nikon f80 - sick or dead?

[peterlg]

mine has been hanging on its peg for 3-4 years now, not used! Took it down the other day - no life in it so I took out fresh batteries and loaded them - still no life! I measured the old batteries they were all right.
Whatever I do the camera does not respond, have cleaned the poles in the battery compartment and have pushed all buttons, turned all knobs.
Do you think this is a lost case?
Peter

[big paul]

what a perfect excuse to buy another camera .if you haven't got a Nikon f5 maybe this is the time to buy one..

[John King]

The F80 is a good camera (I have 2) but I have always considered them less than robust say compared to a F100 or even a F801. They are not expensive 2nd hand now but it may be worth getting someone just to look it over

[GoodOldNorm]

Try putting the battery in and leaving it switched on over night it may need time to respond. I read somewhere that the F80's do suffer from sudden death due to a fuse failing in the circuit. Second hand F80's fetch £30-£40 on Ebay. If you end up throwing it away please throw it my way:D, I dropped my f80 and cracked the base. It still works and I use it as my backpack camera because it is so light.

[Mike O'Pray]

Some of us such as me and others here and I suspect you as well Peter belong to an era where if something went wrong you could see it or find it. It was missing, fractured, loose etc.

Modern stuff suffers from a kind of invisible and often irreversible death such as fuses in circuits and the younger generation accept that you simply throw it away without wasteful, in their eyes, curiosity about repairs.

Norm's suggestion sounds worthwhile. Unfortunately I'll take my "it must be repairable at a reasonable cost" attitude to my grave.

Best of luck from a fellow sufferer who "rages against the dying of the light" as Dylan Thomas said


Mike

[Richard Gould]

I agree with Mike, like many others on here, I grew up with mechinal cameras, the only battery needed being for the meter, and if the meter packed up then you used your hand held, which most, if not all, photographers had, if something went wrong then you could tinker with it yourself or take it to the local camera repair person, and it was always repairable, these days with the all singing all dancing and all electric cameras, if something goes badly wrong getting it repaired you need not just a camera repairer but a electronic expert, so mostly they are thrown away as getting them repaired is so expensive, perhaps that is why I collect and use old cameras, you can easily and fairly cheaply get them repaired still, even if the local camera repairer is mostly gone today, I will use the old cameras as long as I can, My last ''modern'' all singing all dancing cameras were sold a while ago and so I only have mechinal cameras left, and my collection is still growing, no more camera battery's for me
Richard

[youngrichard]

As a last resort try hoicking the battery contacts at the bottom of the compartment up with some sort of hook on the end of a stick. Repeated insertion of batteries may eventually imperceptibly push them down out of contact. I have had this trick save me a a trip to Nikon and a few quid.
Richard

[Phil]

My last ''modern'' all singing all dancing cameras were sold a while ago and so I only have mechinal cameras left, and my collection is still growing, no more camera battery's for me
Richard

Having been at the wrong end of a long hillwalk with an inoperable Pentax 67 due to something wrong with the powering of the shutter, I wholeheartedly agree. Anything that relies on battery power for the shutter is a no-no.
As for the Nikon - chuck it and get an F2 . . they are around £100 these days and will see you out . .
Phil

[peterlg]

Friends, have now tried to leave it "ON" for 24 hours, have fiddled with the spring-loaded contacts at the bottom of the battery compartment : there is nothing that works!!! So it's for the skip but obviously if somebody can use it for parts i'll post to him/her. Did I understand that GoodOldNorm would be interested? just PM me.
Peter

[peterlg]

And by the way; I stopped using battery-operated cameras several years ago, except for my Leica MP but the battery is only for the light meter. Have also got an M3 and recently a IIIg, both have been CLA'ed and they work just so well! I always carry a handheld light meter and then I'm getting accustomed (slowly) to the sunny-16 technology.
Have had some Nikon SLRs over the years but abandoned them because I had troubles holding the camera still even at 1/60s - troubles I don't have with rangefinders.
Peter

[Richard Gould]

one of the many reasons I love using these old cameras is that with Rangefinders,folders, viewfinder cameras and TLR's is that, without that clunky mirror and extra weight I can easily hand hold down to 1/8, or with the spped setting on many of them, 1/5 sec
Richard

[peterlg]

it's on its way to GoodOldNorm
Peter

[GoodOldNorm]

Thankyou Peter, when I remove the bottom base plate(which I need) I will have a poke around inside, if I can get it working I will send it back to you.

[peterlg]

Oh no, please, please, not back to me:shock:. The truth is I have already too many cameras. Now its yours and let's it can be useful to you.
Peter