Do you guys know if fungus or haze in Hasselblad 50mm 2.8 FE lens is fixable? Photos attached

It can probably be improved but might have done some damage to the coatings or glass.

Depends how extensive the problem is. Your photos indicate two apparent issues: the protective rear lens baffle (held on with three screws) seems either corroded or infested with mold (the white spots), and the inside surface of the next-to-rear element (Group 7) has haze or fungus.

 

The condition of the baffle worries me: for it to get that corroded or moldy usually means the lens was improperly stored for some time in a moist humid environment. If that is true, then it may not be prudent to have the lens cleaned: such poor storage can lead to later mold problems even after cleaning. You might be better off selling it as mold damaged, and buying a replacement lens: fully servicing this lens runs approx $300 (US), while a good condition replacement 50mm f/2.8 FE typically sells for approx $999 (US).

 

But appearances can be deceptive. Zeiss has an extremely annoying tendency to use stunningly ill-conceived materials in their lens barrels (note the notoriously fragile focus trim rings of the CF lenses, and the self-destructing focus grips on the $5000 Otus lenses). The apparent "corrosion" of your lens' rear baffle could simply be age-related decomposition of poor-quality materials. Similarly, the clouded inner element could be haze or fungus: either is bad, but fungus is usually worse and tends to cause more damage as it re-occurs.

 

Try to have the lens evaluated by a proper camera technician, and see what they think. If the cloudiness is limited to just the one rear glass element shown in your photos, that element is easily accessed for cleaning (so a servicing could be cost-effective). OTOH, if you also have haze or fungus on glass elements in front of the diaphragm, cleaning service may be very expensive (or impossible) due to the complex floating element mechanics. A good honest repair tech would tell you whether repair or replacement is the better option. Some types of haze or fungus are easy to remove without damage to coatings, others etch into the glass surface and leave permanent marks.

 

Another option is to ignore the issue, continue to use the lens, and don't worry about it unless things get noticeably worse. I've had several Hasselblad Distagons (and a couple Sonnars) develop fogged or hazed elements, with little or minimal effect on performance. It bothered me not to have a "perfect" lens, so I eventually did replace them, but if I'm honest the haze didn't really have much impact. Fungus is more of a threat, and can contaminate your camera body or other lenses: if you or a tech determine the issue is organic fungus instead of inert haze, the lens absolutely should be cleaned or replaced ASAP.

Edited November 19, 2018 by orsetto

it doesnt look that bad in the pix. it wouldnt hurt to clean it as best as you can n hope for the best. worst case.. you have a nice soft focus glamor lens.

rear lens baffle

 

Yes, the lens itself looks pretty good and I wouldn't expect noticeable problems from that aside from some slight scattering.

 

The rest of the lens does look like 'heck'. I'd try wiping the metal with some kind of fungicide before it does spread any further.

If not 'disinfected' the fungus will only spread and get worse with time.

 

The only permanent fix is to strip the lens down to gain access to every mouldy surface, and to clean and treat those surfaces with a fungicide - e.g. a few percent sodium hypochlorite solution.

 

The misting is unlikely to go away on its own, and it will degrade contrast and certainly devalue the lens.

 

You could try exposing the lens to hard UV, which will kill or arrest the growth of the fungus. Exposure to strong sunlight will have a similar effect, but if you don't live in a sunny part of the world a UV lamp might be more achievable. UV or sunlight won't remove the existing mist or fungus 'spiderwebs' though.

With a bit of luck, the haze may be caused by only oily vapor and will clean off easy enough when the element/s can accessed for cleaning. This is what some of my lenses (not Hasselblad, I don't own any) had, with other lenses having removable fungus and a few with that fungus that etches the glass. Still other lenses have permanent haze caused by what seems to be deteriorating glue between two glass elements. Such is life when buying on-line

I would definitely send it in to Hasselblad or someone who has the proper tools to disassemble, clean, lube and re-assemble and then columate the lens to ensure proper functions. Since it's an F lens many Hasselblad repair shops do not service them. I would call first and make sure the the shop can do the work.

Haze tends to develop between element groups, typically the independent rear element and the rear group just in front of it. The most common fungus location is under the front element, or the surface of the element right behind it. In the majority of optical designs, these locations are reasonably accessible after removing the front or rear element. Most techs will clean these areas for a moderate fee.

 

If bad luck strikes, you find haze or fungus within a sealed element group. When that happens, we're pretty much on our own, as most professional technicians will refuse to disassemble optical groups (Hasselblad used to sell replacement groups, but that option might have vanished). We can dispose of the lens and take a huge financial hit, or we can get cute and try to clean it ourselves. I've DIY cleaned a number of 35mm, medium format and large format lenses, but only if the $ loss of my ruining it was worth the risk.

 

Standard, portrait and common tele lenses are much more amenable to DIY cleaning than most wide angles: the retrofocus wides made for most SLR systems are far more likely to have sealed groups and complex floating mechanicals. I've managed to disassemble the sealed groups in my 55mm Mamiya wides, but re-assembly is tricky, and those are TLR designs with no mechanics to speak of. Hasselblad wides are in a whole other league: if a professional can't/won't clean them, DIY isn't a fallback option- the lens is a goner.

 

The Zeiss 50mm f/2.8 FE is an unusual optical design for Hasselblad: it has only one sealed cemented group of two elements, located behind the separate rear element. The other 7 elements are individual, so in theory should be removable for cleaning (an inner barrel or baffle might still seal off one or more elements, the complex floating focus mechanism and funky FE diaphragm could seriously impede access from the front). The example that kicked off this thread seems to have fungus/haze on the surface of the group behind the rear element: simply unscrewing the rear element should provide sufficient access to clean that surface. Given the unfortunate appearance of the rear baffle, however, this lens may have additional problems in other less-accessible locations.

Edited November 20, 2018 by orsetto