I.S. - durability?

Hi everyone, a recent post has got me wondering about my IS lenses.

Has anyone here had their IS break? What are some things I shouldn't

do when IS is on?

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Would IS be messed up(broken?) if I had IS on and quickly changed

framing by swinging the camera body around while IS is active?

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Thanks,

<br>-Dan

I've owned an EF 28-135 3.5-5.6 IS USM since 1999 and have carried it around the world several times, dropped it twice and taken thousands of pictures with it. I rarely turn IS off and it has been utterly reliable.

I have been using for just over a year and its been good so far. Only some grinding noise when I move the lens after AF, this however does not affect the outcome of the pictures. Just a plan annoying sound.

The IS unit on my 300 /4 L IS malfunctioned after 6 years of regular use. The IS worked for a few seconds, where after it stopped working, disabling all other functions of the lens like AF, and the aperture display on the camera disappeared, showing only zeros. Only dismounting and mounting the lens revived the lens and camera again. Canon South Africa replace the whole IS unit for approximately 330$. I am currently awaiting the return of the lens.

I've had a 100-400 L IS for a few years and done this on many occasions with no ill effects as far as I can tell. I generally try to avoid this, but I usually can't wait for IS to disengage before changing the framing of my shot.

A pro photographer I met on vacation last summer loved IS but hated the reliability "it sucks". Well I had to take that comment with a grain of salt or two, his camera's and lenses were beat to sh*t. I am suprised any of his canon gear was still running at all.

 

Gerry

I've had a 75-300 IS for about 4 years now with no problems at all,

 

a 28-135 IS for about 3 years that recently developed a case of the 'jitters' (image will sporadically 'jitter' or 'vibrate'),

 

(for both of the above lenses the IS is, for all practical purposes, on all the time)

 

and a 70-200 2.8 IS that has never had a problem since the day I got it (of course I only got that lens today so this means nothing).

Dan:

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I have used 3 IS lenses for several years. Two have never caused any problems or broken down. The IS in the third lens quit working a few months after I purchased it. Everything else on the lens (AF etc) still worked ok. Canon fixed the lens under warranty. It has worked fine ever since.

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I use my gear a lot, so having IS quit in one lens does not seem like a big reliability problem to me. The way I figure it, between all three lenses I have had over 12 years of IS usage with only one break down

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Jim

I have a 28-135IS where the IS quit after 14 months: The only �panning� I was doing was �focus, exposure lock, recompose, shoot�. I normally AF with the center sensor (ElanII) and move the target to a �third� of the frame. IS servos were replaced for $250 (CAN).

 

The good thing is Canon Canada cleaned all the dust inside the lens for free!

 

Good luck

 

JB

My shooting buddy has been using his 75-300IS since 1995 or 1996 when it first came out. The IS died on him last year and he had to get the whole IS mechanism replaced at cost. Of course it will wear out in time.