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M8 shutter problems


IWC Doppel

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I have a friend with an M8 (I had an M8 and now an M9, I have not experienced any shutter problems)

 

Basically he took a picture and it coughed, beeped a few times and displayed some errors on the screen. First one was something like 'drive blocked' followed by 'shutter fault'.

 

It was evidently cold outside but not that cold, maybe around 2 degrees C.

 

Finally just switching the on/off switch around through all the settings, when he switched it to 'timer' it recocked and has been fine since.

 

Any advice or idea ?

 

Tks

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I'd suspect the battery. My reasoning is that cocking the shutter draws a largish amount of current. An elderly battery which is not freshly loaded might suffer a drop in voltage at lower temperatures which in turn would prompt the computer in the camera to produce error messages.

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Two degrees is close to the lower limit of the temperature range. If the camera was allowed to come to ambient temperature, the battery capacity would certainly have been significantly diminished, possibly enough to drop below operating capacity during the shutter sequence, especially on an older battery.

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Yes comes from the battery probably but i would check if the firmware is up-to-date as well since discreet and continuous modes did cause some shutter problems between firmware updates 2.004 and 2.005 (or 2.014) if i recall correctly.

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Two degrees is close to the lower limit of the temperature range. If the camera was allowed to come to ambient temperature, the battery capacity would certainly have been significantly diminished, possibly enough to drop below operating capacity during the shutter sequence, especially on an older battery.

 

I have recently used my M8 at -5°C without any issues.

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Quite possible. The outside temperature is not relevant - the temperature inside the battery cells is what matters. There are variables - was your camera cold through and through? - the battery sits in the middle.- That will take quite some time. Did you keep it under your coat ? That will keep it warmish. Was your battery in optimum condition? That makes quite a difference. Etc.

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I've had repeated problems with the shutter re-cocking in cold environments. Usually needs a few minutes in a bag or under a jacket to recover. I've recently had the problem with a new fully charged battery, previously I thought it was a battery fault as the older the battery the more cold seems to affect it.

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I've had repeated problems with the shutter re-cocking in cold environments. Usually needs a few minutes in a bag or under a jacket to recover. I've recently had the problem with a new fully charged battery, previously I thought it was a battery fault as the older the battery the more cold seems to affect it.

 

I had that problem and just lived with it for a while. I sent it to Leica last month, noting the problem and they fixed it charging the standard CLA rate.

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Do you know much the standard CLA rate is ?

 

It depends where you send it, but I think it is about 475 euros (SOLMS) or dollars (Leica NJ). I made the mistake of sending mine to SOLMs and it was more expensive than sending to Leica NJ because of the exchange rate.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I had the same issue when operating the camera at -20°C. First the recock started to be late which caused the "drive blocked" messages, then they changed to "shutter fault" but the camera still soldiered on. After 20 minutes the shutter finally stopped moving, but it recovered quickly inside the house.

 

I've had the camera in a CLA since then, but I have also avoided shooting the Leica at those temperatures.

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