<p>Hi all,<br> Well, I took my brand spankin' new E-M1 and 12-40 Zuiko kit with me on vacation for a week and while the cam was crazy fun to use, there was one irritant that drove me nuts: The hood for the 12-40 lens kept falling off! All it took was a slight touch or brush of the button and it would unlock and spin right off (eventually, normally at the most inopportune time). Almost lost it over the edge of a moving tour bus--that would have been horrible! Keep in mind that a replacement costs about $50.</p> <p>Anyway, I looked online and found that I wasn't the only one with this problem. In fact, it appears to be pretty common. And just to put the notion to rest that one needs to press BOTH hood buttons to remove the hood--it doesn't. One button is for when the hood's reversed, one is for facing forward. </p> <p>So, I figured that I could easily (1) gaffer tape the hood on, (2) glue it on, or (3) not use the hood at all. I didn't like any of these options, so I came up with option 4: DISASSEMBLE AND REPAIR!</p> <p>The aluminum ring that surrounds the buttons is lightly glued on to the plastic hood. Luckily, it's not glued very well. I ran my fingernail around the seam slowly and it started to separate. Not wanting to bend or kink the aluminum, I used a hair dryer on medium heat on the aluminum ring and continued to separate the pieces. It easily separated in a minute! DISCLAIMER: DO THIS AT YOUR OWN RISK, PLEASE DON'T BLAME ME IF YOU DAMAGE YOUR HOOD!</p> <p>My assessment of the problem is that the springs are way too soft. I bent back the spring as far as it would go to add some additional preload/tension then replaced the button. It's MUCH stiffer now! Did it to both sides and replace the ring with a little Elmer's glue (didn't want to replace it too permanently, in case I have to remove it again to make additional mods) and used some masking tape to hold it tight until the glue dried. </p> <p>There, problem fixed. It takes about 3X the pressure to unlock the hood than it used to stock. If you wanted really add some additional tension, consider a tiny piece of rubber foam (insulation type) behind the button itself. Be careful--too much and you might not be able to get the hood off! I'm trying it like this for now. If you're into experimenting, consider taping the aluminum on with scotch tape until you're happy.</p> <p><a title="Photos of fix found here." href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/21855256@N06/sets/72157644183281769/" target="_blank">Photos of fix found here.</a></p> <p>Hope this helps!<br> Aloha,<br> Keoni<br> _____________<br> Stub Plug for Olympus Chargers: Get rid of that long cable!<br> www.stubplug.com</p>
