Dust in lens

[Ginu]

Hey guys, I need some advice in regards to my one year old 18-200 AFS lens which has some dust on the inside at the telephoto end of the lens.
Should I take it back to the place where I bought it from or should I contact Nikon to see what options I have? I know this is not a air tight lens, but I don't think it should accumulate dust in just one year of light use.

I'd like to mention, the lens has a UV filter since day one, and rarely comes off the body and it is always stored in its proper camera bag.

 

[dxqcanada]

Most dust comes in from the rear ... or metallic dust from the internal gears.

I do not think Nikon would cover this under warranty.

 

[Ginu]

The good new is the dust does not affect the quality of the photographs and I do understand this would happen due to the pressure from the zoom, but I was expecting a few years before dust would breach the inside...

 

[dxqcanada]

Some lenses are not sealed as well as others (some are not even sealed).

 

[JenG]

So how would you advise we clean the lenses, I also noticed dust inside on my camera as well, thanks.

 

[dxqcanada]

Dust inside the lens ... you will not be able to clean it as it requires dis-assembly.

Dust in the camera ... that could be dust on the mirror, on the ground screen, or in the viewfinder.
You can carefully clean the mirror (do not touch the ground screen).
Cleaning the ground screen is dangerous, and should not be anything more than some air.
Dust in the viewfinder requires dis-assembly.

 

[JenG]

so you can suggest taking it to a camera store like B&H to have it air dusted? thanks

 

[dxqcanada]

You can clean the mirror ... just be careful.

A blower (without the brush) can be used to remove dust from the bottom of the ground screen.

In most cases the dust in a lens will not be large enough to affect the light coming through the lens.
The cost of removing a couple of specs of dust would be too high to justify.

 

[Ginu]

I would not stick my fingers to dust inside the camera, that's for sure and in order to clean the lens, well they require disassemble which is best done by the dealer and they charge $$$ for this.
I was reading other forums and people are getting quotes of 200$ to clean a lens.

 

[djacobox372]

Unless you plan on reselling the lens in the near future, I wouldn't worry about it. The only thing dust does is scare away ignorant buyers--it has no effect on image quality.

 

[AverageJoe]

I can see how a tiny bit of dust in a lens shouldn't be a big deal, but I would like to know more about why it isn't as big of a concern? The extreme of this; a lot of dust in a lens, would obviously reduce the amount of light that passes through the lens and into a sensor and cause a problem.

 

[KmH]

I'd like to mention, the lens has a UV filter since day one, and rarely comes off the body and it is always stored in its proper camera bag.

The UV filter causes more problems (lens flare, loss of contrast) than dust in your lens will. The Nikon 18-200 is not a stellar performer at any rate, because of all the design compromises that had to be made to accomplish it's 11x+ zoom range.

It's likely the lens came new from the factory with dust in it.

 

[djacobox372]

I can see how a tiny bit of dust in a lens shouldn't be a big deal, but I would like to know more about why it isn't as big of a concern? The extreme of this; a lot of dust in a lens, would obviously reduce the amount of light that passes through the lens and into a sensor and cause a problem.

Think about it this way, there's usually some dust in the air between you and whatever you're photographing, but it doesn't make much of a difference. Obviously if there's a lot of dust in the lens (or in the air) it does make a difference, but that's not very common.