Anyone have an AF-I lens repaired lately?

Hello everyone,

I have a nikon 300mm f2.8 AF-I lens, that seems to be crapping out on me. It's Autofocus seems to be doing strange

things on me including losing interitently, the ability to auto focus. I can swtich from the Full A seeting, to thwe A/M

setting and it will work for a while, but then locks up on me again. The only way i can seem to free it up is by

changing the setting to M (manual on the lens), changing the focus manually, then switching back to A/M or A.

It seem to do this closer to infinity on the focus scale.

My question....Has anyone had one of these lenses repaired lately?

Iam aware that they have been out of production for some time now, and Nikon does not support them anylonger, so

parts are scarce. I'm hoping someone knows a reputable repair facility, that has parts? (whats the chances of that,

right?).

BTW, i've done all the usual steps, cleaning contacts etc. etc..and it occurs on both a D700, and a D300.

Thanks for any help i can get.

John

Yes, sound very similar to issues I had with mine last year.

I used Nikon Camera Repair

http://www.nikoncamerarepair.com/

Fast, great work, fair price, and when you call you actually can speak to the tech working on your gear!!! I was shocked

to get a real person and even calls to keep me up to date on the progress!

FYI, I was informed the 400 AF-I is getting hard to find parts for....but they made a ton more 300's so it seems to be

fixable.....

regards

Ray

John, something to try, first.

I had similar symptoms with my own 300mm AF-I on D2X a couple of years ago. I cleaned the contacts on both lens and camera with methanol (eclipse) and pec-pads wrapped around q-tips, and she's been fine ever since.

Good lock. Never give up on a 300mm AF-I. In my opinion, it was both the sharpest and nicest bokeh 300mm f2.8 that Nikon ever made (I compared it to the AF, AF-S, and AF-S II).

Thanks Guys,

Joe, i did try cleaning the contacts, but i used the electronic contact cleaner Deoxit. I 've read great things around here on P-Net about it. Used it on a q-tip, but still no luck.

I have a feeling it has something to do with the clutch mechanism inside the lens. In the A/M setting, i cannot manually overrde the auto focus. So i think there's some sort of lectronic clutch problem . anyway, i live this lens, focuses fast when working. I'm gonna send it out on Monday.

THanks again

Hopefully either Melville or APS (Nikon Camera Repair) can fix your problem. The AF-I was discontinued back in 1996 in favor of the AF-S version. Therefore, we are a bit over the 10-year threshold for parts. I have no idea whether those parts are shared with the more recent versions.

That is the main concern.

Yeah Shun...I called Melville and it didn't sound too promising. They only do repairs that they have parts for, which was very limited.

I'm hoping APS has more parts for it, as i'm gonna ship it out there on Monday, based on what Ray indicated to me. If not, i'm gonna be buying a another lens, which i really don't want to have to do.