Dropped summicron, reassure me.

yossarian123

yossarian123

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Well it was a pretty dumb mistake but my v4 50mm cron took a 3 ft fall onto a concrete floor. Good news is that the aperture blades seem fine and the glass is intact. The only problem is the focus is now frozen - it looks like the lens took the impact on its side directly on the depth of field scale. This outer focus ring is now bent out of round, which I'm assuming is what's causing the focus to be frozen.

Has this ever happened to anyone ? Is it repairable and if so does it require a trip to Leica or can DAG handle it? I'll be calling Don first thing tomorrow morning, I'm just looking for a little comfort in the meantime.
 
it has never happened to me, but if it is not as it was before the drop, and the focus is frozen, yes, a trip to DAG or to Leitz is in order.

Good luck!
 
yossarian123 said:
Well it was a pretty dumb mistake but my v4 50mm cron took a 3 ft fall onto a concrete floor. Good news is that the aperture blades seem fine and the glass is intact. The only problem is the focus is now frozen - it looks like the lens took the impact on its side directly on the depth of field scale. This outer focus ring is now bent out of round, which I'm assuming is what's causing the focus to be frozen.

Has this ever happened to anyone ? Is it repairable and if so does it require a trip to Leica or can DAG handle it? I'll be calling Don first thing tomorrow morning, I'm just looking for a little comfort in the meantime.
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I had the exact same thing with the same lens. I sent it to Sherry Krauter at Golden Touch and she worked wonders with the lens. She is terrific!

http://www.sherrykrauter.com
 
Similar thing happened to my DR Summicron. It got dropped on a marble floor in one of Saddam's outlying HQ buildings near Fallujah, Iraq.
Focus froze and the mounting flange was bent.
Seeing as there was no Leica service there, I took the lens to the machine shop in our camp, stuck the mount in a vise and squeezed it back into round between two little shims of wood. Once the focus was working better, I got to the mounting flange and with some channel locks and a file, I got the lens back on the camera. RF was still working and I gauged it against a piece of tape on the film plane. Focus was still perfect.

After I got back to the states, I sent the camera and lens to Sherry. The camera had problems before but that's another story. The lens she said was still perfectly collimated and worked just fine.

It's the last Leica lens I have now along with that same M4. Everything still works perfectly in spite of nearly being destroyed then flooded in the bay of Cadiz.

Phil Forrest
 
I feel your pain.

I dropped my Nokton 50/1.1 on a hard tile floor not too long ago. It ended up doing a lot of damage. It's off now getting parts replaced.
 
There is a lot to be said about keeping a hood on your lens, the Leica 12585 hood has saved more than one of my Summicrons, it seems to have been specifically designed to absorb shocks from drops.

I hate to change lenses on my cameras, so I don't have to worry about dropping the lenses. I simply have a body for each lens. But I have dropped cameras countless times, or fallen off a bike, horse, or out of a tree holding a camera or two. Invest in some Leitz hoods, they are not cheap, but they are great insurance.
 
What's great is that I had just finished sending paypal funds over to DAG 5 minutes before I dropped the 50. Time to budget for another repair.
 
Sorry not summicron war stories, but I have an old and ill cared for canon 50mm f1.2 that looks like someone took to it with a scrubbing brush. But I got it cheap and figured it might work as a portrait lens. It did until I dropped it a several feet onto a carpeted floor. No observable physical damage done (not that you would notice) but it is no longer sharp (not that it ever was terribly sharp) when mounted with adapter on a Leica M. (OK on an M3/4 body). Its an easy lens to disassemble so my plan is that when I have time, energy and the requisite quantum of bravery I will disassemble then reassemble in the hope that whatever out-of-collimation has been caused can be adequately repaired by eye and a little deft assembly.
 
Should be around USD150-USD200 to straighten the helicoid. Happened to my DR, a few other repairers wanted to substitute with an identical Rigid helicoid, but in the end, was with DAG. After 16 months, lens can back close to perfect.
 
A guy came to my house once to buy a lens. The very first thing he did upon shaking my hand was pick up the lens and drop it on my hardwood floor. He paid me for it and left in a hurry. I think he felt so embarrassed he didn't even want to check to see if he'd damaged it. I never heard from him again.

Good luck with your lens! I am sure if it needs fixing, it can be fixed.
 
My guess is the barrel is dented, if it will no longer focus.

I think the only remedy is to have the lens elements put into a new barrel.

Generally, once you dent metal, it is very difficult to get back to its original shape, and when you have something as precise a helicals, I don't know that it would be repairable.

But maybe it is. I doubt anyone here can offer real advice without seeing the lens in person.
 
yossarian123 said:
Oh yeah, it's definitely going somewhere. I expect it won't be cheap either.
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That lens, having no moving elements/groups but a single assembled optical cell, might have fared better than you think after a fall. In fact, the distorting of the focusing ring would have absorbed some of the energy of the impact. Just ahead of the mount it's pretty beefy too.

A shame, the V4s are sweet.

Good luck and please post the eventual resolution.
s-a
 
... bad luck, my experiences of dropping Leica stuff has been bad and expensive ... rugged they are not, whatever the reputation claims
 
ZeissFan said:
My guess is the barrel is dented, if it will no longer focus. I think the only remedy is to have the lens elements put into a new barrel. Generally, once you dent metal, it is very difficult to get back to its original shape, and when you have something as precise a helicals, I don't know that it would be repairable. But maybe it is. I doubt anyone here can offer real advice without seeing the lens in person.
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More likely it the focusing mechanism and it is easily repaired by a qualified, competent repair person.
 
I've dropped lenses and had them stick. DAG fixed and cleaned my 35 'cron for $75, took about 6 weeks to get it back. I Also dropped a 50 'cron with again the same issue, a stuck focus ring. Sent that one to Leica, cost a little over $300 to fix but got it back in 1 week.
 
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