[Leica] Weird camera behavior

[Harrison McClary <harrison@jnlcom.com>]

This past weekend I was shooting in North Carolina and I had several 
weird things happen with my Leica gear:

1) on my R6 the shutter appeared to drag on 3 frames.  The result was 3 
frames looking like I was shooting with a flash on the camera but had the 
sync speed wrong-only I was using god light (the sun) so the only thing I 
can think that happened is that the shutter was not opening all the way.  
Only happened on 3 frames in the middle of the roll.  I shot probably 15 
rolls of film through this camera this past weekend and the problem was 
only on those 3 frames.  Anyone ever seen this before.  The only times I 
have seen it is when the shutter is totally trashed, never a single 
incident like this.

2) As I was shooting training camp I noticed that the front of my 180 
seemed loose.  The lens hood seemed to be rotating very loosely and I was 
surprised at this.  I then realized that the entire front half of the 
lens was unscrewing.  I tightened it back up and am assuming this is ok.  
I have had lenses get loose before and this was all that was needed.  Do 
I need to send it in to someone for a check up?  It is still quite sharp 
at widest apertures so I don't think there are any focusing issues here.

3) Once again my R8 acted squirrely flashing all diodes on the back panel 
at the same time & locking up.  Pascal suggested I return it to Leica.  
The only reason I am hesitating is that I was letting the editor of our 
magazines work with it so he would not look too out of place on the 
sidelines of the game.  He did open the back of the camera 1/2 way 
through the roll (you know how those word types are just don't understand 
cameras or photogs at all!).  Anyway could the flashing diodes be from 
reaching the end of the roll and the counter only being at 16 frames from 
being reset?  Once again has anyone seen this on the R8.  It was a VERY 
humid night with a severe thunder storm having dumped a lot of rain on 
the field about 1/2 hour before game time.

Any comments welcome.  I am afraid I am about to be in the middle of the 
busiest time of the year for our company and not have a single damn 
camera to use.  



Harrison McClary
http://people.delphi.com/hmphoto