Tamron 17-50 2.8 issues

[Stradawhovious]

Well, it's not a Nikon lens, but it IS a Nikon mount, so I hope there isn't an issue posting here.

That said, I accidentally left this lens out in the garage for the better part of the winter, and that has led to issues. My kid brought it in and put it in the kitchen... as my wife was cooking... from -10f with 0% humidity to 70f with 80% humidity... I think you can guess what happened.

After allowing this thing to dry out as best as I could there were still large water spots on the inside of the rear element. Since the lens was pretty much shot anyways, I tried my hand at disassembling the lens and cleaning out the mess.

All went well at first... Got it apart, got it cleaned, got it reassmebled. All screws in their original location, all shims where they should be etc. The issue now is extremely soft images at larger apertures.

Anything below about f5.6 is borderline useless. At f8 it's nice and sharp... at f2.8 I may as well have smeared the lens with vasoline. It never used to be this soft wide open. Yes, I understand IQ suffers with big apertures, but not like this. Never like this.

Any thoughts as to whether or not this is fixable without sending it in and spending the replacement value of the lens on repair? I don't mind making this my kick around lens to take in dangerous situations, but it used to be a really nice sharp lens and if I can get that back

 

[jcdeboever]

Well, you didn't get it back together correctly so chances are you won't recognize where you fell short. Send it in or at least call to see what it costs.

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[Stradawhovious]

Well, you didn't get it back together correctly so chances are you won't recognize where you fell short. Send it in or at least call to see what it costs.

Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk

I can see where you'd say that, however I'm quite mechanically inclined, everything was labeled and indexed... every screw in it's original hole and the one cluster of elements I removed put back in its original orientation. It's hard to believe anything isn't as it was, but I suppose it could be the culprit. Either way, it's a moot point now. Unless there's an easy fix I'm going to chalk it up to a loss. It will make a pretty paperweight.

 

[jcdeboever]

Well, you didn't get it back together correctly so chances are you won't recognize where you fell short. Send it in or at least call to see what it costs.

Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk

I can see where you'd say that, however I'm quite mechanically inclined, everything was labeled and indexed... every screw in it's original hole and the one cluster of elements I removed put back in its original orientation. It's hard to believe anything isn't as it was, but I suppose it could be the culprit. Either way, it's a moot point now. Unless there's an easy fix I'm going to chalk it up to a loss. It will make a pretty paperweight.

Well take it back apart. Look carefully at the element.

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[Stradawhovious]

Well take it back apart. Look carefully at the element.

Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk

I have. I have even clocked the rear element cluster to all three of it's available positions just in case I didn't index it properly when it was reassembled... No go. In looking at reported repair costs, it will cost almost as much to send it in to get it fixed as it would to replace it, so I may as well just leave well enough alone and try and sweet talk my wife into buying something else. at about f/5.6 and smaller it's still razor sharp, so at least I can still use it as my high speed shot camera. At least now I won't feel bad about having to clean exploded fruit and egg out of it.