[Robert N]

The autofocus drive on my HD Pentax-DA 16-85mm F3.5-5.6 ED DC WR lens became faulty a few months ago (the autofocus became erratic). The lens was my workhorse, was 4.5 years old and had taken around 13,000 shots. From the list of UK repairers, John Pye Ltd was listed as the warranty repairer. I sent the lens to John Pye for repair and the predicted turnround was 4 weeks. However, after 4 calls to check progress, it took 5 months to get a lens returned. The technicians could not repair the fault and requested a new replacement from Ricoh. The new replacement was provided at the cost of a repair, at £279. However, in this situation, the warranty period is only 6 months.
As Pentax lenses with DC focus drives are meant to be reliable, I am hoping the failure I experienced is a rare event (has anyone else experienced DC lens focus failures?).
My stand-in lens was the SMC Pentax-DA 35mm F2.4 AL, which performed extremely well, with superb image quality. It is a pity this lens is not WR (which would obviously make it more expensive).

[Paul the Sunman]

See my recent thread on my 16-85 woes. In my case it wasn't the DC motor, but a faulty gmr focussing circuit. I had it back, fully repaired for Aus$193 by the Australian distributer CRK, in about 2 weeks.

It's certainly a wonderful walk-around lens for APS-C. It was by far my most used lens for sightseeing on a recent trip to Europe, despite its AF issues (before repair).

[Thagomizer]

My 16-85 is being repaired for the third time. The first time the aperture control stopped working. Fortunately it was within the original warranty. Most recently it's been the autofocus system that's acted up, with erratic hunting and indecisiveness. I had it fixed in June, but the same fault recurred. Fortunately it was within the repair warranty period. I like the lens's results very much, so it's been worth it to get it fixed. I just hope it stays fixed!

[Paul the Sunman]

I also had an internal screw come loose early on, but not within the warranty period. It jammed the zoom mechanism. It was repaired by CRK free of charge.

[premek.b]

I had the 16-85 focus repaired twice, a year apart, due both times to a faulty GMR sensor (the lens worked but failed to obtain focus, esp on some focal lengths). The lens had to be sent to Germany as the national service was not able to fix it. It all happened, fortunately, during the warranty period and the second time it got fixed well, and since then it works without a glitch.

[NigelS]

Had the samer problem with my 2 year old HD 28-105 FA lens. It too has the DC motor and focussing became not existent at anything over 28mm. The focus pojnt would just hunt back and forth and eventually give up. UK repairer 'AJ Pye' could not repair (they say no available parts?) so it was sent over to Eurpope. That was at beginning of October 2022. Just been informed that the lens needs a new mechanical assembly, whatever that means, at a cost of approx £500 !!

So much for DC reliable lens from Pentax! Looks like DA and FA lenses with DC motors are all suffering same problem. How they can justify the cost of the repair so high is beyond me. On the continent you can pick up a new version of this lens for just over £500, and in America, Adorama are retailing them for less than $400 at the moment.