Hi Folks
I'm looking to buy a copy of the 40-ish year old Nikkor 50mm f/1.8 ai-s manual lens, a lens with a great reputation because of its sharpness, compact size and light weight. The particular version of this lens was made for the Japanese market, and most available are being sold from Japan.
A seller who is very thorough in his description, and when answering my questions gets into even more detail, says on inspection with an LED light that his lens has several 'dot scratches' or 'spot flaws' in the coating surface. In photos they look like specks of dust or round dots. He says the cause of the scratches is not known, but are often caused by corrosion marks from mold or scratches on the coating during cleaning. He assumes the lens has been disassembled several times because of cleaning marks inside the lens.
He says however, that none of this, at least now, will affect image quality. Since most descriptions of vintage lenses are much less detailed than what he's provided to me, I'm figuring there are a lot of 40 year old Nikon lenses out there with these kinds of flaws. Or not.
If the lens performs fine for 5-10 more years, I'm good with that. These lenses go for less than $200. Should I buy this one? The seller has perfect feedback, with return policy, though return ship is to Japan. I'd be using the lens purely for shooting on film.