re coating a lens? possible?

[gustav[] pEña]

I bought a summaron and the lens had some fungus so i took it to a repair man here in mexico. This guy is not an expert but he is what i found. He told me in order to remove the fungus he had to remove the lens coating of one element.

So two question come to mind
1-what have i lost? what is the coating for?
2 is it posible to re coat a lens?

 

[Sonnar Brian]

If he can take off the coating at a reasonable cost, that is the best way to go.

Recoating the lens will probably be expensive.

 

[dexdog]

So two question come to mind
1-what have i lost? what is the coating for?
2 is it posible to re coat a lens?

Coating helps to reduce internal reflections (improves contrast) and reduce flare. John Van Stelten of Focal Point can recoat a lens, but will likely run into several hundred USD. I think that a company in Russia used to recoat lenses, but not sure if they still offer this service.

I would probably have the fungus removed, and test the lens to see how it performed before sending it to be recoated.

 

[tennis-joe]

I had haze and sent the Summarit lens to Sherry K. Well it probably did not have a coating and now the whites flare out and I see various cleaning marks on the front element. I can't use the lens like that at all.
Joe

 

[bmattock]

http://www.focalpointlens.com/fp_intro.html

 

[jmkelly]

John Van Stelten (Focal Point - see above) will polish and re-coat for you, at something like $200 per surface. You could buy another Summaron...

 

[Sonnar Brian]

Page down about halfway in this thread:

http://www.rangefinderforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=81311

to see the results with a Collapsible Summicron that I recoated myself.

 

[kermaier]

I had fungus on an internal element of a Canon 50/1.2 LTM. Essex Camera couldn't remove enough of it to help, so I sent it to FocalPoint. John Van S. polishes off the coating, which got rid of the fungus, but it would have cost too much to recoat. The lens works just fine now. Think of it this way: If the lens has 6 elements in 5 groups, that probably means 10 coated surfaces. Of you lose the coating on one surface, you have a (maximum) 10% reduction in flare resistance and contrast. In how many photos are you likely to notice that?
Ari

 

[nickdando]

Malcolm Taylor can re-coat lenses. And he can certainly take the coatings off, as that what he did for some of James Ravilious's lenses.

Nick

 

[Platon]

Try this. www.araxfoto.com
It cost me about 40USD to fix a front element on a Canon 85mm. That including polishing and recoating of the lens.

His name is Gevorg Vartanyan.
Good luck!

 

[hans voralberg]

Arax has ceased to offer coating service since 06 I think