Happy Camper (so far)

[banditvt]

First a quick back story.

A few weeks back I posted about a Nikon 80-200 2.8 push pull lens that I picked up locally from a gentleman on Craigslist for $125. I tested the lens, and it appeared to be in good working order, but shortly after bringing it home it developed some issues. that thread is located here

Yesterday I got the lens back from my local repair shop. The lens apparently has lived a "well used" life. Below is the email he sent to me a couple of days ago outlining what he did. (I'm assuming when he said that some parts aren't available, that it's likely due to the fact that Nikon is not selling to non authorized repair centers any longer.)

Your lens is ready. We have tested it on a D100 and it focuses through the range smoothly. The zoom is as smooth as we can get it and very acceptable without replacing the zoom barrel which is no longer available. At one point the second element group on this lens came loose and was making contact with the back surface of the first group. It left a slight abrasion which is barely noticeable and should not effect picture quality. Also, the contact holder on the lens mount is worn and cracked. We glued the cracks and it should be ok. Notice that one of the contact pins had been worn through. This lens had a lot of use, but it should give you plenty more to come.

The lens appears to be working absolutely great. The focus is nice and smooth, and the zoom works much better. There is only a slight bit of resistance when pulling the zoom back toward the 200mm mark, and it's so slight that I barely notice it. The repair shop is going to keep an eye out for a new set of contacts for me and will let me know if he happens to get some so we can replace them, but for now they are working just fine. All in all I can't complain for a $188 repair. I think this is going to be a wonderful lens.

I've included a couple of pics I took with it last night at a friends house of his son, and one of my Husky this morning. They were all shot at f/2.8 and are SOOC. except for a 1/3 stop increase in exposure on the picture of the Husky. I also reduced them only slightly when converting them to JPEG.

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[longzoom]

Very sharp lens, very nice dog, beautiful boy! (Knock-knock on wood!)

 

[Moony16]

banditvt: (I'm assuming when he said that some parts aren't available, that it's likely due to the fact that Nikon is not selling to non authorized repair centers any longer.)

That's a shame Nikon has gone this route, but glad to hear about the happy ending with your 80-200 2.8. The Nikkors have a well deserved reputation for being "workhorses" & this lens is testimony to that.

The shots look excellent--looking forward to seeing many more from you with this classic piece of glass. Huskies are a most beautiful breed of dog!

JT

 

[cobradriver]

Looks good. Glad you got it fixed.

 

[threecats]

Sounds great and looks the same. I have looked often at a couple push pull Nikons and read great things about some of them. I keep balking I guess because I have never used push pull on a zoom. The physical mechanics of zooming that way just seems awkward to me.
Just curious how you feel about this zooming action vs the typical after using the lens some.

 

[banditvt]

Sounds great and looks the same. I have looked often at a couple push pull Nikons and read great things about some of them. I keep balking I guess because I have never used push pull on a zoom. The physical mechanics of zooming that way just seems awkward to me.
Just curious how you feel about this zooming action vs the typical after using the lens some.

The push pull does take a bit of getting used to, but In the short time I've had the lens It already feels second nature to me. The push movement on my lens is a bit stiffer than most other push pull lenses due to the extreme amount of use that the lens has endured so you have to kinda pull the camera gently towards you while you're pushing the zoom, but other push pull lenses I've tried are very smooth, and require very little effort to zoom in and out. One benefit of the push pull lenses is the fact that they are what are known as "one touch" lenses meaning that the push pull grip also rotates for your manual focus adjustment. However the way my lens is set up it's either AF or manual focus. It cannot do both simultaneously like many of the newer AF-S lenses can. I believe that this is a limitation of all the "screw drive" type AF lenses.

I have to agree with the many people here that own or have owned this lens, that it is a gem for the money. Despite the slightly stiffer zoom on my lens, it looks as though this is going to be a wonderful addition to my lens collection. If you come across one at a great price snap it up, and try it out. If you don't like it you can sell it likely for as much as you bought it for as they appear to still be a pretty sought after lens.

 

[bargainguy]

Congrats! Glad you got a decent deal out of it.

This was one of my first fast glass lenses for sports work. There are two versions of the early push-pull 80-200/2.8 AF. The first version has three screws holding the front element onto the rest of the lens barrel. Apparently Nikon thought this was enough, but in heavy use the front element can work away from the rest of the lens, so Nikon redesigned the front element group to six screws. You can easily tell which version you have by looking down the glass through the front element.

I had the six-screw version. Mine had a slightly warmish tone to it, which outdoors for portraits wasn't a bad thing, but for indoor sports it presented quite a challenge under sodium vapor lighting. It was pretty bad with color film. When I got my original Nikon D1 in 2000, I'd set a custom preset WB in an effort to correct this, but still got an orange cast that required some work in post to correct. All this pretty much became a nonissue when I got my 80-200/2.8 AF-S which didn't have the color cast, and I sold my push-pull.

 

[sprdv1]

Nice Gary!! Glad it worked out for ya

 

[frdjohns]

Sounds like you got a bargain, even with the repair bill.

 

[banditvt]

First off, thanks for the comments on the photo's everyone.

Congrats! Glad you got a decent deal out of it.

This was one of my first fast glass lenses for sports work. There are two versions of the early push-pull 80-200/2.8 AF. The first version has three screws holding the front element onto the rest of the lens barrel. Apparently Nikon thought this was enough, but in heavy use the front element can work away from the rest of the lens, so Nikon redesigned the front element group to six screws. You can easily tell which version you have by looking down the glass through the front element.

I had the six-screw version. Mine had a slightly warmish tone to it, which outdoors for portraits wasn't a bad thing, but for indoor sports it presented quite a challenge under sodium vapor lighting. It was pretty bad with color film. When I got my original Nikon D1 in 2000, I'd set a custom preset WB in an effort to correct this, but still got an orange cast that required some work in post to correct. All this pretty much became a nonissue when I got my 80-200/2.8 AF-S which didn't have the color cast, and I sold my push-pull.

I have the second generation of this lens. It was manufactured between 1992-1997, it has six screws holding it.

Sounds like you got a bargain, even with the repair bill.

Fred, despite the slightly stiff zoom near the 200 mark, I really feel that I made out great on this lens. I certainly have no complaints. Yeah it looks a bit more used than other 80-200's out there (I'm typically very picky about my lenses looking like new), but it seems to take very nice images. Also I get a certain thrill out of using a 16+ year old lens, and getting fantastic pictures. I think I will be hanging on to this for a while, while I try and save up some money to purchase something a little newer and nicer down the road, then I'll look in to selling the 80-200 for what I have invested in it.