Nikon

Funeral for a friend | Last rites Nikon D600 – D610

Friday afternoon 23rd August I walked into Harvey Norman Penrith for what was ostensibly the last time with my faulty Nikon D610 by my side. I’d been holding off trading across to the negotiated D800 body because I didn’t feel that paying the extra $300 in the difference was a demonstration of good faith by a retailer who had stalled on doing anything for the last 17 months. It’s a long saga and not necessarily worth launching into an abridged recount here.

I had hoped to be simply able to swap out the D610 body and 24-85mm lens from the old D600 for the D800 body but management wouldn’t budge despite on their price which is nearly $1000 dearer than anyone else in the country. Had it not been for a well informed friend pointing out that I could end up banging my head against the franchise battlement for as long as they chose to hold out, I might have pushed on. 

So I’ve paid my money, cut my losses and taken the high road. 

vba300ah

Multiple Class Action Lawsuites filed over Nikon D600

It appears that a number of Class Action lawsuit’s have been filed as a result of consumer experiences with Nikon’s D600. If you are interested to follow this you can read about it here, here, here, here, here, here, and here. It’s all a bit messy really and no doubt the problem may well be compounded by the same issue showing up on the D610.

As for me, I appear to be set for protracted run around with Harvey Norman Penrith in terms of getting a satisfactory resolution i.e., refund or appropriate replacement and by that I mean a camera / camera body that does not have this ongoing issue.

 

Home again | Nikon D610

About a week ago ( 21st July) my D610 made it back from Nikon Sydney with a new shutter mechanism to replace the original that came with the replacement camera from Nikon Sydney via Harvey Norman (more or less). I’d love to say I have the confidence that this issue will not resurface again but unfortunately this is not the case. It’s such a weird situation to be in. I’d love to be able to load files from the SD cards and not even have the thought cross my mind that the images will somehow show contamination on the sensor. After 17 months of nothing but one problem after another (to date five shutter mechanisms and two cameras) it’s going to take some serious consistency from the D610 to rewire that mindset.

 

Oil on sensor | Nikon D610 @ Casey’s Beach

Following on from yesterdays post. The image below is taken from a series shot at Casey’s Beach, South Coast, NSW on the 6th July.

Shot at f 9. Oil spots top left, following the same contamination pattern as Nikon’s discontinued D600.

 

I found another post with images showing a particularly bad contamination of the 610 sensor here

Follow the thread down and pick up the “Update” it’s a shocker.

Bad oil | Nikon D610 crashes on take-off

This is the post I thought I’d never be writing. But here we are again in snake oil territory.

On the 4th and 5th of July I took my relatively new D610 and old faithful Canon 50D for a workout along the South Coast from Batehaven to Tuross Heads.

All appeared to be going well until the files were loaded from the respective cameras into Lightroom on Saturday evening (5th July). From the first batch out of the D610 starting at DSC0343.NEF through the next one hundred and twenty or so shots there they were, those telltale oil marks I was so familiar with from a previous and thoroughly unpleasant experience with my ex D600. I couldn’t believe it. The previous 300 + shots gave no hint that this was going to be an issue I would have to contend with again.

Whilst there were some unpleasant issues with Moire in the 610’s video output and I was preparing a write up for that, this took me completely by surprise. The worst part of this was it started out with just two spots in the upper left (a familiar pattern) and just over 120 shutter actuation’s later had increased to a spread of 10 spots of oil, indicating a worsening problem.

4/6/14 @ F11
4/6/14 @ F11
5/6/14 @ F9
5/6/14 @ F16
5/6/14 @ F16
5/6/14 @ F16
5/6/14 @ F16

It’s possibly a fair argument to say that most of these are shot with the aperture stopped well down and so it’s more likely that oil on the sensor is going to have increased visibility, however, in the image below shot the following day, Sunday 6th July you can see visible oil at f4.5. These images have been pushed and processed a little to increase the visibility of the spots. Whilst there aren’t as many to be seen at this aperture the fact that they are visible at all is a serious concern.

Detail @ f4.5
6/6/14 @ f4.5

The earliest reports of an oil problem with the D610 began appearing mid Jan 2014, see here and here.

It’s going to be interesting to see how this news will be received by Nikon Sydney when I take it in this week.

Do I wish I had read these before collecting my D610 replacement in May this year? Yes indeed.

I had argued with the people at Harvey Norman that I did not consider replacing the D600 with a D610 a particularly wise course of action and had at the time suggested other options; now my initial reservations have been verified. I can’t really see how Nikon can resolve this other than by abandoning production of this camera series. It’s an extreme suggestion I know, call me old fashioned but this model roll-out appears to be jinxed in the true sense of the word.

I have a couple of Canon cameras and problems like this are simply not on the spectrum at all.

Here are some detail captures

detail from 5/6/14 @ F16
detail from 5/6/14 @ F16
detail from 5/6/14 @ F16
detail from 5/6/14 @ F16

Ressurection shuffle

Screen Shot 2014-05-09 at 8.47.49 pm

It’s been a long wait. One year and 10 days and numerous shutter replacements since I first brought the issue of dust and oil on the sensor of my Nikon D600 to the attention of the retailer who sold it to me. The resolution is not ideal (call me fussy) however Nikon came to the party and 17 days after dropping the camera off via Harvey Norman, shipped a new D610 body along with the old 24-85 lens from the old D600 to the Penrith store which I collected today.

D610

It had kind of a surreal air to it seeing that old lens in the plastic bag with the new D610 body. I also felt significantly out of pocket as the D610 is nearly eight hundred dollars cheaper than the D600 was when I purchased it and the extra cash laid out on the extended warranty felt like an arms deal gone wrong. However I didn’t have the mind to argue the case with an innocent and helpful technician at HN. I walked out without even having to sign for anything to say I had collected the camera. That weird ‘Twin Peaks’ sense of finality and futility washed over me briefly, like walking out on a bad relationship that you held out some hope for.

Call me old fashioned but I found a twisted sense of irony as I stared up at the sign over the counter that read …

Screen Shot 2014-05-09 at 8.33.31 pm

Had I missed something?

In the waiting room

Throwing caution to the wind I dropped my Nikon D600 into Harvey Norman Penrith for the last time. Surprisingly the issue was dealt with promptly and with a minimum of fuss. I took some paperwork (Previous job cards from Nikon Sydney, the most recent reference file and a copy of a 40 + page Class Action Lawsuit) with me this time which I think gave the guys who I spoke to (Peter and Joe) a better view of the bigger picture. I put my preferred options on the table and now simply have to wait for the outcome. Hopefully I won’t have to follow through with the next step.

Nikon-d600

image courtesy of www.nphotomag.com