Has anyone bought a DIY "butchered" camera?

[MC JC86]

I recently purchased a used Nikon rangefinder from a certain reputable used camera equipment broker. After shooting a few rolls with it, I realized that nothing shot wide-open or close up was ever in focus. A trip to Essex camera fixed everything, and it works beautifully now. I realize that this can happen, regardless of tampering. After talking to some other NHS members, the suggestion was made that the proliferation of websites with DIY repair instructions has caused the used market to be flooded with cameras that have been “butchered” (their word, not mine) by those trying to do repairs on the cheap. Especially problematic, I was told, are people performing their own RF adjustments. It brings to mind working in a camera store when I was 18 and trying to explain to a man who had flooded the shutter assembly of his Bessa folder in an attempt to get the slow shutter speeds to work again, that he had actually made the problem nearly impossible to fix.

I think that the do-it-yourself spirit has always been widespread in photography, and is usually an enviable quality (one that I sometimes wished I possessed, considering my extremely limited financial resources). My question is: Has anyone else experienced an issue like this? Can any of the people who are older than me comment on whether or not this has gotten worse since the advent of the internet?

 

[graywolf]

I doubt it is any worse. There have always been camera repair people who may have been pretty good butchers (meaning they should have been working in the meat department at the grocery store rather than in a camera repair shop). The real problem is that their are a thousand short cuts you can take, and all of them are the wrong way to do it; but you can not convince the ones using them of that. They will tell you that they have been doing it that way for 40 years (Which only says they'd been eff'ing up peoples cameras for at least 40 years).

I have been told that when I say someone is competent, that I am damning with faint praise. I do not see how I could be when 90% of the people I have met are incompetent to do the job they are being paid to do. Of course, bosses often will not let them take the time to do the job right, even if they know how, and want to do it like it should be.

Nope, it is not a new problem.