Bought a refurbished item.

BrianLy

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As some of you guys know, that I bought a refurbished nikon vr 55-200mm lens a few weeks ago, and finally had time to play with it, I notices that sometimes the auto focus will not focus at all, it will keep trying to focus on that item but it never can. Should I return it or did I just not put the right settings?
 
Does the AF mechanism make a clicking sound, like the motor can't engage? Does the focus ring turn at all?
Does it "hunt" for the correct focus?
Does this only happen under low light conditions?
Does this occur when trying to focus on a flat, uniform surface (like a wall)?
 
It's hard to say here, but if it seems to be doing it in lower light or with in a range it may be just the lens and it's fine. My old Tamron 70-200 2.8 had this problem usually at closer ranges like if I was trying to do a macro shot on a flower and often times would have to toss it into manual. The Nikon 55-200 is a fairly popular lens for most places to carry, not only for a camera store but Best Buys, Target and other similar places would probably have them so see if you can find a demo at a store near you and try it there to test. This should help you decide if it's really broken or just having trouble do to the scene your wanting to photograph
 
Auto focus is not the be-all-to-end-all many think it is.

Auto focus will not work well, and you will need to manually focus:
  • if the light level is low
  • if there is little or no contrast between your subject and the background
  • If the selected focus point contains both near and far objects
  • if the subject is dominated by regular geometic patterns
  • if the focus point selected contains areas of sharply contrasting brightness
  • if background objects appear bigger than your subject
  • if the subject contains many fine details
If any of those conditions prevailed, there is nothing wrong with the lens.
 

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