D700 aperture problem with Tamron 500mm Mirror

<p>I have a question and hope that anyone of you may find the cure to my problem.</p>

<p>I have a D700 and use some non-cpu MF lenses on it. One of them is my Tamron 500MM F8 Mirror lens. For some obscure reason the D700 chooses aperture stop F11 when I select the lens from the non-cpu menu. I have checked and checked again whether or not I have set up the lens correctly, and I can find no wrong settings.</p>

<p>Any ideas?</p>

<p>Thanks,<br />Arthur</p>

<p>Perhaps it is taking a reading based on the lens' actual transmission. When I had a 500mm mirror lens, I noticed often my meter indicated it was transmitting at f11 vs the stated f8...but the pictures came out fine. I've since read that often the f8 manufacturers' ratings on some of these lenses are wishful thinking at best.</p>

<p>Stephen's explanation sounds convincing...<br>

But this lens shows as f8 mounted on my D300?</p>

<p>Perhaps the lens is snagging the aperture ring a little bit and turning it one stop? Mount the lens and see if the aperture ring moves - even a tiny bit.</p>

<p>And you've tried entering a 500mm range lens from the non-CPU menu? I'm surprised it wouldn't think it is a Nikkor 500mm. I'm intrigued by how the camera knows what lens it is using.</p>

<p>@ Arthur: Weird. You programmed 500mm and f/8? How are the exposures? I have a Nikkor 500mm f/8 cat. It works correctly with my D700 and D200.</p>

<p>@Ian: Cat lenses don't have aperture rings.</p>

<p>Have you checked the adaptall interface? Some of them needed to be adjusted to the lens maximum aperture. Is yours properly aligned?</p>

<p>Thanks for the reply. I couldn't get back to you earlier, for photo.net gave me all sorts of can't load this page stuff last night.<br>

I'll give the adaptall interface another look and see if that's the cause of my problems. I will report my findings.<br>

Thanks again,</p>

<p>Arthur</p>

<p>A setting of F8 or f11 does not make any difference unless you measure the light using an external meter. Besides as far as I remember f8 is a bit optimistic for that lens anyway^^.</p>

 

<p>Do the pics look ok? If that is the case, who cares about f-stop-readings of a lens that does only have a single setting?</p>

<p>The pictures look ok-ish. It is very hard to find proper focus I discovered. It functioned flawlessly on my F100 though. I'll run some additional tests with it.<br>

And I don't care whether or not it is F8 or F11. The thing is, that I instruct my D700 to handle this lens as a F8 lens, and it refuses to do so. There is not electronic interaction that tells the D700 to set the aperture to any setting. That's why I question the D700.</p>

<p>Hi,<br>

I think Stephen and Ian hit the mark. I believe it's the lens that pushes the aperture connector on the camera - for lack of a better description - and that's what telling the camera to set a certain aperture opening. I put my 135mm 2,8 on and realised that I have to set the aperture manually on the lens. Hence the lens tell the camera what the aperture is. I believe that the adaptall system just isn't too precise to give a F8 reading.</p>

<p>The pictures however seem to come out just fine. No top quality, but that was to be expected anyway.</p>

<p>Conclusion, the D700 is fine, the lens causes this slight problem.</p>

<p>Many thanks for your thoughts. I wouldn't have figured this one out by myself!</p>