Talking to a retired repair guy at a swap meet made me rethink how I clean shutters

Met this older guy at a camera swap in Austin last weekend. He saw me digging through a bin of old shutters and just started talking. He said most people overclean their shutters and end up ruining the lubrication. Said I should only clean when absolutely necessary and use the tiniest drop of oil on a precision tip. Never thought about it that way. Always figured more cleaning was better. Has anyone else been told they clean too much?

2 comments

2 Comments

the_tara17d ago

The swap meet guys are a mixed bag, honestly. Some know their stuff, others are just repeating what they heard 40 years ago. That whole "overcleaning ruins lubrication" thing might be true for some old leaf shutters with weird grease, but a lot of modern shutters use sealed bearings or dry lubricants where a drop of oil is more likely to gum things up. Your mileage may vary, but I'd take that advice with a grain of salt unless he was talking about a specific camera model. A lot of repair guys also have their own pet theories that don't hold up in practice. Just a thought before you start going light on the cleaning.

wyattbennett17d ago

Laughed out loud at "pet theories that don't hold up" because I'm pretty sure I've adopted every single one of them at some point. I'm the guy who'll hear one tip from a stranger and immediately restructure my whole cleaning routine like I'm getting graded on it.