slin100 wrote:
Wouldn't the date code be useful for determining the age of a lens that has changed hands one or more times?
Darn right it would be it can tell you the year and month it was made. Not long ago I was looking at a lens online and the guy said the lens wasn't that old like new and I asked for the date code and it was very old. Bad thing he was asking top dollar for it
Actually I was going to ask this question too as mine didn't come with date code either :S
I bought mine from DigitalRev just over a month ago and only realized recently.
If I look really hard (it could just be me) but it looks like there could be a sign of one but its very very very faint, and no way of making it out.
tanglefoot47 wrote:
SHE? boy you better hope the ladies here don't see this Don't they have men on the assembly line?
Most of the workers in Canon's optical assembly lines are women. I have heard men have more difficulty maintaining consistency with high precision but repetitive tasks. Check out pictures of the Canon factory floor and you'll see very few men. Of course most of the designers are men.
Lars Johnsson wrote:
Yes of course the date cod have a lot of impact on the price of a used lens. When I'm selling my 85/1,2 lens. The price will not be the same with a date code from 1989 as a date code from 2006
I'm sure if you asked a dealer he wouldn't care, or even look at the date code, but would offer a price simply on the condition.
A private sale may be different because of all these people who hype the importance of date codes - a 1999 made lens isn't in any way going to be worse than a 2000 made lens, all other things (condition etc.) being equal.
I'm not bothered about what dates my lenses were made so long as they work as they should, my oldest lens is a 1987 50/1.8 - but I only know that because there was a thread about oldest EF lenses in regular use, which interested me (now that is a use for date codes), and yes, not only L lenses had date codes in the early days!
Thanks bobbyboy ...that's exactly what mine looks like!
Considering that the markings range from normal to "barely visible" to non-existant, maybe they're churning them out so fast that the branding stamp isn't working that well.
On another note, I'm quite impressed by the increased protection in packaging. Considering that this is (to my knowledge) a mechanically identical lens to its predecessor, maybe Canon figures the improved protection will result in more reliable final quality delivered to the customer?
PaulB wrote:
I'm sure if you asked a dealer he wouldn't care, or even look at the date code, but would offer a price simply on the condition.
A private sale may be different because of all these people who hype the importance of date codes - a 1999 made lens isn't in any way going to be worse than a 2000 made lens, all other things (condition etc.) being equal.
I'm not bothered about what dates my lenses were made so long as they work as they should, my oldest lens is a 1987 50/1.8 - but I only know that because there was a thread about oldest EF lenses in regular use, which interested me (now that is a use for date codes), and yes, not only L lenses had date codes in the early days! ...Show more →
I've typically shied away from anything older than 10 years, even if it looked cosmetically perfect, simply because I'm afraid of fungus and lubricant leak on the leafs. Many of my FD lenses ended up being useless at 20 years of age or more.
Anybody care to comment at what age one can expect to see fungus or lubricant leak (presuming of course that the lens was stored under normal conditions). Do EF lenses, or lenses manufactured, say after 1990, exhibit any of these issues?
insomnia09 wrote:
The ones without the stamp will have a longer Serial Number. Canon has changed the identification.
So date codes ARE irrelevant to Canon then.
Serial numbers rule!
Date coding was introduced when Canon had two lens manufacturing plants and the first letter denoted which plant the lens came from.
F = the Fukishima Plant opened in 1970
U = the Utsunomiya Plant opened in 1977
The Fukishima plant didn't make any EF lenses - all these were coded U.
In 2007 Canon opened the Oita lens plant and this should use the code O if any L lenses have been made there.
Perhaps Oita is coming on line for L lenses and with the date codes coming round to the end of the sequence (year code Z) perhaps Canon decided that it was an outdated system and time to be changed.
PaulB wrote:
So date codes ARE irrelevant to Canon then.
Serial numbers rule!
Date coding was introduced when Canon had two lens manufacturing plants and the first letter denoted which plant the lens came from.
F = the Fukishima Plant opened in 1970
U = the Utsunomiya Plant opened in 1977
The Fukishima plant didn't make any EF lenses - all these were coded U.
In 2007 Canon opened the Oita lens plant and this should use the code O if any L lenses have been made there.
Perhaps Oita is coming on line for L lenses and with the date codes coming round to the end of the sequence (year code Z) perhaps Canon decided that it was an outdated system and time to be changed.
Date codes are not irrelevant to Canon. And it's not seriel numbers or date codes. All of the five Canon lenses that I have bought this year have date codes. And also the camera that I bought
Don't they have men on the assembly line? 
