broken aperture lever?

jands · May 11, 2011

I'm pretty sure the answer is "take it to a professional", but I wanted see if anyone had any other input.

I started to notice that when using medium to small apertures (around f/9) that my photos would be overexposed. The smaller the aperture, the more overexposed the image seemed to be. No matter what mode I was shooting in...

When I noticed this, I tried all three lenses I owned at the time. All three had similar results. I've recently acquired two new (used) lenses and I've ran some tests. This is what I've found:

On my 50mm 1.8, the aperture blades do no stay fully open when resting. The aperture ring is locked to its smallest setting (22). My guess is it's not letting in the proper amount of light and thus the camera is metering wrong. When the camera is set to 1.8 and the DOF preview button is pressed, it gets a tad bit smaller than its resting spot. Which, again, is not full open. It physically stops getting smaller when the camera is to 5.6.
On my Sigma 28mm 1.8, the blades sit wide open, but just like the nifty fifty, the aperture doesn't get physically smaller in the lens then 5.6 in DOF preview mode.
I bought a used Nikkor 70-300mm 5.6G for real cheap. Interestingly, it doesn't seem to affected. Shooting tests and DOF preview test work as they should.
Also, I just got an old Nikkor 105mm AI. Since I have to control the AF and aperture manually and it does not use the aperture lever in the camera, it works just fine.
The aperture lever does not look bent or distorted. Although the tip looks a little jagged, I cannot tell if that's normal without another one to compare it to.

Below are some shots I took. In all the photos, the settings were the same except the aperture. I think you'll notice after f/5.6, the photos do no change exposure-wise. Histogram seems to confirm this.

#1 f/1.8

#2 f/2.5

#3 f/4

#4 f/5.6

#5 f/8

#6 f/11

#7 f/16

#8 f/22

So it seems the aperture lever is not pushing the levers on the lenses properly.

Here are more shots, in Aperture Priority Mode from 5.6 to 22.

f5/6 - 1/1250

f/8 - 1/640

f/11 - 1/320

f/16 - 1/125

f/22 - 1/60

Living in Turkey, I can't just take it to a technician. For one, the language barrier, for two the cost I'm sure would be outrageous. We move in July, so I'll have to wait until then, assuming it's not something I can fix myself, which I doubt.

Sorry for all the photos for a question I'm pretty positive I know the answer to. I appreciate your indulgence.

o hey tyler · May 11, 2011

You could always just look for a second hand 50mm, they're fairly cheap and pretty handy. It would probably even be cheaper than getting it repaired.

jands · May 11, 2011

I might not have been clear... this happens on three different lenses... not just the 50mm. I'm pretty sure it's the camera's aperture lever. What is interesting is that 70-300mm lens does not seem to be affected.

Also, as a note... the above shots were taken on my 28mm.

o hey tyler · May 11, 2011

Oh, I reckon I missed that (didn't fully read your initial post). I was just focused on your photos, and what seemed to be like a stuck aperture blade... Sorry about that. In that case, there may be an easy fix. But I don't know enough about Nikon to help.

Good luck though, and sorry about the camera troubles.

exacta · Oct 30, 2012

jands said:
I might not have been clear... this happens on three different lenses... not just the 50mm. I'm pretty sure it's the camera's aperture lever. What is interesting is that 70-300mm lens does not seem to be affected.

Also, as a note... the above shots were taken on my 28mm.

I have the same problem on a Nikon D2Xs. Started as an intermittent problem with a 50mm 1.8 D and gradually spread to all of my (6) lenses. (I have no third party lenses).

On firing the camera with lens removed the aperture lever merely flinches. I have now spoken with Nikon Service who will give no opinion without having the camera to hand whereas I have received a top ballpark quote (incl. VAT) of close to £300 (UK) say, approx $450 (US) from Fixation, a highly regarded Nikon repair shop in London UK.

The camera has less than 11,500 actuations.

I have heard of this problem being encountered across a wide spread of Nikon bodies. It seems that there is a potential design/manufacture weakness which causes this problem to occur.....I am seriously considering moving to Canon because of this ad other hearsay Nikon weaknesses.

KmH · Oct 30, 2012

How will you cope with all the Canon design/manufacture weakness hearsay issues Canon has had since 2006?

The Nikon D2Xs was only produced from the 2nd quarter of 2006 to the middle of 2007. Yours only has 11,500 actuations? Your camera has to be somewhere between 5.5 and 6 years old. How often did it get serviced in that time frame?