[paulelescoces]

Lens now partly fixed.... now have aperture control, still dont have AF back yet.... hoping a few more days in Rice/sun should sort it out.... fingers crossed.

[Peter Zack]

maybe lightly rub electrical contacts with clean pencil eraser, mineralization could
form as an oxide and inhibit normal operation.

Sorry Bill but never use a pencil eraser. The gold plate on the contacts is only microns in thickness. Once that's rubbed off, your contacts will corrode. Always use proper contact cleaner. Pencil erasers have fine abrasive material in it and will eventually ruin the contacts. Also you can get debris in the small openings around the contacts that could cause other conductivity issues.

If the lens is begining to resond, then try it on the camera again. This time manually focus the lens several times and then try the AF again. MF'ing the lens can get it working many times.

[BillM]

Know what your saying Pete, cant say 'lightly' enough
has worked in past both in hobbies and in matters professionally related.
gold should'nt oxidize, thats why its used, 'stuff' builds up from time to time tho.

[sebberry]

I realize that the key word in WR is "resistant" and not "proof", but the mere fact that Pentax equips the body and lenses with weather seals and markets them as such should mean that it will perform reliably in wet conditions.

More like "It might be weather resistant, the seals might work as intended but they're just there for fun".

[paulelescoces]

An Update on this story...

Camera still going well...

unfortunately, I found that Lenses & rice do not mix well.... noticed a few flecks of rice floating about inside the lens and that the zoom mechanism became gritty... also the aperture level lost its full motion....

took it to Reflecta in Spain who handle the service for this region... just got off the phone from them and they told me it cannot be fixed and I can pick it up free of charge!... total nightmare.

when I go and pick it up I will try and get some more info from them as to what the issues are... unsure if the rice converted a solvable problem into a larger one... anyway careful with the rice.

Any suggestions on next steps? dont see too many options but will likely resist to fork out for another.

[Peter Zack]

How did rice get inside the lens? I realise I was the one that suggested this but I posted to lay it on top not all over the lens.

At this point I'm not sure if a service center says they can't fix it. What can't they fix? Removing any bits of rice or something else?

This has me baffled. It's a sealed lens. How could something as large as a grain of rice get inside the lens? Dust shouldn't even be able to get in there.

[Reportage]

This has me baffled. It's a sealed lens. How could something as large as a grain of rice get inside the lens? Dust shouldn't even be able to get in there.

That is a very good question

[krypticide]

That is a very good question

I think it's sealed only outside and up to the o-ring. I don't have my 16-50mm handy, but I believe a gap can form at the final objective depending on the zoom or focus position.

[philbaum]

Perhaps its too late now for the lens, just saw this thread.

But i ordered a lens from ebay, old mechanical 50mm lens, and it was left in my mail box for about a week before i found it there, with snow on the ground. brought it inside (this was 2 winters ago) and there was fog on the inside of the lens.

Took the wife's hair dryer, and rotated the lens in my hand as i held the hair dryer blowing on it at a lower level of heat. Holding hte lens in my hand assured it would not overheat.

Anyway, the fog started getting smaller, smaller, smaller and finally disappeared. So i was going to sugget that a little hair dryer heat on the externals might help a bit. I wouldn't suggest blowing into the mirror chamber on thge camera or letting the externals get too hot, thats t he reason for hand holding it while the gentle warming is going on.

worked for me once.

best wishes and sorry this happened to you - tough luck!!

[paulelescoces]

I will need to ask some more specific questions to the service centre....
I am actually half thinking (hoping) that they never looked in any detail... even though I explained the whole situation... the description they had in the service form was "water entered lens"... I could imagine a technician reading that desctription, feeling the lens mechanics are jamming and drawing a conclusion that it was salt water and concluding the lens was irrepairable without taking a real look... Normally they also charge 20EUR for a quotation... I get it back for free, I imagine thats more due to the fact that they have done minimal/no work on it.

If is just a combination of minimal water and a few flecks of rice I dont understand exactly what part is past repair... alhtough I dont really understand the complexity of the lens build so maybe it depends how far the rice reached.

as to "how the rice entered"... I left the lens on top of the rice... zoomed out... in this position, without the rear lens cap it is possible for rice to sneak in on the mount side... in hindsight I could probably if thought this through better before :P

also, I have seen service information posted previously for manual focus lenses... any idea on the complexity of unbuilding (for drying/cleaning) of a DA* lens?... I am a mechanical engineer by background and quite handy although have no experience with these things (ie. what tools needed, jumping springs to watch out for etc..).... if it is the last resort I would like to take it apart myself before binning/shelving it.

[paulelescoces]

Just contacted the technician who reviewed the lens, was very helpful and gave me some more insight into why "unrepairable" and will send some photos of the internals.

He said that the small pieces of rice are no issue but that the internals are very oxidized... he suggested that it looks like a good quantity of water entered the camera for it to get to this state... and it looks like it entered via the mount end. He said that we could send it on to be repaired to the pentax service centre who deals with the SDM motors but noted that this is likely to cost 300€+ and to his opinion was not worth it ( I assume the service centre that handles SDM is that located in france, is the location of the Pentax Euro HQ).

I am interested to see the photos (I will post them once received) but am concerned that any... and even more a significant quantity of water can enter while mounted to a K20D, again, completely understand the difference between waterproof and "weather sealed" but in this case it was clearly not sealed vs the weather. Strongly thinking to try and contact pentax or others directly as "product does not meet its description as sold".

[paulelescoces]

Photos Attached... see what he meant by the oxidation... interestingly... following the oxidation, looks like the water entered through 2 rightmost electrical contacts (in top photo)... can kind of see this also in photo 3 with the mark left on the circuit board.

[Ash]

That's some serious corrosion Paul.
Unfortunately that does look like a big repair job - or a write-off.
Sorry to hear this.

[Reportage]

The mount end...a bit odd to put lens as weather sealed when the mount itself could be prone to water and etc. Maybe somewhere in the T&C is listed as lens being weather sealed and not the mount but i am not going to read all that.

Thats quite a loss but thanks for sharing.

[interested_observer]

Maybe I am off base, and I know that seals dry out and crack over time, but isn't the 16-50 a DA* lens that is sealed and "weather resistant"? I am guessing that non SDM lenses that are WR would fair a bit better (being simpler)?