Canon L Red Ring

Ever wonder what the red ring on a Canon lens might look like?

On this partcular lens (35-350L) it's actually a machine piece of metal painted red! Always thought it was just a painted red line.

Anyway, decided that I'd have a go at doing a semi-service on the main work lens. It's has got terribly dusty inside (not surprising for a trombone zoom after 70-80,000 push and pulls in a dusty atmosphere, and I could find absolutely no where that will service it!

So....decided to take it apart. Can't be too difficult.

First thing first, dust free environment required so I took the cat off the table.

Second thing was a tray, didn't have one so I'd just catch the screws as the drop onto the MacBook lid.

Third thing was a good memory cause it didn't occur to me to film how it came apart. I learned this bit whilst putting it back together.

Fourth thing was not to lose the screwdriver when putting it back together. Learned that the hard way as well.

You only really need two screwdrivers to pull it apart, a 5/64th flat nose (or 1/16th at worse) and a P000 Philips head screwdriver (or a P00 when you lose the P000). And yes I know that spells poo.

Anyway, I got the whole of the zoom mechanism apart fairly easily, but thankfully all the motor control for focussing was a sealed unit so I didn't need to screw with that as it's working perfectly.

Cleaned a lot of stuff out of the lens, special care with the lenses themselves. But they were all horribly dusty. The front optic is obviously calibrated, so before I removed that, scratched a line in the casing so I could match it up perfectly for reassembly.

Eventually got it all back together, the lens has a lot less dust in it now, and the trombone action is probably better than it's ever been.

Quick test of the lens - and yup - nothing broken and everything working perfectly.