On Nov 22, 2005, at 3:44 PM, Shel Belinkoff wrote:
Why screw around replacing and removing lens caps when changing film
anyway? It just slows you down, can sometimes be cumbersome, and
there's
little chance that a cap will provide any real protection to the
camera or
lens in a fall.
When I dropped my RB67 it not only had the cap but also a lens hood
fitted.
It landed face-first on concrete from about 4 feet. The lens cap got
a bit of a scuff and there was no visible damage to the lens itself,
but the weight of the rig had caused internal damage to the leaf
shutter mechanism inside the lens.
Anything fitted to the front of the lens is only going to prevent the
filter thread from being scuffed, and lower the chance of it being
bent. The transmitted shock can still wreak havoc elsewhere in the
lens and/or body.
There are only two things that are useful for protecting equipment:
1) careful handling,
2) good insurance.
And #2 isn't really about protection.
It turns out that my insurance would have covered my accident, but I
didn't realise it at the time (maybe due to the joy of it missing my
foot). The repair quote was more than the lens was worth so I ended
up repairing the lens myself under the advice of a former Mamiya
tech. That's a story by itself...
- Dave
