Nikon D300 Issues

[ShunCheung]

It has been two weeks since this thread was started. Is there any update to this case?

[a.j._olmscheid]

I still have not received my camera back from Nikon yet. However, The photographer from

the MN House of Representatives got his back. Apparently they changed an aperture piece

where the lens connects to the body. This seems to have fixed the problem, of the black

frame and the false low battery. It could be because it was causing some kind of short in the

circuit, which then would shut off the camera (or give the false low battery icon). This

problem only happens when I put a larger or even maybe a heavier lens on the camera. My

camera is fine with the smaller lighter wide angle lens.

[tom_prebelich]

YES, there IS a problem!

 

I just posted this in the forum and I didn't realize this subject has already been touch on.

 

 

 

 

"I recently had a problem with my D300 during a shoot. After about 100 shots my camera stopped working and it indicated that my battery was dead. Very strange as I just charged it the day before. I quickly changed to a fresh battery and shortly after it did it again. I powered down/back up and it was fine. This happened a few times during the shoot.

 

Has anyone else run into this?

 

Thanks, Tom"

 

 

 

 

 

I would like to add that this series of events has only happened to me once so far and I was using the Nikkor 70-200VR. Does it matter? I don't know but I would just like to mention in an effert to find out where the problem lies. Also I am only at 4200 frames taken.

 

AJ, you are not dreaming as some may think!

 

Thanks,

Tom

[daverhaas]

It happened to me last weekend during a swim meet... I had the 70-200vr mounted and it gave me a false low battery a few times. Each time, just rebooted the camera and it worked fine. I put it off to a combination of the heat and humidity in the pool area.

 

May have to send it in after all.

 

Dave

[a.j._olmscheid]

Howdy,

 

Well, nothing has really been solved yet. However, I did receive one of my cameras back

from nikon about a week ago. There tech form stated that they could not duplicate the

problems that we were having (black frame, false low battery) and the only thing they did

was update the firm ware. My only wish is that I could have a Nikon Rep. follow me around

for the day so, they could see the problem happen on site. My other co-worker got

another one of his cameras back and this time instead of replacing the aperture lever they

replaced the lens mount due to it being warped. It seems very strange that the techs are

replacing parts on some cameras and not others even though they are having the same

problems. Two more of my cameras are being shipped out to nikon so I'm hoping this time

around they can duplicate the problem.

 

Cheers,

A.J.

[tom_luongo1]

Have you sent them a copy of the black frame? The tech support website has a system to do that.

[sam_ellis]

I'm sorry to see this isn't resolved better as I am having similar issues.

 

Quick summary- bought the D300 in November, shot a wedding right after Christmas and noticed the back panel freeze up a couple times. Being a new camera, I thought that I must have hit something like a combination of buttons. I wasn't always paying attention to what I was doing when it happened.

 

Next wedding was the beginning of March, same issue. Sent it to Nikon for repair. They listed two repair items "SC 202183" and "SC 201759" but didn't say what they actually did other than ckecked the control pane, shutter mechanism, flash operation, AF operation, release sw, upgraded the firmware, and cleaned the ccd.

 

Got the camera back the other day, and found MORE problems with it. Not only did it hang up again, but now I am getting the "dead battery" issue again! I added an MB-D10 grip, so I don't know if that triggered it, but I was getting the same issue without it.

 

Oh, and I also had a memory card fail when I got home. AAARRRGGGHHHH!

 

I'll be placing a call to Nikon in the morning!

 

Sam

[a.j._olmscheid]

Well, now the camera which had the lens mount replaced is experiencing both problems

again.(Black frame and False battery issue) I was shooting the Twins vs Angels baseball

game for Associated Press and I was having problems the whole game. I could get fired

from my job if I don't get the critical pictures. For example, Torii Hunter received his 7th

golden glove award, if I didn't get that picture the photo editor at associated press

would've been furious. Also, the camera I got back and the two loners that Nikon gave us

are all failing. VERY FRUSTRATING.

 

-Come on Nikon issue a recall-

[ShunCheung]

A.J., if Nikon doesn't know what the problem is and how to fix it, what is the point to order a recall, and what are they going to do with the recalled cameras?

 

I moderate the Nikon Forum here and bought a D300 in the 2nd week since it became available (November 2007). I see a few isolated complaints, and understandably, those people complain loudly, but otherwise a lot of us, including me, have absolutely no problem with our D300's. When I wrote the D300 Review here for photo.net, I also used a loaner D300 from Nikon; we had no problem with that sameple either.

 

The following link is to a thread in the Nikon Forum on a similar topic. I also mentioned this thread in that other thread so that people can cross reference their issues and experiences. Please take a look at Joe Hurley's posts. Apparently cleaning the electronic contacts with a particular product seems to work for a number of people, but I have no personal experience with that solution.

 

http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=00OYX4

 

If that still fails, I would suggest pressuring Nikon to replace your cameras with new ones.

 

Good luck.

[michael s.]

Appreciate the update, AJ.

 

So you actually want these cameras to *work* when you take 'em out on assignment ?

 

Every time ?

 

Picky, picky, picky ...

 

Seriously, it's hard to believe that if these problems can be replicated, Nikon hasn't been able to resolve them. A request for replacements would certainly be well within the realm of reason, and coming from pro photogs, who have many (faulty) cameras, I think it would carry extra weight.

[andrew_vonbank]

I'm here to back-up what A. J. is reporting as a problem with the D300. Both of my D300 cameras have this problem- intermittent black-frame and the occasional false low battery reading. It should be noted that THESE PROBLEMS ONLY OCCUR WHEN USING AN 80-200mm LENS. Another photographer in my office has the exact problem with both his D300's (that's a 100% failure rate) and it ONLY occurs with his 70-200mm lens. Obviously there is a problem with the mount/contacts using a longer, heavier lens. One of my two D300's even occasionally and spontaneously releases the shutter when attached to the same long heavy lens.

[ShunCheung]

Andrew, I am afraid it is not that simple. As least based on what I have seen, the 70-200mm/f2.8 AF-S VR is often mentioned in these failure reports, and cleaning the electronic contacts between body and lens seems to work for a large percentage of the cases. If the weight of the lens is the issue, cleaning the contacts shouldn't fix it.

 

I happen to have a number of long lenses, including a 500mm/f4, which obviously is typically supported by a tripod. Last December, I spent a fair amount of time in San Diego photographing pelicans in flight, and I was hand holding a 300mm/f2.8 AF-S with the D300. The main problem was that my arms and back got a bit sore about a couple of days; nothing was wrong with the camera.

 

But somehow the 70-200 seems to be a common component in these cases. As I mentioned in the thread I cited above, it is important to send both the camera(s) and lens(es) to Nikon to help them reproduce this problem. If they only have your cameras which have no problem with other lenses, it is likely that the repair will get nowhere for quite a while.

 

A.J. started this thread on February 18, so this issue has dragged on for a month and half. That is a long time.

I do have a couple of contacts in Nikon USA but I don't know them all that well. I'll get in touch with them and see whether they provide some information on this particular problem.

[tom_luongo1]

If there is an issue with large lenses, one would expect it to show up most frequently with something like the 70-200 because that is probably the most common large lens mounted on the D300.

 

The 300mm and longer lenses probably have a fraction of the production of the 70-200.

 

Are photojournalists more likely to have the camera with a mounted lens bouncing around in the bag? If there's a latent problem, perhaps a factor like that exacerbates it.

[ShunCheung]

I am approaching this problem two ways: (1) I have brought this thread and other similar threads to the attention of a manager inside Nikon. He is willing to bring A.J.'s repair problem to the attention of the head of Nikon USA repair, if A.J. can provide the repair order number, etc. I am sure A.J. is already in close contact with Nikon repair anyway, so I don't know whether this offer will provide additional help, but it is available. (I have sent e-mail to A.J. separately.)

 

(2) I am going to summarize the "false dead battery" issue reported in various thread and discuss that with Nikon USA Technical Support through photo.net's contact. Therefore, if other people have similar problems with their D300, please do post them with some details to this thread. For example, the 70-200 seems to play a role and somehow cleaning the contacts seems to help. The more data points we have, the more clues we should get.

 

Most of this work will happen in the background, but if there is useful development, I'll share it in this thread.

 

In the larger scheme of things, Nikon started producing the D300 around August last year (perhaps earlier) and the initial rate was 70K units a month. That was subsequently increased to 80K. Roughly speaking, there should be over half a million D300 cameras out there. It is typical that a few percent of a product like this to have some problems, but for the sake of argument, if 1% of them have this particular problem, that would be 5000 units and if only 1% of those are reported in photo.net forums, we would be overwhelmed by 50 different reports.

 

Meanwhile, Nikon is doing extremely well financially. If they need to replace ten D300 bodies, that should be peanuts for them.

 

Finally, concerning big lenses, I use a 500mm/f4 and a 200-400mm/f4 often. A 70-200mm/f2.8 is not that big and should not be putting that much stress on the lens mount. Additionally, when using these lenses, the combo should always be supported from the lens and therefore the weight of the lens should not be a problem. Some PJ and news photographers don't take very good care of their equipment, but that is a different issue altogether.

[Mary Doo]

OK, time to fess up: I did experience some strange battery issue with the D300 and I suspect it had something to do with the MB-10 grip -- I am not sure. I mostly used it with the 200-400 lens at that time. I did use the MB-1o for quite a while before the battery appeared dead. Replacing the AA batteries alone did not seem to work, so I replaced the EN-EL3e as well. At that point, the battery supply became intermittent. I tried another spare EN-EL3e and the condition was the same. Typically, it would come alive for a while when I turned the camera off and then on again. This was most annoying as I was in Tanzania shooting wildlife. I am sure it had cost me some would-be-nice shots. Finally I took the MB-10 grip off completely and the situation seemed a bit better; the battery-on duration seemed to be longer. When I got back to the lodge, I used a microfibre cloth to clean all the battery contacts of the camera and EN-EL3e batteries. It started to get better and I have not experienced another episode again. I have not put the MB-10 grip back onto the camera again. Somehow I am thinking that the problem had something to do with it, perhaps coupled with dirty contacts inside the battery chamber. As someone suggested above, the problem could have been aggravated by multiple factors, such as climate issue, etc. However, it may be noteworthy that the D200 did not have this problem at all, and I used the same battery pool.

 

Mary

[andrew_vonbank]

One more thing, Shen. For me, at least, the problem is lens specific. Even after carefully cleaning the contacts, I can actually see the aperture reading change on the camera display when I twist the lens manually(as it has some give). Likewise, the other photographer in my office only has this problem with his similar lens. Something is not lining up properly with these lenses- my theory is that the mount is machined slightly differently on the D300 and after using a heavy lens it actually warps enough to intermittently cause these problems. Keep in mind that I shoot thousands of frames every week and my 80-200mm is my workhorse. Also, the problem only occurred after significant use of this lens. Hope this clarifies things. But we're stumped.

[ShunCheung]

Mary and Andrew, thanks again for the input. I am sure this is a tough problem to figure out.

[jim_fenton3]

Folks....

 

A) Nikon is aware of it and is looking into it. The problem is that they'll need to find cameras where they can reliably reproduce this to study just what the heck is causing it. On one body, the shot 3,000 frames with my cmaera dn my brand new 500 VR and found no issues...and it failed 26 images after I got it back.

 

B) I'm on body #5 and that one has failed and I'm currently shooting a D2Xs loaner instead. The D300 sits and Nikon advises they'll be in touch as soon as they have some information.

 

C) Along with the loss of power / lockup, I experience really bad AF ability, especially out past 25 yards and at times, the camera will attempt to focus and just lock up while doing so.It's almost as if the AF is ratcheting or stuttering (no...VR isn't on) and I'm thinking that all of this is interrelated.

 

D) It isn't the grip or batteries as I've encountered this with grip, no grip, no battery in the camera, etc. I've beeen sent new batteries to try, new CF cards, etc.

 

E) Lenses I've been using when it occurs: 28-70 AFS, 300 f4 AFS, 500 AFSII and now my 500 VR...both with and without converters.

[knobby6]

Anything been resolved concerning this problem. My D3 has same problems with false battery readings and now I am getting the black frames. This is with the 200-400 vr.

[ShunCheung]

I am in touch with A.J. Olmscheid (who started this thread) via private e-mail. A.J. has received some cameras back from Nikon, and I'll let A.J. provide any details.

 

I am in touch with two different folks with Nikon, but I haven't received any official information concerning this D300 issue yet.

 

This is fist time I hear a similar complaint on the D3.

[knobby6]

In software on the black screens, shutter speed and iso show, but apereture read is missing. You can get some detail when you bring exposure up in software, but not much. Even autofocus is getting intermittent today, have to turn camera off then back on, sometimes more than once. I use the af-on button, but I don't think that is relevant.

[andrew_vonbank]

Just got one of my D300's back from Nikon repair. Evidently they adjusted the aperture lever. Dark frame problem (no longer calling it black frame, as the image is severely underexposed) came back after a few days. Now Nikon wants me to send in my 80-200mm lens with the camera. We'll see...

[jim_fenton3]

I continue to shoot the loaner D2Xs Nikon sent me with the last replacement D300 body.

 

That D300 continues to have really poor AF with my 500 VR, AF lockup, inability to acquire and intermittent low battery lockup.

 

My last communication from Nikon was to use the D2Xs loaner and basically sit tight while Nikon looks into this.

 

The D300 for the most part just sits currently.

[carlos_estela]

I bought my D300 in November, two weeks ago I started having problems with the intermittent low battery lockup. I started having this problem using the MB-10 and 70-200 VR lens. My D200 is working a little more now until the D300 gets fixed.

[uspandey]

>>Shun Cheung: For example, the 70-200 seems to play a role and somehow cleaning the contacts seems to help. The more data points we have, the more clues we should get.<<

 

Shun, the damned thing happened to me with an 18-70 mounted. So are you going to add up the 18-70 in the list of suspects or it is just the obvious?