What is this in my M2 viewfinder? Help..

[normclarke]

Hi,
CRR's current charge is $240 for this exact service.

Best,

normclarke.

 

[fixbones]

Thanks for all the help and advice so far.
Somehow, i have a feeling that it is probably prism separation...... how unlucky... sigh.... and i thought i could avoid all this by paying the slight premium and buy from a dealer.......

Attached are more pictures (better quality)...

Would be grateful for any further advice. Still waiting for dealer to reply.
It certainly doesn't help that i am from Australia and the M2 was bought from the states 🙁

 

[Kozhe]

It looks to me like it´s on the rear window glass, not in the prism, so it might be a simpler and way less expensive fix. Ask the dealer anyway, if he´s reputed enough he should be aware of most of the problems you can find in these cameras.

If you´re really worried about it you might ask for a refund or a change, if it´s not a practical issue but aesthetic I would not worry too much about it.

Is the camera still L sealed? It might be it was not dry or clean when someone put the covers back.

 

[Ronald M]

Does separation only effect the the RF patch? This appears to be something on the inside of an eyepiece glass component.

 

[nobbylon]

First things first eh? Unscrew the eyepiece and clean it. This looks similar to one i've seen and someone had used something nasty to clean the glass and it buggered the coating up leaving strange patterns. I just polished it off with some fine toothpaste and it was fine. It looks too uniform over the area to be seperation which usually from what i've seen starts at the bottom or top edge as you look through the front large r'h side window. If you shine a torch from the back you may see small gold like beads on the edges. The finder then progresses to patches of black as you look through it but not uniform in pattern. Can affect the whole finder.

 

[Erik van Straten]

I have never seen this phenomenon before, but looking at your second picture I would say it is fungus on the outside surface of the prism. This fungus however grows in a far more regular pattern than usual. I do not think it is separation of the prisms.
Fungus should be treated, but afterwards you can use the camera normally. The viewfinder image will be of lower contrast than originally, but hey it's a fifty years old camera.

Erik.

 

[fixbones]

Thanks for all the help and suggestion.
It seems like it is most likely de-lamination of main prism in the finder.

Have since contacted the dealer and he turns out to be a very stand up guy.
Agreed to take the M2 back and have it repaired.
I requested for store credit for the value of the M2 which he agreed................ credit (+extra) to go to a new silver MP instead =D.

I still can't believe that i am a soon-to-be MP owner!!!
Sad to lose the M2 but i am sure i'll end up with another sometime in the future. Just not this time.