ring of the lens. The tab is quite small, but can be seen between the camera and lens. With a lens mounted on the camera and looking down from above, you will see this tab rotate along with the lens f-stop ring as it is moved. The tab is part of a plastic ring that is spring loaded, which rotates beneath the silver metal lens |
mount. As the lens is being stopped down the tab is rotated
by the f-stop ring on the lens. As the lens aperture is opened up, the
spring is relied upon to rotate the tab back as the f-stop ring is moved.
Over time my camera had accumulated dust and grime under the lens mount
and the spring was no longer able to rotate the tab all the way back when
the lens f-stop ring was in the full open position, f2.8.
The Fix: I have only tried this on my N8008S, but it appears the N90 has the same design.
Preventative Maintenance: When doing the normal cleaning which I'm sure we are all doing, keep the area around the lens mount on the camera body clean. To do this, remove the lens and using a tissue and/or q-tips, clean the silver lens mount, especially along its outer edge. Your questions and comments are welcomed. Randy Morse |
