Adjustment of M7 Metering?

[Mark II]

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Does anyone know if it is possible to recalibrate the M7 metering without a trip to Wetzlar?

In January, I sent my M7 to Leica for a very expensive  curtain replacement. It came back and I shot a set of Delta 100 films to test it only to find that the focus was wildly adrift (a 50mm f1.4 shot wide open at 2m front focussing about 15cm). I recalibrated the focus myself, shooting more Delta 100 to confirm all was ok.

Then I switched to Delta 400 at EI1600 for night photography only to discover that the metering was also completely miscalibrated. At EI1600 with the lens cap on it tells me that I need 1/180th second. The problem exists at all ISO settings, but is proportional to the speed such that at low ISO in bright conditions the issue is masked. 

FWIW I have email Leica customer care, but they do not answer. After several days I then emailed Leica’s general information line, who replied immediately to say that they had forwarded the information to the service group. But still no reply from Leica service. Hence if there is anything that I can do to avoid Leica I would rather try that as I have zero confidence in their service and support. 

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[Paul Verrips]

9 hours ago, Mark II said:

Does anyone know if it is possible to recalibrate the M7 metering without a trip to Wetzlar?

In January, I sent my M7 to Leica for a very expensive  curtain replacement. It came back and I shot a set of Delta 100 films to test it only to find that the focus was wildly adrift (a 50mm f1.4 shot wide open at 2m front focussing about 15cm). I recalibrated the focus myself, shooting more Delta 100 to confirm all was ok.

Then I switched to Delta 400 at EI1600 for night photography only to discover that the metering was also completely miscalibrated. At EI1600 with the lens cap on it tells me that I need 1/180th second. The problem exists at all ISO settings, but is proportional to the speed such that at low ISO in bright conditions the issue is masked. 

FWIW I have email Leica customer care, but they do not answer. After several days I then emailed Leica’s general information line, who replied immediately to say that they had forwarded the information to the service group. But still no reply from Leica service. Hence if there is anything that I can do to avoid Leica I would rather try that as I have zero confidence in their service and support. 

 

[Paul Verrips]

I always have contact with Andrea.Frankl@leica-camera.com an email her direct.
Sometimes i have to send a reminder, but in the end, everything is o.k.

[Mark II]

Thanks for the suggestion, although I hesitate to contact named people directly - not least they might be away on holiday etc. The camera is now on its way back to Wetzlar...

FWIW, everyone I have ever dealt with in Leica tries to be as helpful and courteous as possible. But the service organisation is sadly and hopelessly under resourced. 

[250swb]

On 3/31/2019 at 8:06 AM, Mark II said:

 

Then I switched to Delta 400 at EI1600 for night photography only to discover that the metering was also completely miscalibrated. At EI1600 with the lens cap on it tells me that I need 1/180th second. The problem exists at all ISO settings, but is proportional to the speed such that at low ISO in bright conditions the issue is masked. 

 

This really doesn't make much sense. I assume you meant to say 'with the lens cap off' because the M7 has TTL metering, and that with 'EI1600' you meant to say 1600 ISO? But without saying what the aperture is why wouldn't 1/180th of a second be a correct exposure, or any other value, no one here knows how dark it was? It should also be remembered that meters become less sensitive in low light. But if you feel your meter is a little bit off first check to see that the correct voltage battery has been installed, and if it still persists you can adjust the meter by altering the ISO. So if your camera is under exposing by half a stop with film rated at 1600 ISO set the meter to 1000 ISO.

Edited April 4, 2019 by 250swb

[Mark II]

Sorry - probably not very clear.

Put the lens or body cap on (ie complete darkness) and the meter never reads less than 1/12th at ISO 100, or 1/180th at ISO 1600 (the error scales with the ISO setting). Hardly "a little bit off", and the was metering fine before the camera was sent in for an unrelated repair...

I usually shoot at night in manual and typically expect to be around 1/50th at f1.4 with ISO1600, so a meter that never reads slower than 1/180th is not terribly helpful.

Even though I use manual settings I still periodically check exposure, because pushed Delta 400 does not have much latitude.

[Photon42]

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On 3/31/2019 at 6:23 PM, Paul Verrips said:

but in the end, everything is o.k.

Otherwise, it is not the end 😎

[Photon42]

On 3/31/2019 at 9:06 AM, Mark II said:

Does anyone know if it is possible to recalibrate the M7 metering without a trip to Wetzlar?

In January, I sent my M7 to Leica for a very expensive  curtain replacement. It came back and I shot a set of Delta 100 films to test it only to find that the focus was wildly adrift (a 50mm f1.4 shot wide open at 2m front focussing about 15cm). I recalibrated the focus myself, shooting more Delta 100 to confirm all was ok.

Then I switched to Delta 400 at EI1600 for night photography only to discover that the metering was also completely miscalibrated. At EI1600 with the lens cap on it tells me that I need 1/180th second. The problem exists at all ISO settings, but is proportional to the speed such that at low ISO in bright conditions the issue is masked. 

FWIW I have email Leica customer care, but they do not answer. After several days I then emailed Leica’s general information line, who replied immediately to say that they had forwarded the information to the service group. But still no reply from Leica service. Hence if there is anything that I can do to avoid Leica I would rather try that as I have zero confidence in their service and support. 

Honestly, if your observations are correct, I would not mess with anything and let them sort it out. I know it hurts but it will happen. Only one Leica is anyway never enough so either you have a second one already or now you have a good reason to buy one 😄

[Mark II]

Well, it is back at Leica now.

I keep toying with the idea of a backup M7, but given that they are no longer produced I am somewhat hesitant about spending such a large sum of money. And I only tend to think about getting a second body this when something is in for servicing - which is usually when I also start to wonder if I should just give up on Leica completely 😕

FWIW, my backup film camera system is Minolta MD based. Completely different shooting experience,, but I can find replacement bodies and lenses for less than it cost me to post the M7 to Wetzlar for servicing 😀 As long as you are not shooting wide open, such that the lens signatures are not obvious, it is possible to mix images taken on either system without most people noticing.

[Mark II]

And now the M7 has come back, and the metering is *still* broken even after they changed the main circuit board. Again in good light all looks ok, but set the camera at ISO1600 and try to shoot at night and the meter grossly over-exposes (by several stops compare to a reference meter) or gives up completely with the flashing "too dim" triangle that indicates that it is too dark to meter. The failure is different, but again visible only in low light/high ISO - which suggests that Leica's "meter calibration" checks do not bother to test this.

It has been nearly four months since I sent my M7 for a shutter curtain repair, but each time it comes back with something else broken. I will need to send it back in a third time. Just beyond belief.

I am seriously thinking of ditching Leica completely at this point - the reliability, service and support are totally at odds with pricing and completely incompatible with any professional use.

[pico]

With sympathy, my opinion is that asking an M7 to meter accurately at ISO1600 is unrealistic. Can you meter at, say, 400 and then just extrapolate  manually to 1600?

Very best of luck,
Pico

Edited May 7, 2019 by pico

[M9reno]

On 5/7/2019 at 9:03 PM, Mark II said:

And now the M7 has come back, and the metering is *still* broken even after they changed the main circuit board. Again in good light all looks ok, but set the camera at ISO1600 and try to shoot at night and the meter grossly over-exposes (by several stops compare to a reference meter) or gives up completely with the flashing "too dim" triangle that indicates that it is too dark to meter. The failure is different, but again visible only in low light/high ISO - which suggests that Leica's "meter calibration" checks do not bother to test this.

It has been nearly four months since I sent my M7 for a shutter curtain repair, but each time it comes back with something else broken. I will need to send it back in a third time. Just beyond belief.

I am seriously thinking of ditching Leica completely at this point - the reliability, service and support are totally at odds with pricing and completely incompatible with any professional use.

I am guessing that your metering is resulting in overexposure because you are pointing the camera at areas of the frame that are predominantly dark.  Does the camera overexpose if you measure an area containing some of your highlights?  Or if you measure the most important part of the picture up-close?

Anyway, I would advise trying out an actual roll of film and seeing how your film looks.  Depending on your film and reciprocity failure it might be perfect!

[wlaidlaw]

That sounds a bit like one of the problems my M7 had. We feared that the timing EPROM chip was dying as 1/1000 was timed at 1/500. When connected to a storage oscilloscope, the timing pulses were however at exactly the correct interval so we had to look elsewhere. A number of other problems were found, probably arising from a previous repair. The electromagnets and their keepers on the shutter release were misaligned and slightly dirty/sticky plus the silicone rubber on the swivel of the keeper was missing. The blind spindles were not exactly in alignment and the sprockets not perfectly central. After all this was corrected the timing was then spot on. All this may have caused additional drag on the internal gearing, which then led to the motor drive spindle suffering a fatigue failure and shearing completely - see photo below. 

Wilson

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[sepiareverb]

Would you have access to a different back for your M7? I have had several M7 bodies with messed up ISO dials. Does spinning the iso wheel back and forth and returning it to the same setting and taking another reading change anything?

Edited May 21, 2019 by sepiareverb

[Mark II]

I strongly suspect that the problem is/was the cable connecting the photosensor to the ADC in the microcontroller that the M8 uses. After reseating the cables following the last repair, any oxidisation can cause mechanically variable resistance that might be significant at very low light levels.

Hopefully the camera should be back today from its 3rd trip to Wetzlar (UPS not withstanding...). The people in Leica have been really helpful, but it has been four months without the camera now and I do not have a budget to buy a backup at the moment.

[wlaidlaw]

2 minutes ago, Mark II said:

I strongly suspect that the problem is/was the cable connecting the photosensor to the ADC in the microcontroller that the M8 uses. After reseating the cables following the last repair, any oxidisation can cause mechanically variable resistance that might be significant at very low light levels.

Hopefully the camera should be back today from its 3rd trip to Wetzlar (UPS not withstanding...). The people in Leica have been really helpful, but it has been four months without the camera now and I do not have a budget to buy a backup at the moment.

I was in a similar position with my M7 and ended up buying an R9 and 50 Summicron ROM for about half the price of an M7 body, as a stand in until my M7 was mended (picking it up in the UK on Friday). Since then I have also acquired a free R4-MOT that supposedly was not working but simply had dirty/corroded contacts on the mode and EV switches, which took me about an hour to sort out. If you don't mind asking, how much did you pay in total to Leica for your M7 work? I sent mine to Cameraworks-UK and although we had a nightmare getting replacements for the failed parts from Leica and then once that was mended, discovered all sorts of other problems, caused by poor previous service, the end cost was a very modest £350. I originally sent mine to Cameraworks, as I thought it was just the burred /damaged shutter release shaft problem, which is a very quick and easy fix but it turned out to be far worse, with a sheared motor drive shaft/intermediate gear spindle, which had allowed the whole drive train to crash and jam. 

Wilson

[Mark II]

Well, it just arrived back! An quick sanity check suggests that the metering is now at least internally consistent - so now I need to go out and shoot. The service notes suggest that they replaced a resistor in the metering, although I do not know what specifically.

The service was originally just  to replace the shutter curtains and upgrade the viewfinder (this is one of the first production runs, from 2002). The cost was a shade under 1000 euros, which was just at the limit for which I would have just bought a replacement. Leica also upgraded the DX reader (this is still free) and they ended up needing to replace the entire main circuit board. So although the initial quote was painful, for the actual work that was ultimately done it was reasonable.

The M7's circuitry is based around a 16 bit microcontroller that is unfortunately out of production and which must now be almost impossible to source. This is going to constrain service in the future without (costly) re-engineering to replace the obsolete parts with modern equivalents.

I have a long term project shot on the M7 that is likely to heat up again in a couple of weeks time, and I keep a parallel Minolta system as a fallback (and which likely cost less than the postage for the M7's three service trips!). I have tried using an M10 as a backup, but editing the output to match existing film work is much harder than using a different system using with the same focal lengths, film and processing. And some of what I shoot is in environments where I simply would not want to risk an M10.

When we get over our current financial crisis (home re-construction) I will probably add another Leica film body - but probably one without a reliance on digital circuitry.

[Mark II]

Well, the results after the M7 was returned are mixed at best. The M7 metering seems to throw fits, with the rear dial often failing to register the ISO correctly with a large offset (for example, to configure ISO400 I sometimes have to set ~ISO800 or ~ISO200). Sometimes with ISO 400 correctly registered it gives an exposure reading of 1/45th with the lens cap on - ie in total dark. Spinning the dial sometimes changes the behaviour, but not always.

I wondered if it might be temperature dependent, so I cooled the camera to about 10c - after which it more or less works, even after returning to the abmient 24c here ("more or less" because I still have to offset the ISO dial one notch to get a non-flashing ISO reading in the display either with a manual ISO setting or by trying to select "DX").

My M7 has now had 3 trips to Wetzlar over five months. This was originally for a shutter curtain repair, and the metering was fine until Leica serviced the camera!

I am really unsure what to do, as I have completely lost confidence in both the camera and Leica service 😞

Edited June 6, 2019 by Mark II

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[wlaidlaw]

It makes me very glad now I used Alan Starkie (Cameraworks-UK) to repair my M7. He double/treble checks everything before sending the camera out and he found a number of other issues apart from the original problem that I sent him the M7 to get sorted. Given the large differential between what Alan Charges (around £350) and Leica (€800 +), to me this shows that Leica badly  needs to raise their game. This is particularly relevant, given that by restricting the supply of spare parts to third party repairers, Leica are trying to enforce a virtual repair monopoly. 

Wilson