lens repair
 

Does anyone know a good place for repairing a lens?

The auto focus on one of my lenses is not working correctly. so currently have to manual focus if i use the lens

Vancam

Vancam Service Ltd.

Stay away from Vancam.

I had a Canon lens with some visible stuff in it, at first I thought it was fungus and dusts or something and wanted to clean it off. Brought it to Vancam, after waiting for 2weeks (originally said 3days to get back to me with a quote) and several phone call to push them, they quoted me like 250 to have it cleaned, specifically, the dusts AND the fungus-like thing. I said fine, and they said it was going to be done in 3-5 business days.

Then after 3 weeks and many phone calls later with all sort of excuses (technician training, backlog... etc), they call me to let me know the lens was ready. I went to pick it up and as I was in a hurry, I didn't check properly. The dusts were gone so I figured it should be good. After coming home, I noticed that even though the dust was gone, the fungus thingy (it formed a ring shape) was still there and showed 0 sign of ever being dealt with.

Called Vancam next day and brought the lens in after mentioning about it, they took the lens in and AGAIN made me wait for 2~3 weeks only to tell me that they weren't able to clean it as it's physically on the lens and nothing they could do. I was pissed but I thought, oh well... the fungus might have permanently damaged the lens.

I ended up bringing the lens back to Taiwan during one of my recent trips and brought the lens to a famous guy doing CLA on lenses to see if he could somehow clean it or make it less severe. The guy got back to me in 2days, fully cleaned and told me, it was just some oil that leaked into the elements. He was able to clean it in one pass and charged me ~40bucks CDN for the trouble.

Tl;dr: Vancam might be able to deal with some problems to a certain extent, but their techs' skill is doubtful. I'd bring it to an authorized repair center before Vancam.

the authorized sony repair centre on venables was pretty professional when i dealt with them
their website suggests they service other makes too

http://fusioncine.com/

also interested in a good lens repair shop. The zoom on my lens is stuck.

What lens are you guys talking about? Unless your lens is high end ones (fixed focals, L, Zeiss etc), I don't think it is worth taking it in for repairs. It is not that hard to repair a lens by yourself, tutorial and parts are easily available. Just build yourself a mini box out of plexiglass, 2 holes for gloves which you glue to the box, put everything you need in and suck out the air to reduce dust intrusion.

Nothing better than factory repair shops though.. Asian facilities are way better, faster (and cheaper) than North American ones.. We just don't have the population density.

eg The restoration below only cost $120US! Amazing restoration of old Nikon lenses | Nikon Rumors I got similar work done on my Nikon 20-35 a while back. I am grateful someone repainted the gold details.. it was a nice bonus!

I got a L lens so would like to repair it than to buy a new one :(

Next time when you are at the airport.. get a temporary export card at the customs office.. and just get a friend to bring your lens to a service center in Asia.