opinion on hazy lens

[serial_lain]

Hi everyone, I have an old coated leica elmar-m 90mm lens which is showing signs of slight haze. Everyone has differing views on haze so I would like to hear them. There are 3 choices I could do right now

1. return the lens I bought and find a non-hazy one (ironically the seller declared no haze when i bought it)
2. clean the lens. (are there skilled leica repair people in singapore? safe to send to camera workshop?)
3. Keep the lens as is and use it.. a little haze never hurt anyone.

Everything else about the lens is good.. focusing and aperture are as they should be. Do let me know what you guys think!

 

[ckuang]

hi, I've bought hazy leica lenses before and sent them to TCW for repair and they came back clear and sharp. Probably good idea for a CLA anyway to lube the lens, clean the aperture blades etc. I always do that to my second hand lenses because who knows how old the lubricants etc are and a CLA is not terribly expensive.

 

[tribal.snake]

depends on how bad the haze is.
but a CLA wun hurt and would be recommend to best maintian the lens.

 

[YOL925]

why not shoot 1/2 roll and see the result first. If the pix turn out nice, then no need to do anything. Else, send for cleaning (at the risk of getting misalignment). I would recommend cam.x rather than the one u mentioned.

As this lens is of v simple tessar design, quite easy to dismantle and clean. so the risk is relatively low. I had bad experience sending a leica lens for cleaning (ended up with OOF problem at close-range) ;(

OTOH, this lens is supposed to be not-expensive, w another $100 for cleaning, the cost would probably doubled. Is it worthwhile? only u can answer.

 

[brian]

Hi everyone, I have an old coated leica elmar-m 90mm lens which is showing signs of slight haze. Everyone has differing views on haze so I would like to hear them. There are 3 choices I could do right now

1. return the lens I bought and find a non-hazy one (ironically the seller declared no haze when i bought it)
2. clean the lens. (are there skilled leica repair people in singapore? safe to send to camera workshop?)
3. Keep the lens as is and use it.. a little haze never hurt anyone.

Everything else about the lens is good.. focusing and aperture are as they should be. Do let me know what you guys think!

If you decided on #2, let me know how it turned out. I almost bought a lens that had haze on it last week but decided not to take the chance since its something I dont have too much experience on (haze that is). thanks.

 

[serial_lain]

well i did have an old pentacon 135mm that had 'haze' like appearance on the outer front element surface that was impossible to clean off.. probably eaten into the coating.. but this haze is internal so it should be cleanable.. well since everyone recommends a CLA, i will test it out.. if its ok and flare isnt such an issue i'll leave it for now.. but if not a CLA is in order!! thanks everyone for their lighting quick responses

 

[FM2 User]

Hi, by the way, where is TCW?

 

[alternatve]

Hi, by the way, where is TCW?

TCW refers to The Camera Workshop. It's beside Ruby which is in Peninsula Shopping center, next to Funan.

Samuel

 

[serial_lain]

ok as recommended i went to cam.x today to get a quote for cleaning the lens.. it was actually quite reasonable so i decided to send it in for cleaning.. results will be known in a week!!

 

[fatigue]

A lot of good lens out there damaged by haze. Hope there's a reasonable alternative to remove them.

 

[serial_lain]

ok! totally forgot to report my findings.. cam x did a good job of removing the haze.. only got 1 teeny tiny mark probably due to the soft internal coating of the elements.. but no big issue.. id rather that then haze.. the guy told me as long as the lens elements are not cemented in a block.. as some leica lenses are.. its able to be dismantled and cleaned.. camera hospital is another alternative somebody else suggested that has recurrent recommendations!