I've developed a recent obsession with acquiring MF glass for my E-P1, and have eBayed a number of Pen F and OM lenses. The ones I've bought have been in generally good optical shape, but most of them have a little bit of dust or debris between the elements. While I appreciate that this has little effect on the quality of photos taken with them, it bugs me enough that I'm tempted to try cleaning it myself.
I am quite comfortable with handling and cleaning optics (I build lasers as part of my day job), and I'm reasonably comfortable disassembling and reassembling little mechanical bits. Having never disassembled a multi-element photographic lens, however, I have some trepidation about doing so. Given the impressive feats of lens modification on display in some of the threads around here, I was hoping that someone might have some knowledge about disassembling and cleaning lenses that they could share with me.
I have concerns about two particular pitfalls that have occurred to me (again, I'm mostly talking about older Olympus OM and Pen F lenses): First, are there likely to be glued/cemented (or otherwise nigh-impossible-to-separate) components inside the lens? Second, will reassembling the lens require a careful optical realigment procedure, or is everything sufficiently registered that a naive reassembly will not likely degrade the performance of the lens?
Any information would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
I am quite comfortable with handling and cleaning optics (I build lasers as part of my day job), and I'm reasonably comfortable disassembling and reassembling little mechanical bits. Having never disassembled a multi-element photographic lens, however, I have some trepidation about doing so. Given the impressive feats of lens modification on display in some of the threads around here, I was hoping that someone might have some knowledge about disassembling and cleaning lenses that they could share with me.
I have concerns about two particular pitfalls that have occurred to me (again, I'm mostly talking about older Olympus OM and Pen F lenses): First, are there likely to be glued/cemented (or otherwise nigh-impossible-to-separate) components inside the lens? Second, will reassembling the lens require a careful optical realigment procedure, or is everything sufficiently registered that a naive reassembly will not likely degrade the performance of the lens?
Any information would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
