Who has a vintage Nikon that needs a CLA but shoots with it anyway despite it needing an adjustment…?
Vintage Nikon that needs a CLA.
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How do you know that it needs a CLA? Are you shooting with a faulty camera? That doesn’t make sense considering the cost of film, etc.
OP
OP
I bought the camera from Japan with no service records and probably is ready for a CLA…!
What is not working and how do you know it is not working? With film cameras I've found that it is good to have a routine for testing, checking the light meter and shutter with actual results. I like to bulk rolling short rolls of black and white film with a small single tank.
Look at it this way. You buy a motor vehicle, possibly already used and with no history, then never in your ownership do you have it serviced or checked over, One day, at the most inconvenient moment it will fail. (That is one of God's unwritten rules!) Even the Nikon stalwart of old, the F2 needs looking at occasionally, seals deteriorate, meters drift away from bring accurate, shutter speeds do change, and dust will accumulate inside which will take the edge off it's performance. I would get it checked over by someone who knows what he is doing. You would not take a car like a Rolls Royce to a back street garage who only worked on virtual wrecks. For one thing they will not have any of the essential special tools.
Unless you can see a problem, hear a problem, or it creates a problem on your negatives I think the sensible action is 'if it ain't broke don't fix it'. At the very, very least use it until you identify the problem or all the problems because sending it off for a CLA is exactly that, clean, lube, adjust, it doesn't address any other problems that you might find annoying in the future.
But if it's an F or an F2 (it's a mystery what it is so far) you can take the head off and remove the screen to give it a good clean out. Apart from the mirror bumper foam and some small pieces around the head to stop dust getting in there isn't much foam that could need replacing, an F doesn't have any around the back and the F2 it's only there as a dust seal. Japan is a humid country so be diligent and look for fungus. But these are all things you can check yourself. A good clean with some IPA always makes a second hand camera feel your own.
all the time. if it ain't broke...
I am not saying it should be done on a regular basis, but for an instrument like a camera with an unknown history it will be diligent to have it looked at. You then know what it is and have a baseline what is correct so you can look forward to a good few yeas use before anything goes wrong. line i
But what is there to do if everything works just fine? Sure, one could just pull a Jiffy Lube on every camera he owns and do pre-dated CLA's no matter how it behaves, how much it was used, and how long it typically lasts without any CLA. And CLA is no guarantee that one will not poop out shortly into post CLA use.
The slow speeds (1/4 to 1 sec) on one of my plain prism Nikon F's are almost 50% slow. I know for a fact that it has not been serviced in at least 20 years except for the two little strips of foam that I replace on general principle every 5 years or so. It's easy enough for me to mentally subtract half a stop when I set the aperture for these shutter speeds.
What kind of shutter? Cloth horizontal shutters need constant attention, whereas vertical metal shutters can just run until they need to be replaced.
Same as a vacuum tube TV from 1972, it needs constant tweaking for a good picture. Whereas a 2022 vintage OLED TV can just be replaced when it stops working.
Same as a vacuum tube TV from 1972, it needs constant tweaking for a good picture. Whereas a 2022 vintage OLED TV can just be replaced when it stops working.
A £250 CLA is a pretty radical suggestion for spending somebody else's money given there's nothing to say there's anything wrong with it yet. Shooting some film would help though. I think perhaps the OP is unfamiliar with a film camera and maybe even metering for film. If there is something wrong with the camera it should be sent back because a CLA on top of the price paid would make it a very expensive Nikon F2 if the sale price was in the average region. Keep in mind you can buy a Nikon F2 for £250 in the UK and a camera dealer would add a six month warranty.
When a working PJ I had my Nikon CLA once a year, in my mind it was the lube that was important, may have become less important with the newer all electronic shutter of the F3P. At this point I would not go out of my way as it is not only the cost of the service but the cost and and hassle of shipping. My local camera repair shops only works a few brands and models of film cameras and will not work on any if the shutter speed is off by more than a stop or so. So find a shop that will work on your Nikon, shipping it and waiting for it, depending on the backlog.
like all my nikon cameras. just cross fingers.
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Don't fix what ain't broke. I got my F3HP from Japan and it works great. Try it out and see how it goes.
Oh and I totally understand your desire to get it 100%. I have several old Nikon's that I'm sure would benefit from a CLA, however, I'm not going to mess with that as they all seem to function fine and have produced excellent negatives. F3HP, FA, F4S all get used regularly which I think in a way helps them stay functional.
First if you have another meter or even another camera (even digital) that has good meter, compare your meter reading with that of the F2. I assume that you don't have a shutter tester so.. shooting the same scene with the same exposure settings but with different combination of aperture and shutter speed. See if you have the same exposure with the frames.
From the 50+ cameras, many meters, flashes and other accessories I have purchased on ebay I have about a 98% success rate without ever getting a cla.
Not bragging, maybe just lucky. I have even purchased a few that were untested but worked fine.
However, on my one and only trip to Vegas luck stayed home...
Not bragging, maybe just lucky. I have even purchased a few that were untested but worked fine.
However, on my one and only trip to Vegas luck stayed home...
OP
OP
I will get the next roll from the lab.
When I see the prints I’ll share the results…!
OP
OP
That's fine for a vertical running shutter but a F2 shutter runs horizontally (checked before I wrote this)
Or more likely the carbon track in the metering head! (Unless you are taking the mickey)
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