D2h meter after repair

It was mentioned at the end of another thread but I'd like to carry it

here.

 

I just bought a used D2h a few weeks ago. I e-mailed Nikon and the

camera, in the 210xxx range has never had Nikon service of any kind.

 

I'm strongly considering sending it off and requesting they do the

meter repair that they do when the meter does s**t the bed. I don't

expect it to be free, I'll just pay.

 

What do I ask for, as if they don't already know? It has some kind of

repair code right?

 

Now for those who have had the repair done is the meter performance or

any performance better than before the repair?

 

Thanks

I'd advise against irritating Nikon service with unnecessary "repair work".

Unnessecary or premptive? I prefer the latter. The camera does seem to overexpose in bright sun that much is for sure. It just hasn't failed completely yet.

 

I just wonder if there is any real improvement in camera performance after the repair. Some claim so.

Has Nikon formally acknowledged that issue with that serial number range? If so, I don't think they would be irritated, especially if you intend to pay. I guess it depends on whether they see the issue as an inevitability, or just something that happens occasionaly to D2Hs in that serial number range. There are certain cases where they've repaired out-of-warranty stuff for free (like the oily 35mm diaphragm blades). If they haven't acknowledged it formally, I guess there's no harm in sending it in based on your overexposure complaint, if you can stand the down time. :)

Neil,

I advise you to be very patient and prepared to deal with the Nikon people I have had to send in 3 cameras for repair in less than 18 months and the last one I got was sent back as fixed but was still not working. Send it in and pray that you issue is resolved. My experience was with 2 D70's and one D2H.

Had one of mine repaired last week. Now the camera appears to metre even better than before.

 

The problem is with the circut board behind the prism, the code is VBA10301-1c998-574 Pnetaprism FPC it took 12 warranty 1/4 hours to do the repair.

 

I hope this helps, apparently the part number above is the one used in the D2Hs and it's different from the older D2H.

 

These are Australian codes so they may not be the same if you are o/seas. Nikon did this for me as warranty even though the camera was out of date. I spend a lot of money with them so that may have made a difference I don't know. I read countless threads on the topic and have a 67 page report on the problem prepared from all the web stuff I could find but luckily never had to use it.

 

Apparently it doesn't happen to all of them but it sure does happen to a lot of them.

 

From my research the repair is around $350 USD or under $1000 AUD. My advice is to wait until you need it done and then beg for warranty.

Maybe you are one of the lucky ones that never needs it replaced?

 

Temperature was mentioned numerous times as the reason for failure but it's very unsubstantiated like most stuff off the web.

 

Good luck with it, they are a great camera for sports (what i do) and are worth getting repaired as apparently it fixes the problem for good.

 

I'll tell you it's not good when it happens, The thing won't metre at all and some times won't even focus (thats what happend to mine). Mine let go litterally a few minutes before a soccer grand final I was about to shoot and I'd just lent out my two back up to an employee about half an hour before that.

 

I shot in manual mode guessed exposure using histogram and manual focused. To make matters worse in the panic I dropped and lost my cf wallet with 4 X 512 cards leaving me with one 256 card in the camera so shooting raw + jpg was out of the question. All in all I aged a few years but got the stuff I needed. I WILL NEVER GO WITHOUT A BACK UP AGAIN!

 

Good Luck

Mark

I wrote several posts about the older D2h having this problem with the meter. Go to www.nikonians.com and look for old posts on the D2h forum. There were over 40 members there who had the same dead meter problem and Nikon return repair tickets showed a pc board was replaced. One of the members assembled a list of the groups failed camera bodies in an effort to isolated a pattern of affected serial numbers. This problem led to later serial number units shipping with stickers that indicated upgraded components. This was later followed by the release of the D2hs, which many including myself believe was a bug fix model since it still had only a 4MP sensor.

 

A lot of those who were out of warrantee had to pay hundreds for repair since Nikon didn't take responsibility for anything that they knew was wrong with the unit. But, the fire sale price reduction indicated to me that something was wrong with the product. I guess if you purchased the bargain priced D2h you can't complain since you saved more than the repairs will ever cost you to get the unit upgraded.

My d2h is 202xxxx series and yes... the meter was not working hardly at all -- was off by about 2 1/3 stops too dark.

 

For the past three months I've been shooting completely manually with it on exposure, using histograms and the highlight flashes (zebra) to double check.

 

In addition, just today, I mounted a Nikon 300 2.8 AFS on it and the camera just STOPPED working. I switched batteries, switched lenses, switched CF cards... nothing seems to wake the camera back up -- it acts as if I have no power, so I don't get any LCD displays or anything at all to light up when I turn it on.