observation on camera reliability

[RalphLambrecht]

I am in the fortune position to own dozens of cameras. Many are mechanical ,some are electronic, some only a few years old, Some are many decades old(my oldest will be 100 next year), some frequently used, others I've been sitting on the shelf for years.
I made a few interesting observations I like to share. Keep in mind that YMMV.
1. Electronic cameras are not less reliable than mechanical cameras. This is especially true for shelf queens.
2. Reliability as little to do with a country of manufacture.
3. es, mechanical cameras can be serviced for a long time but it seems they also need to be serviced more frequently.
What is your experience?

 

[Don_ih]

I would agree but say that the simplest devices are going to be inherently more reliable than the more complex ones. simply because you can tell immediately if it is or is not working. So, the simplest device would be a pinhole camera. Next up would be a shuttered box camera. The more things that can go wrong will go wrong as time passes. And while electronic cameras at present may be extremely reliable, they suffer from having too many inscrutable components that may at any time (and will eventually) fail. This not only includes things like capacitors and transistors but dedicated ribbon cables and circuit boards that would be almost impossible to economically replace without getting a donor. Many fully mechanical cameras can be brought to operation by cleaning - especially the more simple of them.
As for country of manufacture, I think a lot of people would say that Soviet-made cameras are generally the least reliable. All of my Russian cameras mostly work, though - and could probably easily be made fully functional.

 

[Raghu Kuvempunagar]

In my experience 35mm electronic cameras especially the point and shoot varieties have gone bad in greater number than other cameras. But then I didn't buy any of them new though they were working fine when I bought them.

 

[Chan Tran]

I am in the fortune position to own dozens of cameras. Many are mechanical ,some are electronic, some only a few years old, Some are many decades old(my oldest will be 100 next year), some frequently used, others I've been sitting on the shelf for years.
I made a few interesting observations I like to share. Keep in mind that YMMV.
1. Electronic cameras are not less reliable than mechanical cameras. This is especially true for shelf queens.
2. Reliability as little to do with a country of manufacture.
3. es, mechanical cameras can be serviced for a long time but it seems they also need to be serviced more frequently.
What is your experience?

I agree with all your points.

 

[Deleted member 88956]

I will only add that reliability is not so much a function of how it was made, but far more how it was used. It applies to everything, aside from clearly cheap and not meant to last products, photographic or otherwise. While manufacture/design is very important to postpone failure due to abuse, nothing is bonehead proof. For some reason in some 150 cameras I have purchased, and still own, some beyond 60 years old came in perfect working order, some were apparently just "tested" for what it would take to break them.

But I agree with mostly everything @RalphLambrecht stated. Electronics is the only thing that can make a camera nearly worthless when it fails. For pure mechanical one, there is always going to be a chance to get it righted again. As 3D printing continues to get cheaper and more precise, parts for oldies are not far from being available on demand again. Market will decide if that will have become cheap enough to be accessible to most of us.

 

[Photomultiplier]

Maybe one should discern between reliability and longevity.

During the projected life span of a camera (lets say 10years) i think the electronic ones will be the winner. There is often not that much intricate mechanical stuff that can go wrong. Of course, there are motors, gears, levers etc but the sequence and timing is largely
controlled by microcontroller and not by small moving parts that slow down when lubricant gets old/cold like in an leaf shutter. Also they sometimes use better materials because they are newer. I would bet that the latest leaf shutter blades are far more durable than the ones from the
60s.

But when long term maintenance/preservation comes into play, the mechanical ones could be easier to handle.
A lot of electronic faults can be repaired easily, even if the exact same spare part is not available, one can use functional equivalents. (Diodes, Transistors, plain contact problems, cracked solder joints etc). But it takes specialists to find those faults, the layman usually
wreaks more havoc during repair attempts in electronics than the fault itself

The real showstopper are custom programmed or custom made ICs which are unobtainium
and it would require a sometimes prohibitively huge amount of reverse engineering to duplicate the functionality.

I would feel confident for example to design a replacement PCB board for a Hasselblad 203FE which largely emulates the original behavior. There is not that much stuff involved. Basically light metering, a bit of display controlling (that would most reverse engineering),
some buttons and communication with the lenses (also reverse engineering with a functioning body/lens) and state machine programming. The shutter itself is just 2 small solenoids for curtain 1 and 2 as far as i can tell.
BUT: Nikon F6 replacement electronics? I would never even try that. Far too much peripherals (AF/exposure) to talk with, when some of those are damaged it cannot even be attempted.

There is some technology level up to which one can fully understand all the interrelations between the components.

Mechanical "unreliabilty" very often stems from neglect, lack of service, old lubricants, dirt etc. When a camera is 50 years old, it seems that it has to be stripped down far more to clean out each and everything than normally done by service technicians.
Nice example: Everyone knows about the mirror dampening foam strip against which the mirror slaps. But e.g. in Hasselblads (at least without the GMS) there are 3 foam cushions beneath the mirror. If they deteriorate after some decades, the mirror wont be held properly in place anymore and
random focusing issues arise. So after a long camera life, it starts to be more of an restoration than just service/repair.
Dirt and old grease is a good lapping compound, often to be seen in old pendulum clocks that never got serviced. Some day, they stop. People increase the weight and they run again. Then they stop completely and they go to the clockmaker and say: The clock stopped working, but there
cannot be that much wrong, it worked flawlessly for 60 years! End of the story: Pivots are worn out, bearings are worn out and often worked out to some oblong shape, gear teeth are worn... Totally trashed and it needs a lot of work to get it back to life.
If the clock would have been at the clockmakers for servicing every 5-10 years, the wear would be far less and it could continue its service life for a long time.
Same with cameras.

The good thing with purely mechanical cameras is that they usually consist of only metal and that should be very stable in the long term but they have to be properly CLAd more regularly.
What i hate most about modern cameras is that stupid rubber material that gets sticky and deteriorates. I'd rather have plain metal, even if its not that comfortable.

Regarding 3D Print: Proper machine tools are alien to many people and then 3D printing is brought into the field as solution because its a new trendy technique that is accessible to a broad audience. But they overlook the fact that many camera parts have extremely tight
tolerances and surface roughness to meet and i doubt that it could be achieved by 3D printing even in the mid-term and with professional machines. If someone has more information about what is possible regarding finish and tolerances today, i would appreciate it.

A lot of stuff could be printed even now, for sure. (Cranks, knobs, battery doors, maybe even sprocket wheels) but i just dont see it for those precision machined parts that have to be made to watchmakers tolerances or that need bearing surfaces (need to be reamed).
Also the material has to be suitable for printing.

What also worries me are springs, but even for those there would be solutions to make them. But it needs specialist knowledge and equipment at a company specializing on springs.

@RalphLambrecht: Regarding point 2: I have a Pentax Spotmatic F that sat in the cupboard for nearly 20 years without being used. After that i got it in 2007 and used it for several years. Up to this day, there are no hiccups, the times are spot on, the diaphragm moves quick.
So the japanese seem to know how to lubricate (or rather NOT lubricate, as i suspect that they are using material pairings that dont need it) a camera while european cameras cause far more trouble. One would think that european cameras should be also that reliable, but
if a Hasselblad sits unused for that long, it needs a full overhaul for sure.

 

[MattKing]

Thread Moved

 

[Wallendo]

My experience is that older mechanical cameras and the most recent electronic cameras are most reliable. The early, new technology, electronic cameras tends to have the most problems.

 

[BrianShaw]

Dependability, some might argue, is the more crucial measure. Dependability is the sum of reliability plus maintainability.

 

[Photomultiplier]

I 100% agree with that

 

[AgX]

But I agree with mostly everything @RalphLambrecht stated. Electronics is the only thing that can make a camera nearly worthless when it fails. For pure mechanical one, there is always going to be a chance to get it righted again. As 3D printing continues to get cheaper and more precise, parts for oldies are not far from being available on demand again.

I would not get that far. Cameras with generic electronic parts can be repaired as mechanical ones. The problems starts when proprietary ICs and LCD displays are used. Circuit foils and electromechanical parts can be an issue too.

 

[Deleted member 88956]

I would not get that far. Cameras with generic electronic parts can be repaired as mechanical ones. The problems starts when proprietary ICs and LCD displays are used. Circuit foils and electromechanical parts can be an issue too.

That is where I was actually going. Lots of cameras with LCD gone bad were put to shame of uselessness. Canon T90, one of the otherwise great cameras, comes to mind.

 

[snusmumriken]

In the comic classic 'Asterix in Britain' there's an exchange that goes something like this:

Asterix: Is that a tweed jacket? I'm told they last for ages.
Brit: I wouldn't know, I've only had it 20 years.​

I am that Brit w.r.t cameras. For the last 25 years I have used a Rollei35 and a Leica M6. Both were second-hand (at least) when I got them and both are still working fine. So I can't comment on anything more modern.

 

[faberryman]

I haven't owned a lot of cameras over the past 50 years, so my experience is anecdotal:

1. Every once in a while you need to have a camera fixed.
2. Every once in a while you need to throw a camera away.
3. Every once in a while you need to send a camera in for a CLA.

The last point is particularly important if you know your camera repair guy is getting ready to retire (or worse). I see a future where a lot of cameras are broken and no one is alive who can fix them. It won't be a problem for me because I am as old as the camera repair guys, and we'll all be gone around the same time. You younger fellows might want to pick up a few spares and have them serviced while you still can. The objective is to have a working camera as long as film is available.

 

[Jim Jones]

I've found Leica to be more durable and reliable than any of the many other brands used over 7+ decades. Nikon products have usually been good, although a FM-10 and a Nikkorex were exceptions. In contrast, my Chinese Seagull TLR bought new NEVER worked! China apparently makes good products when necessary, and makes junk for buyers who shop for price, not quality.

 

[flavio81]

1. Electronic cameras are not less reliable than mechanical cameras. This is especially true for shelf queens.

Shhh... hush hush and put your flame suit on. They will kill you.

You are correct, completely correct. Except for electronic cameras with known fragile electronics like the early ones -- Pentax Electro-Spotmatic, or even things like the Nikon EM... a nice camera but the electronics seems to be not so reliable. At least in my city, which is extremely humid.

I believe this is perception spread by really old or lazy camera techs that don't want to learn or bother with electronics. The ironic thing is that mostly the problems in "electronic" cameras are of an ELECTRIC nature, i.e. corroded contacts...

 

[AgX]

By far the dominant defect with anything electrical at ólder cameras or with flashes are leaked batteries, resulting in corrosion.

However this changed whith cameras that took Lithium batteries. So far I did not came across any leakage there.

 

[Don_ih]

The current problem with electronic camera repair is that it is cheaper to buy a new one than get the broken one repaired - or it's cheaper to use one broken one to fix another than to fix both. The limited numbers of these cameras are getting eaten by repair.

 

[AgX]

Which brings me to my rule-of-three concerning analog cameras...

one for use - one as an immediate substitute - one for parts

 

[wiltw]

I will only add that reliability is not so much a function of how it was made, but far more how it was used. It applies to everything, aside from clearly cheap and not meant to last products, photographic or otherwise. While manufacture/design is very important to postpone failure due to abuse, nothing is bonehead proof. For some reason in some 150 cameras I have purchased, and still own, some beyond 60 years old came in perfect working order, some were apparently just "tested" for what it would take to break them.

But I agree with mostly everything @RalphLambrecht stated. Electronics is the only thing that can make a camera nearly worthless when it fails. For pure mechanical one, there is always going to be a chance to get it righted again. As 3D printing continues to get cheaper and more precise, parts for oldies are not far from being available on demand again. Market will decide if that will have become cheap enough to be accessible to most of us.

We should not forget that 'mechanical' cameras often are reliant upon electronics for key functions...like shutter timing, or even shutter closure. And then there are all the status displays in the many SLRs starting around the late 1970s.

 

[flavio81]

I would agree but say that the simplest devices are going to be inherently more reliable than the more complex ones.

This is not correct. Many cameras have "simple" mechanisms because of cost-cutting concerns, and they will not necessarily be more reliable. Many times you can make a more reliable mechanism by ADDING more parts such as ball bearing races on rotating axis, etc. A camera like a Canon F-1 has many many more parts than a machine like the Nikon EM, the F-1 is much more reliable not just because of better materials, but also because it has more mechanical components like bushings and bearings to reduce friction and thus wear and thus add reliablitty.

A camera like the Exa has a shutter that is extremely simple in parts, yet it isn't the ultimate reliable machine and the precision of speeds is questionable due to the simplicity of the mechanism itself.

simply because you can tell immediately if it is or is not working.

No, this only tells you the camera is easy to diagnose - it has nothing to do with reliablity. Again, Exa.

And while electronic cameras at present may be extremely reliable, they suffer from having too many inscrutable components that may at any time (and will eventually) fail.

Electronic components in most cameras are very very reliable. It's the electric parts that require cleaning or resoldering. Just as mechanical parts require cleaning and relubing.

This not only includes things like capacitors and transistors but dedicated ribbon cables and circuit boards that would be almost impossible to economically replace without getting a donor.

Many fully mechanical cameras can be brought to operation by cleaning - especially the more simple of them.

Yet the big elephant in the room is that mechanical components can fail with no replacement available. You would need to have a shop machine the part, and some times the shop can't do it with a material, precision and quality of finish that would make for a reliable replacement. This was under discussion lately on a camera repairmen forum.

Broken pits in ribbons -- which often are caused by a bad technician, can be overcome by jumping with wires.

 

[flavio81]

IElectronics is the only thing that can make a camera nearly worthless when it fails. For pure mechanical one, there is always going to be a chance to get it righted again. As 3D printing continues to get cheaper and more precise, parts for oldies are not far from being available on demand again.

Disagree.

When a mechanical piece like a gear or special cam breaks, it makes it worthless too. And then, what is your chance to replace it without a spare camera? Better than the same chance if it's an electronic part? I don't think so.

You seem to think 3D printing is some magical thing. It isn't. You can't replace a precision cam or gear on a camera with a 3d printed piece made by the FDM process. Unless it's a big piece that doesn't matter if it's fragile. SLA (stereolithography) can make pieces of better precision but not rigid enough. You need a machine shop with a lathe. And then the machine shop not necessarily will be able to make a piece with a reliable, strong enough alloy.

If you're taking the time and expense of making a machine shop make a custom piece, then surely by the same time/effort i can get an electronic wizard replace even a complete IC by another custom IC made by PLA (programmable logic arrays), microcontrollers, or a combination of them plus analog circuits.

 

[flavio81]

The real showstopper are custom programmed or custom made ICs which are unobtainium
and it would require a sometimes prohibitively huge amount of reverse engineering to duplicate the functionality.

In my own experience (as a camera repairman), for cameras of known reliable electronics (like an AE-1P) it's very rare to see an IC fail. To fail it needs to receive a strong electrical discharge from the outside or another insult like overvoltage, wrong polarity, etc. When they do fail on their own, it's usually due to bad manufacturing quality (i.e. substrate defects) but this is rare in a camera. When I see IC fails are on applications where they're subjected to big current and heat: power supplies, power amplifiers, etc. Outside of a camera.

On another camera forum a long-time repairman commented that he's serviced many, many Canon New F-1 cameras (a fully electronic camera) yet has only had the need to replace the electronics board once. And then it doesn't mean any particular IC has failed.

 

[Photomultiplier]

@flavio81: I forgot to mention that my statement was not about how often such IC faults occour. Just that it is one of the hardest to find a solution for without donor parts. Your experience regarding how often ICs fail roughly matches yours. In Japanese Hifi equipment i never had a failed IC. In high end electronic test equipment
(HP and Tektronix) it was mostly bad contacts, dry or shorted electrolytic and tantalum capacitors or mechanical issues. Semiconductor failures were primarly parts with high thermal and/or electrical stress, like power supplies and the like. Of course there were some low power signal electronics with faults, but one has to consider that
a typical piece of test equipment from the 70s..90s can contain several hundred electronic components or even more. Combined with high power consumption and heat, the stress on those parts is much higher than in cameras.

I personally would prefer an electromagnetic leaf shutter like in the Hasselblad HC lenses over a fully mechanical one any time. As much as i like mechanical engineering and clock/watchmaking, but dependability-wise i think the less small moving parts the better.

 

[Don_ih]

Many cameras have "simple" mechanisms because of cost-cutting concerns,

I didn't say simple mechanisms in a device - I said simple device - like a pinhole camera or a box camera with the most basic shutter you can imagine. Adding "mechanisms" is itself complication. Any addition of mechanisms increases the possibility of failure.

A gear or special cam can be made by someone with a hunk of brass and a file. Try making a transistor that way. The mechanical components will always be possible to replicate using hand tools and skill.

While it is rare for a single electrical component to fail, it is not rare for a camera containing them to be thrown in the trash as soon as it stops working.