F100 mirror-jam

The mirrors in my F100 seem to have become unhinged or something...

the only thing I think that could have caused hte problem was that I

dropped my camerabag about 1-2' onto my driveway last night.<br>

<img src="http://www.john-castle.com/mirrorA.jpg"><br><img

src="http://www.john-castle.com/mirrorB.jpg"><br>

When you fire the shutter, the primary mirror returns all the way up

and and the secondary mirror moves up in synch with the primary

mirror. Then they fall back down to 20%return or whatever. I tried

to gently move either mirror with a qtip and neither budged,

excepting I could swing hte secondary mirror towards the primary

mirror about 30o, but it would then stop. The only shop that was

open when I could get to the problem said that they would charge $10

to ship it out to Nikon to get it diagnoised, and get it returned in

about three weeks. Not cool, photo editor for the annual at our

school and we got the fall-sports deadline coming up in the next two

weeks. Ugh. If anyone could provide some help, some key word to say

to the folk at Pro Photo Supply of Portland when I go tomorrow

morning, it would be much appriciated.

Key word is <u>backup</u>. That's what you should have. Don't know what happened but you sure did it. Perhaps Pro Photo Supply could rent you something to tide you over. By the way, you could just as well send it to Nikon Service/Torrence, CA yourself, but I guess $10 for them to do it isn't bad. On the other hand, if you send it yourself you eliminate the middle man and possible delay since Nikon will send an estimate that will have to be approved and returned if this is not warranty work. You also get to bitch directly to Nikon if they are slow and can track the progress on their website.

Or you could take it to Associated Camera, the authorized Nikon shop

in Portland, and get an estimate (if it's not in warranty) and a

turnaround time. They're at 3401 NE Sandy Blvd, 503-232-5625. I've

been very satisfied with them over the years; but YMMV: there are a

couple of negative experiences posted in the Photo.net feedback

section. Don't mess with the mirror assembly! It's quite possible to

throw the focus out of whack

meant to say Associated was the authorized nikon REPAIR shop in

Portland-they don't sell cameras............

A backup indeed sure would be nice, but I'm 17 and a wee bit strapped for cash, ie I can't go out and buy a manual body or get myself a used N90 to lug around.

 

I will stop at Assoc. on my expedition to Portland tommorow morning, and skip morning classes at school, oh horrah.

The jam might have nothing to do with the drop. Despite the tender loving care I lavished on the new equipment, the Mirror on my F100 occassionally remains stuck in the up position after a shit during the first 6 month after I bought it. Eventually I return the camera to Nikon for service, it came back with a thorough caliberation, several modules replaced, and the original problem fixed. Since that time I have been much less tender in my handling, including a few dead drops of the camera onto granite and concret, and no problem of any type have surfaced

<<remains stuck in the up position after a shit >>

 

Well, the F100 is not considered to be as well protected against the environment as, say, the F or F2 or F5. But still...

 

Oh, I see. The "I" and "O" keys are adjacent, probably a typo for "after a shot"...

I got the problem solved.

 

I took the advice of David and took it to Associated Camera Repair in NE Portland. The journey itself was an experience of its own for the suburban-teenager that I am. Anyways, I took it to them because they had a Nikon-certified tech for newer cameras. Over the phone they did say they normally sent out the newer (f80,f100,f5,d-series) bodies out to Nikon to get repaired, unless it was more of a mechanical problem, then they said they could usually fix it in-house.

 

I arrived at about 320PM told the lady at the desk what had happened and she took it back into the annals of the building and I sat down and started to read through a copy of PhotoMedia they had laying around. I had just barley got perhaps 10 spreads into the mag when the lady returned with the camera, fixed and for free. She said it was more than likely the fall, and it was a simple fix for any tech that has experience working with a modern Nikon mirror-assembly. She didn�t go into detail as to what was �wrong� but I didn�t really care. I wish I could tell the community what the specific fix was. I am going to be a fool and assume that something just came �out of hinge�. But if you ever have this problem, a tech that knows anything about the modern Nikon mirror-assembly will be able to fix the problem. And even if they charge you $50 an hour, it should only cost you then bucks.

Great! Nice to hear of a happy ending to a problem around here for a change.