Help! Cleaning Problem

[sibeymai]

Had a (I hope minor) disaster with my new Olympus E-510 which I need some advice about.

By misuse the camera had some dust/dirt enter the camera body. I used a blower (not specifically a camera blower but good for the purpose) to remove this but unknown to me the blower had some liquid inside (it had been used to inflate balloons). Some liquid ended up splashed on the mirror, the viewfinder plane above the mirror and surrounding surfaces in the area behind the lens mount.

I then used a lens cleaning cloth to dry the surfaces Unfortunately the cloth was not 100% lint free (it was the best thing I had at the time). To my dismay I found that the interior surfaces behind the lens mount are coated with a sticky coating. It would appear this is done to trap loose dirt/dust particles dislodged by the self-cleaning ultrasonic mechanism before they can travel past the shutter plane to the image sensor. My previous camera, a film SLR, had no such sticky coatings so there was never a problem with lint. It could always be blown out. Now I have lint firmly attached to these surfaces. The mirror and viewfinder plane are clean. The sticky coating is applied to the surfaces making up the chamber housing the mirror and viewfinder plane in the area between the lens mount and the shutter plane.

The Olympus service centre said these surfaces can not be cleaned and the assembly must be replaced at a cost of 10,000Bt which is more than half the cost of the camera.

Some cleaning methods being considered:

1. magnifying glass and needle-point tweezers. Won't ever be able to get all the lint but those with a free end that I can grab I should be able to remove. What's left will be stuck to the surfaces and I hope won't interfere with the image. This is my preferred solution.

2. Use a cotton swab soaked in isopropyl alcohol and swab the sticky surfaces. This should dislodge the stuck lint and allow it to be removed. However, it's likely to dissolve the sticky film rendering the function of the coating inoperative. I assume the coating is there to catch dust and dirt particles dislodged by the camera's ultrasonic cleaning mechanism. So degrading or removing this film would degrade the performance of the self-cleaning function. At worst I assume I'd have to blow out the dust/dirt more regularly just as with a film SLR.

While the stuck pieces of lint may not affect photography (I've yet to thoroughly test their effect), the point is they should not be there and I would like to remove them.

I'm interested to hear your comments about whether I really need to worry about the lint at all once I've removed what I can with tweezers.

Is what's remaining likely to affect the quality of photographs as it will not be directly in the image path between the lens and the image sensor (but since the lint is coloured I'm concerned if this may have some effect/interplay with the light passing by.

Also, what comments or problems do you think may occur with the cleaning methods I'm considering ? Any alternatives ?

The user manual does say to use a mechanical blower but it doesn't specifically say not to use cloth and makes no mention of the sticky coating. There must be plenty of people moving from film to dSLR like I did. Olympus is in my opinion quite negligent in not making reference to the use of a sticky coating in their documentation.

This has turned out to be quite a trap for me moving from a film SLR to this particular dSLR. Out of curiosity, do other dSLR manufacturers also use sticky coatings in their cameras ?

[The Vulcan]

Personally I'd leave all alone and shoot of a few dozen frames to see if there is any visible effect on the image.

If nothing shows then nothing to do.

Conversely, if a problem shows up then maybe the tweezers mode may help.

I MOST DEFINITELY WOULD NOT APPLY ANY TYPE OF SOLUTION.

Good luck

[Bard]

Sorry to read about your mishap, one solution I have read others have used is a gaffer tape to pull off the lint. I would be hesitant to try it out but it might do it for you, I would see if the camera is still usable and use it like that and in case it wasn't I would try the gaffer tape trick it could save you 10k baht. If not the only way out could be a new sensor...

I do not know of all the manufacturers but Canon now uses a special coating to prevent dust from sticking, maybe Olympus use something similar but with the water ingress it solved up the coating and made it sticky...

Best of luck

Cheers Bard

[sibeymai]

Thanks. Definitely a thorough test required first before any action. The tape idea is good and worth a try. Have ditched the isopropyl alcohol option.

I'll post pack here later with my observations on the test shots.