Long story short I am a water photog on the North Shore. Hit the reef yesterday, not too hard I am okay, but the port got a dent in it and let water in. A decent amount of salt water got in there, prob like 8oz. D300 is dunzo. 10.5 fisheye I am hoping can be recovered. When I got home I submerged it again in distilled water to try and get the salt out. Now it is just drying. I should prob get it cleaned asap. Is this something I could do myself or do I need to send it somewhere? Anything else I should know?
Daniel that sucks man!!! For what that 10.5 sells for used, and what the repair bill will prob be, i'd buy another...camera, prob same thing... :-/...insurance is your best friend....maybe distilled water and a bag of rice...do that 3 times, over like 3 weeks...and cross your fingers :-/
I would say that's too late... saltwater, dang and it's not just saltwater, it would have traces of micro silica in there too and would make it worse... For example, my manfrotto tripod gets soaked in saltwater occasionally and on rare occasions, submerged, I would dissamble the whole unit, submerge it in fresh water and re-lubricate it with beeswax. The quickness of corrosion is so quick with saltwater.
I'd probably be tempted to buy another one and then take this one apart myself. I mean, for the price that I see copies going for on eBay, I'd imagine the repair bill will be more than half the cost of a new lens.
should i try cleaning it myself if the cost of a cleaning is going to be that much? is it hard to find local places that can do this type of work? I dont think its rocket science to take apart a lens and clean it. I live on Oahu if anyone knows anybody.
dpg109 wrote:
should i try cleaning it myself if the cost of a cleaning is going to be that much? is it hard to find local places that can do this type of work? I dont think its rocket science to take apart a lens and clean it. I live on Oahu if anyone knows anybody.
Cleaning the elements isn't bad. Cleaning the aperture assembly is a PIA, but with patience it can be done.
But if the motor or electronics are gone, they're gone. In most Nikon lenses replacing the motor or circuitry requires factory software for recalibration. Then there's also the GMR unit - that stops working if you touch it with a finger, so if saltwater got in there, it's toast. Another item that requires the factory to recalibrate.
Oops - never mind. The 10.5 fisheye doesn't have the motor issue - I forgot. You should be able to get it back together working OK.
ok I think I am going to let it sit in distilled water for like a week straight replacing the water every day. Hopefully I will have a good idea of what to do by then. Seems like I can forestall the lens being ruined if I do this (unless the salt water has already corroded to much of the glass/mechanics).
Do the distilled water for a week like you said, then leave it in a bag of rice for another week...if it comes back from the dead, i'll be insanely impressed!!
same to me a few years ago, d200 and housing electronics were toast, the 10-17 dried out and talked to the camera but the glass elements were all covered in salt stains so not much use. insurance sorted it out for me.
i took the lens apart be couldn't split the inner group up so its a paper weight...
