Olympus XA with a jammed focusing lever

[Time Freeze]

I picked up an Olympus xa at a garage sale today. It is in excellent condition shutter, self timer, flim adavance, flash all seemto work perfectly, The lens is perfect and the body show very little evidence of use.

The only thing that does not work is the focusing lever; it is jammed and won't move. Is this something that is difficult to repair?

Thanks,
John

 

[Nick R.]

I had the same thing with one that sat a long time. The brass tab and ramp seemed to weld together slightly after sitting. IIRC, I had to take off the front of the camera to where I could expose the parts and then used something to force them to move. After that, it worked fine. If you try forcing the plastic lever that you use to focus, it will probably break as it took quite a bit of force to make the parts move.

 

[Time Freeze]

Thanks, that worked. I actually took a small screwdriver and put the point into one the "serations" (may not be the correct word, may not be the correct spelling🙂 ) on the ring that the focusing lever is attached to and was able to apply enough pressure to free it. It now focuses freely and smoothly. Thanks again.