Nikon AF tubes

[jim_roetzel1]

Does any one know if Nikon has AF tubes coming. Maybe there's a lot

more to it than I realize. I know the Kenko's work- but friends who

use them are not happy. I realize AF tubes aren't necessary in

traditional close-up work- in fact I think AF might get in the way of

precise depth of field focusing. I am thinking of their use in

concert with a long lens. I use Canon and don't want to start a

Canon V Nikon thing- but I use my tubes often in bird photography with

a 600/4- and they perform quite well- the lens is not as fast as

without the tubes but it does work. (I lead workshops on a local

level and this question came up last week.)

 

thanks

Jim

[joe_fuhrman1]

Jim, I too have faced this problem. I am a NPS member and have talked to several Nikon reps. & employees and nobody has given me any good indication that AF tubes are coming. I do know that a 400mm f5.6 AF lens from Nikon is not coming, and I would not count on the AF tubes for a long time.

[stanley_mcmanus]

I am curious why the friends who use the Kenko tubes are not happy with them. What are their reasons? I know folks who have these tubes and they seem to work fine for them. Sure, I wish Nikon would make fully functional tubes but that is not a critical issue of a 3rd party makes them and they work fine. Moose Peterson reports that the Kenko tubes work fine with his AF-S lenses.

[charles_bush]

I have a set of Kenko tubes and they do not properly autofocus with my 600f4 and my F5. They work fine with smaller glass and manual focus and metering is fine.

[gary_poleynard]

As per John Foster's suggestion in the TC-14E thread, I contacted Nikon (webmaster@nikon.co.jp) re extension tubes and teleconverters. Response was basically patronizing and totally non comittal. I believe this means nothing is in the works.

[scott_fairbairn]

Another problem with the Kenko is that they vignette with some lenses. I use the 500mmf4 P MF lens. They vignette like crazy with this lens. (I have an F5 and I wanted the AF tubes to preserve the metering and other electronic functions) If you compare the bore of the Kenko and Nikon tubes, you will find that the bore on the Kenko tubes is considerably smaller.

I tried out the new 80-200mmf2.8 AFS with the Kenko tubes the other day, the AF either did not work at all, or it hunted back and forth constantly. I want to move up to a 600f4AFS lens, but I am reluctant to do so until Nikon makes some AF tubes. I figure if they don't make them by the time I can afford to move up, I may change systems because I use tubes alot.

[alex_lofquist]

I am using a Kenko 25 mm autofocus tube with my F4 and 300 mm f/4 Nikkor with no problems. Also the new drop-in circular polarizer from Nikon is a charm with this lens and a bit less expensive than the Kirk drop-in.

Alex

[robert_p._boner]

I have the Kenko 25mm ext tube. On the F5 with 500mm AF-S it searches constantly for focus, and the finally stops with everything out of focus. So much for Kenko claims. It does seem to work some better on the N90s, but still not well enough to trust it. My 500 mm & F5 recently got destroyed, and I am thinking of replacing (they were insured) with a 600mm. Without AF tubes, I am seriously considering switching to Canon. If anyone knows another option for AF Nikon compatible ext tubes, I would love to hear about it.

[danny_weber]

I use Kenko 12 and 25mm AF tubes with a 300/2.8 AF-S on an F5 and they work quite well.

[mark___1]

Moose Peterson did a write up awhile back reporting problems with using the F5 and the Kenko AF tubes. After that, quite a few people wrote to him stating they had no problems with this combo, including myself. He went back and retested them, ordering new Kenko tubes, and found everything worked OK. Apparently there is a bad batch of Kenko AF tubes out there that causes problems with the F5 and AF. I would suggest sending your tubes back to Kenko for replacement.

 

Mark

[robert_p._boner]

I sent my 25mm Kenko ext tube to the distributor to be tested because it did not autofocus properly with the F5 and AF-S lens I own (500 f/4). They said that they were going to test its compatibility with the F5 and several different AF-S lenses. They sent it back saying that there was nothing wrong with the tube, but that the Kenko autofocus tubes are NOT compatible with the F5 and AF-S lenses. They have changed their website to indicate the incompatibility, although this information doesn't seem to have filtered down to the retailers. My Kenko tube worked fine with the N90s and AF-S lens combination.

[rolland_elliott]

You got to be kidding me! You'd switch from one camera brand to the other just because of extension tube problems?

 

All these little tubes do to transmit elecontric information is have a few wires run from the lens mounting end to the F mount end. I've taken apart Kenko tubes and all they have is a strand of 7 wires running from one end to the other, no chips, resistors, capacitors, etc. I've also used these tubes quite successfully on my N90s camera with no problems.

 

Any competent mechanic/camera repair man/women could buy the electronic contacts from Nikon and install them into a hollow tube. I'm sure Nikon sells parts for it's TC14E and TC20E teleconverters. The electrical contacts probably cost $40 to $60 bucks, so the conversion wouldn't be cheap, but it would deffinitely be cheaper than switching camera brands. I'll look into the cost and report back soon.

 

Peace Rolland Elliott

[jim_roetzel1]

Roland- as you said "All these little tubes do to transmit elecontric information is have a few wires run from the lens mounting end to the

F mount end."

 

Sort of makes you wonder why Nikon has yet to make them.

 

Jim