[Kunzite]

Add the DA* 200mm and the DA* 300mm on the list of lenses with SDM micromotors. Coincidentally, those are the only lenses with a SDM micromotor that are officially FF compatible.

[drypenn]

The SDM of DA*55 failed me past the warranty before the second anniversary. I had it sent to Japan last Feb 22 for SDM motor replacement. I’m still waiting for it to come back. It’s too good not to be repaired.

Hopefully, it will last longer.

[clickclick]

The SDM of DA*55 failed me past the warranty before the second anniversary. I had it sent to Japan last Feb 22 for SDM motor replacement. I’m still waiting for it to come back. It’s too good not to be repaired.

Hopefully, it will last longer.

Do you know when it was made? Hoping you will say 2012 or earlier.

[drypenn]

Do you know when it was made? Hoping you will say 2012 or earlier.

Bought 2016 from BH. Most likely post 2012 production

[VAV]

Bought 2016 from BH. Most likely post 2012 production

That is not very encouraging...need to decide if it is worth the risk for me.

[Rondec]

As others have said, SDM is just a label. It has been stuck on the Tamron made DFA zooms (24-70, 15-30) and on a bunch of the DA * lenses. Each one has a different motor and different propensity for failure. The 16-50 and 50-135 are far and away the most common lenses to experience this failure, although the 60-250 is not uncommon. That said, you never can tell, because I have a 16-50 and 50-135, both of which are about 10 years old and both have functional SDM.

All lenses with in lens motors are probably more prone to failure than screw drive, but I think you are pretty safe if you avoid the DA * zooms (even those are probably OK if you don't mind converting them to screw drive).

[angerdan]

That is not very encouraging...need to decide if it is worth the risk for me.

You can't compare the old DA* SDM with the new D FA SDM motors. They share only the label, everything else is different!
Reliability, speed, motor construction - everything is is more advanced now.
The DC motor is expected to be very reliable, since it's used on premium lenses like the D FA* 70-200, DA 560mm and DA 20-40mm Limited.

[woodywesty]

Reading about SDM issues makes me want to vomit... I bought three brand new DA* lenses, the 16-50, the 50-135 and the 300 and they all failed. The 50-135 failed within two weeks of delivery. Sent it back to B&H and they replaced it with a new one which failed in one week. While I love my K-3 and K-3ll cameras and my 15, 31, 77 and 100 Pentax lenses I will never buy another Ricoh/Pentax lens, EVER! The bottom line is that Ricoh knowingly sold defective lenses to thousands of people around the world and in my mind they stole $3,000 from me. I have very much wanted to buy the new K1 mark 2 full frame to do scenery and night sky photography but I need a fast 15-30 lens that accepts various front filters and the Tamron lens doesn't allow for this because of the front element. Sadly, I'll be buying a Nikon full frame and wide angle zoom for my needs. Ricoh is not delivering on the wide angle zoom end or the long end nor are they accepting responsibility for screwing thousands of customers.

[normhead]

I wonder if people still wonder about the sensor stand issues with Nikons, which was happening about the same time as the SDM thing. I mean logically, if you're still asking about SDM failure, you should also be wondering if a D850 has a sensor stand problem. Yet I don't ever hear that.

I have two SDM lenses, my DA*60-250 is over 5 years old and has never kind of issue. And it's failure rate is no worse than any company's electric motor failure issues. It blows me away that this could even come up. Honestly, I haven't thought about it since Pentax started putting upgraded circuitry and motors into the original 16-50 and 50-135. That was five years ago.

I'd be interested in knowing where this information is coming from.

The simple fact is at the hight of the SDM "crisis" Pentax lenses had a better frequency of repair record than any brand on lensrentals.com. Even with a design flaw in their top of the line lenses, they were still better than everyone else. It is incredible that that fact is so rarely mentioned in the discussion of SDM failure.

Sure pentax was "bad", but everyone else was worse. But that data camera from actually tracking of rented lenses from a respected organization. Not internet hysteria.

The bst answer to "Is SDM still an issue?" would be "Don't be silly, that is so old news."

[angerdan]

1. I bought three brand new DA* lenses, the 16-50, the 50-135 and the 300 and they all failed. The 50-135 failed within two weeks of delivery. Sent it back to B&H and they replaced it with a new one which failed in one week.
2. While I love my K-3 and K-3ll cameras and my 15, 31, 77 and 100 Pentax lenses I will never buy another Ricoh/Pentax lens, EVER!
3. The bottom line is that Ricoh knowingly sold defective lenses to thousands of people around the world and in my mind they stole $3,000 from me.
4. I have very much wanted to buy the new K1 mark 2 full frame to do scenery and night sky photography but I need a fast 15-30 lens that accepts various front filters and the Tamron lens doesn't allow for this because of the front element.
5. Sadly, I'll be buying a Nikon full frame and wide angle zoom for my needs.
6. Ricoh is not delivering on the wide angle zoom end or the long end nor are they accepting responsibility for screwing thousands of customers.

1. In which year did you buy the DA* lenses? And in which year the primes did show SDM problems?
2. Why didn't you convert the lenses to screwdrive, which would make them even faster than SDM? How To: Convert SDM to ScrewDrive + Video - PentaxForums.com
3. They didn't sell defective lenses, the problem was only the SDM motor with 2007-2012 produced lenses. Pentax SDM Failure Survey Results - Articles and Tips | PentaxForums.com
4. Didn't you send them in for repair during the 2year warranty until they're fixed?
5. The FA 20mm does offer a filter thread and is cheaper than the D FA 15-30mm.
6. With the great D FA 15-30mm Ricoh offers an exceptional ultra wide angle full frame zoom lens and for the long end there's the full frame image circle DA 560mm.

Something else, in this PF Staff article DC is called "2nd-generation SDM":
Pentax Lens Terminology - Articles and Tips | PentaxForums.com
Is this meaning that 2007-2012 the 1st generation SDM lenses has been introduced, 2010-2016 2nd generation (DC) and 2015-2019 the 3rd generation SDM ?

[normhead]

Reading about SDM issues makes me want to vomit... I bought three brand new DA* lenses, the 16-50, the 50-135 and the 300 and they all failed. The 50-135 failed within two weeks of delivery. Sent it back to B&H and they replaced it with a new one which failed in one week. While I love my K-3 and K-3ll cameras and my 15, 31, 77 and 100 Pentax lenses I will never buy another Ricoh/Pentax lens, EVER! The bottom line is that Ricoh knowingly sold defective lenses to thousands of people around the world and in my mind they stole $3,000 from me. I have very much wanted to buy the new K1 mark 2 full frame to do scenery and night sky photography but I need a fast 15-30 lens that accepts various front filters and the Tamron lens doesn't allow for this because of the front element. Sadly, I'll be buying a Nikon full frame and wide angle zoom for my needs. Ricoh is not delivering on the wide angle zoom end or the long end nor are they accepting responsibility for screwing thousands of customers.

When this was an issue I read an article on another site from a Canon user, who also had three lenses fail, one of which was more expensive than anything you can buy for a Pentax, who then sold all her gear and switched to Nikon. So, I have to ask, what's your point? People have had problems with Pentaxes, people have had problems with all camera companies. Lensrentals say in the big picture Pentax is as good as you can do. So what's your point?

You do have my sympathy if that's what you're looking for. But apart from thst, what happened to you could have happened to anyone with any camera system, it's just not really related to Pentax.

The whole SDM thing as far as I can tell was completely fabricated by Pentax users who had no knowledge of the camera industry trend towards lower prices through less quality control. Lenrentals has and others report Canon and Nikon lenses that cost over ten grand being dead on arrival or failing almost as soon as they were out of warranty. It wasn't and isn't just SDM.

Pentax forum is a really good resource not enjoyed by other company users. The down side tot hat is once the hysteria starts it's tough to shut it down. It's one stop shop where a lens like the original 16-50 will be reported and analysed. Other cameras may not have that kind of resource. That doesn't mean they don't have the issue. It just means their aren't 200 people in one place screaming about it.

If you install higher than industry standard quality, and higher than industry standard quality control, you won't be "the value brand" anymore will you?

[SSGGeezer]

Glad the DA 17-70 F4 I bought here on the forums still behaves beautifully. People miss out on this lens due to overall reduction in rating due to the reviewers who had the SDM failure. I would really like to see numbers on failures as a percentage of lenses built.

I suspect it would not be nearly as bad as you might expect based on the complaints and paranoia seen on the internet.

I think the old saying about a happy customer telling two or three people about their experience and an unhappy customer telling 7-10 people may be accurate and distorts how bad things may have truly been.

[woodywesty]

1. In which year did you buy the DA* lenses? And in which year the primes did show SDM problems?
2. Why didn't you convert the lenses to screwdrive, which would make them even faster than SDM? How To: Convert SDM to ScrewDrive + Video - PentaxForums.com
3. They didn't sell defective lenses, the problem was only the SDM motor with 2007-2012 produced lenses. Pentax SDM Failure Survey Results - Articles and Tips | PentaxForums.com
4. Didn't you send them in for repair during the 2year warranty until they're fixed?
5. The FA 20mm does offer a filter thread and is cheaper than the D FA 15-30mm.
6. With the great D FA 15-30mm Ricoh offers an exceptional ultra wide angle full frame zoom lens and for the long end there's the full frame image circle DA 560mm.

Something else, in this PF Staff article DC is called "2nd-generation SDM":
Pentax Lens Terminology - Articles and Tips | PentaxForums.com
Is this meaning that 2007-2012 the 1st generation SDM lenses has been introduced, 2010-2016 2nd generation (DC) and 2015-2019 the 3rd generation SDM ?

I bought my DA* lenses in 2014 and 2015 from B&H.

The 50-135 failed after 5 days and was replaced by B&H and the replacement failed two weeks later. I bought the DA* 300 in 2014 and it had started failing within six months. Also bought the DA* 16-50 in 2014 and it failed early this year. And I shouldn't have to pay to have them converted to 30 year old focusing technology. Ricoh should give me and others our money back or make good on their product! Ricoh should have Uncle Vanya as paid staff as he's saving their asses.

Ricoh did indeed sell defective lenses... the motor IS part of the lens and its crap engineering or crap production!

There was NO two year warranty period. I did send in the 50-135 after the second lens failed in two weeks. Got the lens back and it failed soon after. After that I threw it in the closet and after awhile had Uncle Vanya convert it. We shouldn't have to put up with this crap from the manufacturer as they are very expensive lenses.

I looked at the new DA lens made by Tamron and it has received some scathing reviews for QC issues.(B&H reviews) Also, if I wanted a Tamron lens I'd buy one. I want the quality that I have in my 15, 31 and 77mm lenses or the better Sigma lenses. I want the optical quality that is in the DA* lenses and I want them to actually focus. Basically Ricoh isn't offering anything on the long end except a telescope and on the wide end their 2.8 zoom lenses have issues and there is no 2.8 15mm. Thanks for your time and feedback but I'm very frustrated, a bit pissed and stuck with a system that I've invested heavily in and can't afford to jump ship.

[normhead]

Thanks for your time and feedback but I'm very frustrated, a bit pissed and stuck with a system that I've invested heavily in and can't afford to jump ship.

Well then, I guess you'll just have to come on here and complain for the next 10 years. What are you hoping to accomplish with this. You going to take it to your grave? Life's too short.

[woodywesty]

Well then, I guess you'll just have to come on here and complain for the next 10 years. What are you hoping to accomplish with this. You going to take it to your grave? Life's too short.

Thank you for your kind consideration Norm...