The Sound I never wanted to hear.

C. Hand

Senior Member
Saturday as I was unpacking my car from a photo trip, I pulled my camera bag out of the trunk and heard the horrible sound of my D7100 and 18-70mm hitting the concrete, I had failed to zip my case. I have now heard that sound a 100 times in my sleep. So the damage report, is :sorrow::sorrow:my camera seems fine, not even a scuff mark, but my lens may be a different story. First glance was a minor scuff on the up by the focus ring. Since then I have tried it multiple times and every now and then I get a squeak, maybe it is just my imagination, but the AF seems slower.

How should I check the Auto-focus of the lens?

This was a near new condition lens I got on Ebay for $62, so not a huge catastrophe, but it has been a good lens. This may be an excuse to move on to better glass.
 

gustafson

Senior Member
Saturday as I was unpacking my car from a photo trip, I pulled my camera bag out of the trunk and heard the horrible sound of my D7100 and 18-70mm hitting the concrete, I had failed to zip my case. I have now heard that sound a 100 times in my sleep. So the damage report, is :sorrow::sorrow:my camera seems fine, not even a scuff mark, but my lens may be a different story. First glance was a minor scuff on the up by the focus ring. Since then I have tried it multiple times and every now and then I get a squeak, maybe it is just my imagination, but the AF seems slower.

How should I check the Auto-focus of the lens?

This was a near new condition lens I got on Ebay for $62, so not a huge catastrophe, but it has been a good lens. This may be an excuse to move on to better glass.

Sorry for the accident! Really made me flinch to read about it. That said, looks like you came out OK. I'll let the experts chime in, but the standard AF test is to tripod mount the camera and shoot a test chart. You can also use Liveview and zoom in if needed to check whether the autofocused image is sharp. See this link for pointers:

How to Quickly Test Your DSLR for Autofocus Issues


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

STM

Senior Member
That is never a sound we want to hear! The sound that makes your blood run cold. I hope the lens is not damaged.

I had a similar occurrence a few months back when my TC-300 fell out of an incompletely zipped bag and hit the pavement. It landed on the edge of the lens near the mount, permanently jamming the linkage between the camera aperture arm and the linkage to the mounted lens' aperture lever. It was so old that the screws holding it together would not budge and after I stripped the second one trying to unscrew it I realized that this was the end of the road. It was a write-off and they are not cheap, even used on Fleabay!!
 
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