Did your Ebay camera Work out of the Box?

Did your Ebay camera Work out of the Box?

  • YES! It worked Perfectly

    Votes: 425 70.7%

  • No. Did not work. It's a Paperweight.

    Votes: 45 7.5%

  • Required a minor Repair, Fixed it Myself

    Votes: 112 18.6%

  • Required a Major Repair: Paid to have the work Done.

    Votes: 73 12.1%

  • Requested a Refund.

    Votes: 46 7.7%
  • Total voters
    601
I selected all, given that I have acquired hundreds of cameras from eBay throughout the years, at varying conditions. The overall trend is, as expected, the more I pay, and the more recent the camera was manufactured, the more likely the camera works out of the box. A few high profile cases when I received a camera that was said to be working and priced high, but did not work, included a Contax AX and a Canon EOS 1n. I did receive refunds for returns or repair costs in most of the times. Lots of lower priced ones I really didn't expect them to work fully even when the seller claimed so. Nice surprises (when a cheaply got camera actually worked) include a Petri Color 1.9, a Rollei XF35, Wirgin Edinex III, Praktica FX 3, Ricoh XR-2, Yashica TL Electro-X, Nikkormat ELW, etc. Note that I don't consider replacing light seals and mirror bumpers at the usual locations repair work.
 
Was looking for a camera case for a small camera and spied an advert for a Canon Sureshot 85 Zoom complete with case. Got the item for 99p plus £3 postage and packing! Turns out the description is about right. Camera appears to be brand new in box complete with all its bits - unread manual! And - a leather case complete with tag. I seem to have a very good case for a very reasonable price plus a brand new free camera. Does it work - frankly I don't really care but I will try a film through. The battery included does 'light it all up'.
Pleased - I should say I am.
Perhaps we should start a new thread with photos from cameras that we have bought for less than $2 or something!

jesse
 
CanonP - works great, some dirt in the rangefinder prism but no big deal.
Trip35 - needed to strip, clean haze and unstick shutter.
Oly 35RC, fine, but seals are starting to go.
Summar - fantastic
Nikkor HC- needed to clean haze and cleaning mark smudge off front element

All in all the descriptions have been honest, I bought them with both eyes open and have not been disappointed in the sellers.
Never spend too much... £100ish an item is my limit
If you buy from someone who "knows nothing about cameras but it looks ok. No returns." then you run the risk but don't blame the seller who just gave an accurate description...

best,
Alex
 
I would say that of the 12 cameras I've gotten, 9 were great right out of the box, 2 where less than advertised and 1 was sold "AS IS" and it was a paperweight - but a $5.00 paperweight.
 
Everything except the light meter on my OM-1. That was quite disappointing. I still have yet to find a fix for it. I requested a refund and the seller simply ignored my 5 emails. I was not one bit happy.
 
Ive had pretty good luck with ebay and remote craigslist purchases over all.

The only disappointing ones were a pair of 7sIIs which the seller has been using for decoration and couldn't comment on condition (cheap buys though and an interesting project trying to make a working camera out of the two) and a lens which was in slightly worse condition than was stated. Not bad enough to impact images though form what I can tell.

Offsetting those purchases though were cameras with little issues the seller was up front about or simply great deals. I picked've picked up a few cameras needing repair like an Autocord with sticky blades sold for $40 and a Canon IIf needing curtain replacement for $50 (still working up to dealing with this one). In both cases, the seller was so up front they almost tried to talk me out of the purchase. I've also picked up an XA4 in great condition for $30 and a

Overall, I'm thrilled with how well I've done but I am also comfortable doing a little repair work myself. If I wasn't, well, it wouldn't have been reasonable to go after many of these deals.
 
Just got a Nikon N75 from FleaBay, seller said it was in good working order. It was in decent shape, but the mode dial was a little wonky. I did a google search, and I found a two-week-old flickr post from the very same seller, asking how to fix the wonky mode dial on his N75!

Well, he never fixed it, he just sold it to someone else.

Luckily, it seems to have been just oxide buildup on the contacts. I rotated the dial a dozen times, and the problem disappeared. Also the camera only cost $25, which helped smooth over the problems.

But come on, if you're going to sell a faulty camera, isn't it common sense to not publicly announce it beforehand?
 
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My latest ebay purchase was another Mamiya m645...I bought it from a reputable dealer...
I looks very nice, no major dings or dents and it came with everything they said it would...
After putting a fresh battery in it I found that the mirror would stick in the up position after firing in certain speeds...I was going to send it back and was in the middle of sending them an email explaining why when I decided to see if there was anything I could do to fix it...
I replaced all the seals and the mirror foam and all is well...
I've shot 5 test rolls and everything looks and works as it should...
I don't mind resealing a camera, actually I expect that to be needed on most older cameras, so that was no big deal and I'm glad that doing it fixed the problem...
And I would buy from that dealer again...
 
My worst ebay buy to date has to be my current very early double stroke M3 bought four years ago. It came with an original collapsable Summicron and ever ready case and was advertised as working perfectly. The advance lever was so stiff to move that something felt like it would break if you forced it and the rangefinder had zero contrast ... totally unusable! I sent it to Youxin who put a replacement rangefinder from another camera into and gave it a CLA and it's now rather a nice camera.

I thought about sending it back to the seller but they were very unhelpful and virtually accused me of lying when I described the problems the camera had. I decided to wear the cost and keep it as cosmetically it was very nice but it owes me a heap now and to sell it I'd be taking a bath for at least $600.00.

Tha last camera I bought from eBay was my black FM3A ... it was described as being in reasonable condition and in fact it was near perfect. It was also a bargain at $300.00 and it was actually located in Brisbane thirty k's from where I live. It has restored some of my faith in the big auction site! 😀
 
chippy said:
i dont know what the symptoms or problems are with your M3 Keith, but cheaper than sending them across the wide open sea you can get them fixed localy much cheaper...there is that bloke up your way, Charles i think his name was, I dont know if he is still around or how good he is..otherwise there are always few others locally that are competent if not trained to fix them..i know a bloke down here that is kept flat out with just Adelaide work (i just saw another 5 M3's dropped off to him the other day which reminded me when i saw your post), he's been working on Leica's all his life (he's in his early 60's now)..most cities have a bloke like that, trick is to get in contact with them directly and cut out the middle man (shop) to save on costs
Click to expand...


The problem was that the rangefinder on this particular M3 was totally trashed and if Youxin hadn't had a beater M3 with a good one in it I was looking at the possibilty of having to send it GB to the mob that resilvers them ... Louton I think from memory and that costs a heap.

To my knowlwedge Charles was having a few health problems a while ago and had given the repair work away ... he may be sorted and back in action by now though? Nice guy and posts here occasionally. 🙂
 
Yes

Yes

I recently made my biggest purchase ever on eBay: an early minty (1958) button M2 along with matching mint 35 2.8 Summaron-M w/hood from the same seller in Canada. I used the buy it now option as I have been looking for about a year for this combination in nice condition and didn't want to let it get away and didn't mind spending a few extra bucks to get.

Everything went extremely smooth and the seller was communicating with me every step of the way. It was an excellent buying experience.

What made me feel very comfortable was along with excellent product shots of the camera and lens, the gentleman posted (and eventually sent me) a copy of Kindermann's invoice w/serial numbers for both a CLA of the camera and a re-lube/check/re-set collimation of the lens (invoice was over $500).

The only thing that gave me pause was the box was a bit crushed on one corner when it arrived and I was a bit worried about the contents but there was enough bubble pack to soften the ride 🙂.
 
I have bought 50-60 cameras on eBay with about 98% success rate. I have had to replace some foam seals, which was expected and advertised. I have also had a couple of cheap FSU bodies which turned out to be duds, but it wasn't worth sending them back to the other side of the world. The worst deal I have experienced, which was direct from the seller and not on eBay, was with the much-vaunted fedka in the US. I bought a Kiev body at premium price from him and it turned out to have a dragging shutter curtain. Did he offer to replace it? No. He only offered me a discount on a CLA and I would have had to ship it all the way back to the US.
 
I've just remembered ... the worst experience I've had on eBay was when I bought a Leica IIIC and Summitar from Hugh's Camera Sales in the US. When the camera arrived the aperture ring was seized and the advance knob was sitting on a weird angle because the shaft was bent from an obvious drop. When I ran a film through it there was a major light leak which turned out to be a missing screw from the front of the camera body ... one of the ones that holds the shutter crate in the body. The thread had been stripped so the screw was just left out leaving the open hole!

When I complained about the state of the camera to the seller I got a series of abusive emails in reply and had negative feedback with more insults left from one of the most beligerant individuals I've ever dealt with on the net. I lodged an official complaint with eBay and forwarded them the emails one of which refered to me as a 'sheep f**ker!' Ebay forced him to offer me a refund and also made him withdraw the negative feedback which triggered another series of abusive emails! 😱

I was very wary of eBay for a long time after this experience! 😀
 
My score so far = 50%

My score so far = 50%

Some examples:

Welta Weltur 6x9: Shutter broke after a week. Sent it off for repair. Works good now.

Fuji GW 690 III. Washer broke on film winder after a week. Sent it off for repair and a CLA. Fuji still services these!
 
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I don't like buying something I cannot touch first. The only item I ever bought on the bay was a V3 28 elmarit I "won" after typing "666" € as my final bid. Guess that says it all...

But as a user lens it's ok and works just fine... (just in case I'd ever want to sell it here 🙄)
 
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