A little tip when changing lenses

Yesterday I was finally able to pick up my broken camera from the Nikon Service Point in Norderstedt. If I understood the technician correctly, about half of the camera has been readjusted or even completely replaced. I will have plenty of opportunity to test everything thoroughly tomorrow at the “Get in the Ring” fight night. (Pictures from the last event are available here, here and here.)

The technician gave me a tip for changing lenses that I would like to share with you here: keep the release button pressed when putting the lens on. There is a "safety button" on the bayonet and - if your camera has a motor for rod-driven autofocus lenses - a drive for the autofocus. Both parts are made of metal and protrude a few millimeters from the bayonet. When changing lenses, the lens rubs against these metal parts, causing very fine abrasion.

The technician told me that I had a lot of metal dust in my camera - which doesn't surprise me, because I change lenses very often because I work a lot with fixed focal lengths and also like to capture new perspectives with suitable optics. In the future I will also press the release button when putting it on.

I took two pictures where you can see the difference in the “lock button” depending on whether the release button is pressed or not. You can see the AF bar motor drive in the bokeh 🙂

Read comments (22)
  1. Hey Stefan,

    thanks for the hint. My D700 also has the additional drive and I wasn't even aware of that. I'll try it out now and I'll try to get used to it. I have also found that when attaching the lenses, it may be necessary to turn the lens back a little while releasing the release button so that the lens clicks into place. My 24-120 otherwise rotates so far that there is no clean contact between the camera and the lens.

    Regards
    Christian

    1. Thanks for the additional note. I noticed that too, but I think the lock clicks into place in a very defined manner. So I don't think this should really be a problem. It's just a process of getting used to it 🙂

  2. Oh, it was your D3 that took so long and why my little one is only now ready... go there and pick it up straight away. But thanks for the tip, I'll get into the habit.

  3. I unconsciously press this button out of habit because I always have to press it when unlocking. Now I'll get into the habit of always pressing it, because I also change my lenses quite often.
    VG Jana

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