Shutter Fault

[Jeffery Smith]

I had used my M8 very little (mostly trying to decide which lens I would use on it regularly) when I got an "Err" message in the viewfinder. The LCD read "Shutter Fault". I thought that, since the shutter didn't respond at all to the shutter release, maybe the battery needed recharging. I recharged it and tried again. Same thing...no response..."Err" in viewfinder..."Shutter Fault" on LCD.

One other person on the LUG had that problem once. He fiddled with the controls, turned it off and on, and it started working again. Didn't work for me. Someone suggested reinstalling the firmware upgrade. Nope. Another suggested taking out the battery and allowing the internal battery to poop out completely. No go there either. Twice I was able to get it working again by turning the shutter speed dial here there and everywhere. But when I would turn it off and turn it back on again..."Err"..."Shutter Fault".

Now is the disappointing part. Several emails to Leica Camera (USA) went unanswered. I finally emailed the president who, in turn, forwarded my email to the head of the service department. No response. I tried calling and emailing the head of the service department about 10 times in one day. No response. No response from emails. One response from voicemail (when I returned his call, no response). All subsequent voice mails and emails have gone unanswered. I finally decided to talk to someone else (the lady who answers and tells me that the service department manager is never there), and she told me to send the camera in. I did so. It arrived there 10 days ago. No response from them, and not available by phone.

Right now, I have paid $500 and still owe my credit card thousands more for a camera that lasted for 2 weeks. I'm not a professional photographer and, as such, my money doesn't seem to spend as well as a pro's. When one plunks down for a camera that costs thousands of dollars, part of the money is, I thought, for service after the sale. That does not appear to be the case for non-pros.

In desperation, I emailed the president once more for help. He has not responded to the email.

Besides my house and my cars, this is the single biggest investment I have every made in a single piece of merchandise. And I still owe 90% of the purchase price to my MasterCard. My wife doesn't know that this has happened. Fortunately for me, she doesn't frequent this forum.

I am 57 years old, and they have made a complete fool of me.

[Keith]

Jeffery,

I am very sad to hear this story and I'm sure all other M8 and Leica owners on this forum are saddened to hear it also. I hope you get satisfaction with this and maybe there is some consumer body you can go to (we have one in Oz) who will remind Leica USA of their obligations!

Personally I am very happy with my camera but the thought of going through what you are going through at the moment gives me the shivers!

Good luck my friend ... I hope it sorts itself out so you can be satisfied with your choice of this somewhat expensive gamble! :)

[CameraQuest]

Jeffrey,

disappointing, but relax a bit. it's a long holiday weekend.

No company is perfect, but Leica does pride itself on customer service.
it will be OK.

Stephen

[Jeffery Smith]

Keith and Stephen, thanks for the support. I'll go back to my film cameras for now and hope that things work out for me some time in the future.

[fdigital]

Really quite disapointing - Hold up with it and see how they handle it. It's sad when a company needs to be hindered about their product when something goes wrong with it.

Especially leica.

Hold up and I'm sure they'll come around. Post up what happens here, I'm interested in the outcome of this.

Good luck to you.

Gav

[Jeffery Smith]

After the storm, we have only about 3 camera stores in the metropolitan New Orleans area, and I doubt that any of them stock Leica products. I ordered mine through B&H in NY. Had the camera died within the first week, I'm sure that B&H would have taken it back. They have been solid as a rock in making things right. But I had already sent my registration in, a requirement in order to get the IR filters from Leica.

[Bob Baron]

Did you contact B&H and ask if they would intercede with Leica on your behalf? If so, what happened?

In years past Henry Posner at B&H was great to work with on this sort of problem, but I am not sure if he is still there or if he is in upper management such that you would need to at least try a lower level before getting in touch with him.

You could probably find his email adress without too much trouble....

[Jeffery Smith]

I would have contacted B&H had I not already sent in the warranty information (necessary in order to get the IR filters). One fellow down here in NOLA bought a camera from B&H, didn't use it at all for over a month, and found that it was not working. Even after that period of time, B&H replaced it.

Posner is a good guy. I hope he is still there.

[Jeffery Smith]

There may be light at the end of the tunnel. I attempted to contact Mr. Fisk again (no luck again) but did have the phone picked up by a very courteous lady. She seemed to be aware of my plight and transferred me to a fellow named Ray. Ray was very kind and also seemed to know about my situation. He assured me that my original defective camera was going back to Germany and that a new one would be on the way via 2-day express air mail. I'll keep y'all posted on what happens.

[Jeffery Smith]

The replacement M8 arrived on Thursday. I charged the battery and give it a test. Works flawlessly. A fellow named Ray at Leica seems to have taken ownership of my situation and got the camera to me quickly. Now to try shooting it about 2,000 times this weekend to see if it will stay working.

Keep your fingers crossed.

[Joe Mondello]

Sounds like a happy ending -- so far! And to the best of my knowledge Henry Posner is still at B&H and posts in this and other forums from time to time.

[Joe Mondello]

Well here it is a few months after my post above and guess what!?!?

MY M8 -- after sitting in a drawer for 2 months (I was away and using my new D3) now gives me "Attention Shutter Fault" and a polite little beep whenever I try to take a picture.

Yikes!

My M8 has 5024 shots on it (as best i can tell).

I'll give a call to Leica in NJ on Monday. :bang:

[nikonhswebmaster]

I read all these posts in disbelief! It is like owning a Mercedes.

[Joe Mondello]

I read all these posts in disbelief! It is like owning a Mercedes.

My Dad owned a lot of M-Bs and I had to bring them in for service where I knew everybody on a first name basis -- don't even get me started on his Jaguar or Rolls.

But I have to say of all the film Leicas he had, there was nary an issue over decades of use. But then again that was the 60s and 70s!

Then we switched to Acura, Honda, Toyota and the results were much improved -- at least insofar as service calls were concerned!

[jaapv]

How things change - You're right about Jaguar a few decades ago, and now they lead in all reliability polls. One wonders what Ford did to workforce mentality - probably replaced them by Japanese robots....

[jaapv]

Ah- that was not Jaguar, that was Lucas - Prince of darkness. Did you know they turned to making electrical systems for aircraft now? That BA plane probably had Lucas avionics.....;)

[Joe Mondello]

Ah- that was not Jaguar, that was Lucas - Prince of darkness. Did you know they turned to making electrical systems for aircraft now? That BA plane probably had Lucas avionics.....;)


NOOOOOOOOO!!!! Lucas electricals in aircraft!!! Are they daft!:eek:

[rsl]

Ah- that was not Jaguar, that was Lucas - Prince of darkness. Did you know they turned to making electrical systems for aircraft now? That BA plane probably had Lucas avionics.....;)

Or maybe it was Phil, prince of insufficient light, with his pitchspoon, who will darn you to heck.

But only Dilbert readers know about Phil. He's a well-kept secret.

[Symeon]

How can I upload a gallery of pictures I have taken, can you help? I am new in this forum and I don't know how to go about doing things. Thanks beforehand..

[infocusf8@earthlink.]

Always, always, always go back to your Leica dealer first with any problems. Leica backs their dealers with protection from faulty cameras and warranty repairs. Out of the half dozen M8's I've sold only one was sent back with no questions asked, I simply handed my customer a new one off the shelf and sent the defective one back and it really was not defective it had some spots on the sensor that I saw in a print the customer brought in. Since he was going on vacation the next day I made sure he had a camera with a clean sensor. Leica is a small company and sometimes not the speediest to respond to customers but your dealer can move quickly to handle situations such as this.

[jaapv]

Europe is a bit different there- Solms is very pleasant to deal with for the individual owner.Often quicker than the local representative.

[cancan]

Jeffery hi
sorry to hear about your problem,i another friend of mine has the same problem. From what i have heard the american service is outrages, I know that the germain service is much better, so my advice to you is to write them a letter and complain and maybe they will throw the american head of the american leica as far as they can from office and fix your camera at the same time
good luck Danny

[cancan]

great

happy for you

[nobbylon]

I'm sorry to all the happy M8 owners out there but I read in disbelief yet another M8 failure post. Why is Leica not doing something about this obvious design flaw? Instead of doing upgrades for cash, they should be re-calling for free! I would have said myself that a few failures is just plain bad luck or the odd duff electrical component failure but this is obviously more than that. I personally will never invest this kind of cash into the Leica test program. To prospective buyers I would like to ask, how can you trust this product? For those of you who have or have had say a digital slr Nikon or Canon, how many shutter faults or breakdowns that rendered them non operational? Leica in my view have got a lot of catching up to do!

[Parker51]

Well here it is a few months after my post above and guess what!?!?

MY M8 -- after sitting in a drawer for 2 months (I was away and using my new D3) now gives me "Attention Shutter Fault" and a polite little beep whenever I try to take a picture.

Yikes!

My M8 has 5024 shots on it (as best i can tell).

I'll give a call to Leica in NJ on Monday. :bang:

Hi
I get the same problem " ATTENTION , SHUTTER FAULT " after two weeks on my new M8.2 .
The dealer ( Photo-Suffren , best place in Paris ) changed it for a new one.

Best
Claude

[Roger Hicks]

Nothing made by man is perfect. A friend of mine seized an engine on his new Rolls-Royce, because of swarf left in the oilways. That was around 25-30 years ago.

The very first new Leica lens I ever bought -- a 35/1.4 pre-aspheric, that I still own -- had a focusing mount that jammed out of the box.

I called the dealer. He said, "For extra speed, contact Leica direct."

A languid young man replied, "Oh, yes, it will take two to three weeks to repair."

I replied, "No it f***ing won't, it'll take return of post to replace."

He said, "There's no need to be like that, sir."

I replied, "Clearly, there is."

It was replaced by return of post, after the dealer heard that story.

That was over 25 years ago, too. This sort of thing would not happen nowadays, not in the UK, not in Germany, nowhere I know. If anyone is still berhaving like this in the US -- and it's normally just one person, or a genuine lost letter or e-mail, which is why I prefer the 'phone -- then I suspect Dr. Kaufmann may have Words with them.

Cheers,

Roger

[TimF]

That was over 25 years ago, too. This sort of thing would not happen nowadays, not in the UK, not in Germany, nowhere I know.
Regrettably, silly buggery is not dead, not by a long chalk. We are currently in the middle of switching our electricity supplier (price difference not to be sniffed at, basically). There are two meters involved (it's a farm, so we have one for the house, another for the buildings, etc), which our present supplier puts onto one bill. Because the broker who arranged this sent out two forms - one per meter - rather than combining them, the supplier is objecting. That, at least, is what our prospective supplier tells me. If it can't be sorted, then we may have to re-apply, in which case I hope the price we were quoted will stand.

Hell, I loathe the bureaucratic mindset. :( :(

[Roger Hicks]

Regrettably, silly buggery is not dead, not by a long chalk. We are currently in the middle of switching our electricity supplier . . . Hell, I loathe the bureaucratic mindset. :( :(

Dear Tim,

Sorry: I meant with Leica nowadays, anywhere I know. Otherwise, of course you're right.

There's a joke in Terry Pratchett somewhere about how someone used to play silly buggers, and then mislaid the the pieces.

Cheers,

R.