Shutter life

HI forum members.

I've just got a 300D and I've been hearing storys about the lifetime of the shutter.Some people say its about 10.000 "shots" others say its even less.

Anyone heard about this?Is it true?Has anyone used 300D longer than this and therefore proved these storys wrong?

By the way I like the 300D alot.Its the first digital camera I get, have been shooting film until now, and I'm very happy with the results, although I allready see I need to get some new lenses (allways the same old story):0)

Best.

JAS

Hi, Jon,

Jon A Sandholt wrote:

HI forum members.

I've just got a 300D and I've been hearing storys about the
lifetime of the shutter.Some people say its about 10.000 "shots"
others say its even less.
Anyone heard about this?Is it true?Has anyone used 300D longer than
this and therefore proved these storys wrong?

I don't know exactly what stories might have been proved wrong. Whatever, the fact that an individual 300D shutter might have survived 12,000, or 15,000, or 30,000, doesn;t prove anything wrong (unless it was the story that "every 300D shutter will fail by 11,000 actuations").

Unfortunately, there is not a good collection of statistics on the 300D shutter from which we could detemine any of the classical statistical indicators, such as the probability that the shutter would fail after between 15,000 and 17,000 actuations.

What is clear is that the statistics for life expectancy are almost certainly worse for the 300D than the 10D, and worse for the 10D than the 20D, and worse for the 20D than the 1D.

Best regards,

Doug

Can a shutter be replaced after it fails, and if so how expensive is it? Is it cheaper to buy a new camera?

Jon A Sandholt wrote:

HI forum members.

I've just got a 300D and I've been hearing storys about the
lifetime of the shutter.Some people say its about 10.000 "shots"
others say its even less.
Anyone heard about this?Is it true?Has anyone used 300D longer than
this and therefore proved these storys wrong?
By the way I like the 300D alot.Its the first digital camera I get,
have been shooting film until now, and I'm very happy with the
results, although I allready see I need to get some new lenses
(allways the same old story):0)

Best.

JAS

I have 2 DR's and one has gone over 15k and one didn't make it to 7K one was 11mos old when it failed the other was 4mos old. The flat rate repair estimate from canon to replace the shutter if not under warranty was $180US from The NJ service center.

Jon A Sandholt wrote:

HI forum members.

I've just got a 300D and I've been hearing storys about the
lifetime of the shutter.Some people say its about 10.000 "shots"
others say its even less.
Anyone heard about this?Is it true?Has anyone used 300D longer than
this and therefore proved these storys wrong?
By the way I like the 300D alot.Its the first digital camera I get,
have been shooting film until now, and I'm very happy with the
results, although I allready see I need to get some new lenses
(allways the same old story):0)

Best.

JAS

Jon A Sandholt wrote:

HI forum members.

I've just got a 300D and I've been hearing storys about the
lifetime of the shutter.Some people say its about 10.000 "shots"
others say its even less.
Anyone heard about this?Is it true?Has anyone used 300D longer than
this and therefore proved these storys wrong?
By the way I like the 300D alot.Its the first digital camera I get,
have been shooting film until now, and I'm very happy with the
results, although I allready see I need to get some new lenses
(allways the same old story):0)

Best.

JAS

Hi,t,

Interesting. Could you tell us more?

Best regards,

Doug

i would expect high shutter speeds like 1/4000 would be a lot harder on it than say 1/50.

something to keep in mind.

purfectimage wrote:

i would expect high shutter speeds like 1/4000 would be a lot
harder on it than say 1/50.

Why? The curtains move just as fast at any shutter speed.

Hi, image,

purfectimage wrote:

i would expect high shutter speeds like 1/4000 would be a lot
harder on it than say 1/50.

Why? The curtains move at the same speed for any shutter speed. The difference is in the delay from when the first curtain starts to move until the secoind curtain starts to move.

What is different is that shift in shutter timing with age (or whatever) has a much greater effect on the actual shutter speed attained for the faster speeds.

Best regards,

Doug

see link:
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1031&message=9613281

Doug Kerr wrote:

Hi,t,

Interesting. Could you tell us more?

Best regards,

Doug

Mine had intermittent Err99 message right at the start. It was still usable as it rarely happened, but I just hated it that it's there. So I sent it to Canon for repair. That was about in the 10,000 mark when I sent it. Now I'm over 40K and still doing fine.

Jon A Sandholt wrote:

HI forum members.

I've just got a 300D and I've been hearing storys about the
lifetime of the shutter.Some people say its about 10.000 "shots"
others say its even less.
Anyone heard about this?Is it true?Has anyone used 300D longer than
this and therefore proved these storys wrong?
By the way I like the 300D alot.Its the first digital camera I get,
have been shooting film until now, and I'm very happy with the
results, although I allready see I need to get some new lenses
(allways the same old story):0)

Best.

JAS

Doug Kerr wrote:
Hi, image,

purfectimage wrote:

i would expect high shutter speeds like 1/4000 would be a lot
harder on it than say 1/50.

Why? The curtains move at the same speed for any shutter speed. The
difference is in the delay from when the first curtain starts to
move until the secoind curtain starts to move.

i would think that opening and imediatly closing places much greater aceleration upon the shutter. the shutter has inertia. and i would not think it would all be disapaited within 1/4000th of a second. but hey, im no physicyst. but it does have some inertia, and hence its 1/4000 sec limit.

that being said, im in the 9900s. id better make sure i shoot something good this next time out!! haha.

Lets imaginge that indeed, all the forum BS is true, and 10,000 is an average expectid life.
it cost $200 for a new shutter.
that amounts to only $0.02 per shot.

if you get 20,000 its only a penny.

your film saving are still head and shoulders above that, and furthermore i doubt a film rebel would even be able to get 20,000. so its not an additional cost. its the cost of using an SLR with moving parts.

the one thing about moving parts is that they wear out. Period.

regular dusting and maintenace should help extend shutter life.
dust adds weight, weight adds friction.

i also worry about hom many times my lenses will stop down, but i havent seen this issue addressed on here.

anyone know about that?

Hi, p,

purfectimage wrote:

i would think that opening and imediatly closing places much
greater aceleration upon the shutter.

No.

One curtain (set of blades) moves to open the shutter.

A totally different curtain (another set of blades) moves to close it.

The first curtain has no idea when the second one is going to move.

The second curtain has no idea when the first one moved.

There is of course inertia, which influences the rate at which either curtain begins to move. But it has no effect on the time relationship between them. And each has to dissipate the energy in it when it comes to the end of its travel - indpendently

The speed limit comes from the fact that the higher the speed, the less time between one action and the other, and errors in that time delay have a greater effect on the effective speed the faster the speed.

For example, an error of 0.1 ms (early) in the time the second curtain starts to move will change a shutter speed of 1/250 sec to 1/256 sec.

It will also change a shutter speed of 1/4000 sec to 1/6667 sec

It will also turn a shutter speed of 1/10000 sec into "shutter doesn't open at all".

(I had about an 01 ms early release of the second curtain in my 300D, and I had Canon replace the shutter.)

Thus, to provide faster shutter speeds, more precise timing control and execution means are needed, which means more crafty, and generally more expensive, shutter construction.

Best regards,

Doug

had no idea.
i guess im used to disposable camera shutters.
probably a different ball game then.
thanks for the info

Dan Kollander wrote:

I have 2 DR's and one has gone over 15k and one didn't make it to
7K one was 11mos old when it failed the other was 4mos old. The
flat rate repair estimate from canon to replace the shutter if not
under warranty was $180US from The NJ service center.

No problems so far.

I'll be out of warranty this month so it looks like it would be the $180 option for me when it happens. That's still pretty good in my book, other digital cameras I've had were generally falling apart by after only a couple of thousand.

Loggedonnow wrote:

Two for two, not a great record. How have the two held up since
the replacement?

The older one I'm using the most becuse my newer one was sent back to canon to have the handgrip and the lcd cover replaced which were both supposed to be done as a one time courtesy (it is cosmetic so they say it is not covered) the same time the shutter was done but the technicians can't seem to read the repair order so I have been without my 6 month old camera for at least 5 weeks in total while canon service in NJ takes there sweet old time doing the repairs they missed and treating it like it was a new repair when it should have been put to the top of the list as a comeback. Then when I called this past Thursday (some 15 days after I sent it Fedex overnight at canons expense) I told them I needed it back Friday for a shoot they told me the tech working on it was not in and would not be in until Monday.....This has left me extremelly aggravated and i am not impressed with canons service at all....it makes me want to sell ALL my canon products.