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The thin alu-piece, that is on top of the hot-shoe (not the hot-shoe-cover) fell off my camera yesterday, so the top plate of the hot-shoe is “naked" (see the attached picture).

 I don’t know why the alu-piece did fell off, since the only thing that has been sitting on/in the hot shoe is my Leica-flash and Visoflex-viewfinder.

What function does that small alu-piece have? What would you do?

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Edited by BjarniM
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Just looking at my M10 hotshoe flash to yours, it looks like the metal band/spring thing has been pulled out with the flash unit. I assume that is to add some sort of tension/grip when the flash is in the hotshoe so it doesn't just slide out. 

The obvious conclusion either way is to send this in to Leica to be repaired.

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Deleted as I misunderstood the original posting. 

P.S.: Right, the little spring which is supposed to keep things you put into the hotshoe tight, is missing. It looks odd, as if it was unscrewed deliberately.

Edited by UliWer
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1 minute ago, UliWer said:

It has no other function than protecting the electric contacts in the hotshoe. When I got the M10 new I was surr that I‘d loose the little thing very soon, so I bought a „thumbs rest“ which has more or less the same purpose, but it‘s more obvious which reduces the risk of unnoticed loss. 

No, you are misunderstanding. It's NOT the little plastic thing that sits in the hot-shoe when coming from the factory, it's a much, much thinner alu-piece (maybe a 1/10 of a millimeter) that sits on top of the hot-shoe, not the plastic thing, which maybe is 2-3 mm.

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BjarniM

Anyone with an M camera can see what the problem is, and others have identified the problem.  For the sake of clarity, I’ll have another go!

There should be slightly flexible convex strips of metal permanently covering the two holes visible in your hot shoe. (Under both the serial number and model number) .  Their purpose is to act as pressure springs to hold any flash or optical accessory.  You cannot replace them yourself as they are an integral  part of the hot shoe and are not screwed on..   Send to Leica for repair.  A new hot shoe is required.
Have you forced something too large or non-standard into the hot shoe.  That may have damaged the whole fitting and caused those springs to break off and fall out.

two years of regular insertion of your flashgun or visoflex could have caused the problem.

Good luck.

 

 

Edited by lucerne
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44 minutes ago, lucerne said:

BjarniM

Anyone with an M camera can see what the problem is, and others have identified the problem.  For the sake of clarity, I’ll have another go!

There should be slightly flexible convex strips of metal permanently covering the two holes visible in your hot shoe. (Under both the serial number and model number) .  Their purpose is to act as pressure springs to hold any flash or optical accessory.  You cannot replace them yourself as they are an integral  part of the hot shoe and are not screwed on..   Send to Leica for repair.  A new hot shoe is required.
Have you forced something too large or non-standard into the hot shoe.  That may have damaged the whole fitting and caused those springs to break off and fall out.

two years of regular insertion of your flashgun or visoflex could have caused the problem.

Good luck.

 

 

No, there has never been any non-Leica equipment mounted or used in the hot-shoe of the camera.

If two years of regular insertion of my Visoflex (1-2 times a week) is wearing the hot-shoe like this, and this will cost me additional money, my final decision is made and i will never look back:

I will skip Leica and change to another brand!

I'm almost fed up with Leica's lacking quality check. I have two cameras, and four lenses. Both cameras have shown errors and so have two of my lenses. I'm abouth to get tired of Leica.

Edited by BjarniM
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I guess you are referring to digital Leicas? From the number of manufacturing faults I read about here, starting with corroding sensors, it does sound as if the modern era of Leica cameras are inferior to the classic mechanical era. No doubt down to more plastic, cutting costs and the inherent unpredictable failures of computer software. Though I have had problems with film cameras. Back in the 70’s I left my M3 at the Wetzlar factory to have the viewfinder cleaned when I was there. Three months later it came back in the post no better than it was when I left it, and I had to pay customs duty when it came back !

Thankfully I am more interested in film than digital, though I have just bought a digital camera. For some time I have thought that I would eventually get a digital body that I could use my various other lenses on. Before Christmas my local classical camera dealer had a low mileage Fuji X Pro 1 body, so now I have that. So far I have just bought a couple of Fuji/Leica adaptors and have taken a few test pictures with it.

What will you use instead of Leicas?

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15 minutes ago, Pyrogallol said:

What will you use instead of Leicas?

I haven't made my final decision yet. I've sent Leica's customer's service an email, and if they respond that i must pay for the service myself, i will ditch and bury Leica for good.
I'm not sure which brand i will choose, right now I'm awaiting the answer from Leica.

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I tend to "love" that my beloved person or things to be "perfect".

That made me unhappy.

Now I learn to be happier accepting that the person or things can be not that perfect as I want them to be.

 

I understand that but sometimes I tend to "dig" the beloved because that "not perfection details".

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6 hours ago, BjarniM said:

I haven't made my final decision yet. I've sent Leica's customer's service an email, and if they respond that i must pay for the service myself, i will ditch and bury Leica for good.
I'm not sure which brand i will choose, right now I'm awaiting the answer from Leica.

I wouldn’t get so upset until you hear from Leica. Most likely they will resolve this for you at no cost as long as they don’t find any cause for concern (drops, etc). 

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12 hours ago, BjarniM said:

No, you are misunderstanding. It's NOT the little plastic thing that sits in the hot-shoe when coming from the factory, it's a much, much thinner alu-piece (maybe a 1/10 of a millimeter) that sits on top of the hot-shoe, not the plastic thing, which maybe is 2-3 mm.

You are absolutely right. Here is a photo of my M10-P showing the whole piece your are talking about intact. It seems yours just slid off when you removed an accessory. Leica should be able to just send you the part for you to slide back in yourself.

 

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5 hours ago, dkmoore said:

I wouldn’t get so upset until you hear from Leica. Most likely they will resolve this for you at no cost as long as they don’t find any cause for concern (drops, etc). 

Even if the work is done for free, the time and hassle involved is immensely frustrating - and doubly so given that Leica that attempts to justify its premium pricing based on its on quality.

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4 minutes ago, Mark II said:

Even if the work is done for free, the time and hassle involved is immensely frustrating - and doubly so given that Leica that attempts to justify its premium pricing based on its on quality.

There is no work to be done. Compare my photo above to the OP's. This is as easy as replacing a lost hot shoe cover

Not sure if the OP is in the US but this is the sort of thing where you just call and ask to have a replacement part sent to you.

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At once, out of curiosity, while I bent the springs of this hot shoe on my M10, tried to take it out, lifting at one end.

It came easily out of the hot shoe.

Maybe a "flaw in design", but I know that this can come loose with time.

This piece is on most cameras with hot shoe ( not only on M10 ! ).

Just checked on my M-A, the piece is fixed by tiny slotted screw so better than on digital M.

I think that Leica, if we ask, would send this tiny springs (that is the main function) to slide in the nude hot shoe in few seconds.

 

Edited by a.noctilux
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I had this happen with my M10-P.  Fortunately, I noticed that the part fell out.  I picked it up and shoved back onto the hot shoe where it belongs.  This is not a "factory service required" type of thing.  

In my case, it was that I hadn't completely loosened the retaining ring on the SF-24D flash which allows a pin whose job is to keep the flash in place to drag the clip out when I removed the flash unit.  I'd never noticed the pin in the flash hot shoe until this happened.

As mentioned above, see if they'll send you another.

Best of luck,

Kevin

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22 minutes ago, Kwesi said:

There is no work to be done. Compare my photo above to the OP's. This is as easy as replacing a lost hot shoe cover

Not sure if the OP is in the US but this is the sort of thing where you just call and ask to have a replacement part sent to you.

Hopefully this will be the case...

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23 hours ago, BjarniM said:

The thin alu-piece, that is on top of the hot-shoe (not the hot-shoe-cover) fell off my camera yesterday, so the top plate of the hot-shoe is “naked" (see the attached picture).

 I don’t know why the alu-piece did fell off, since the only thing that has been sitting on/in the hot shoe is my Leica-flash and Visoflex-viewfinder.

What function does that small alu-piece have? What would you do?

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Could be a combination of the spring weakening with something permanently squashing it, together with KFo's idea that not fully loosening the flash lock ring caused it to be dragged out. Either way Leica hot shoes have been shown to be fragile with the digital cameras all the way back to the M8.

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