Re: [Leica] How often CLA

["Bill Christensen" <kangwei@interaccess.com>]

Tina,

Thanks for relating your Honduras experience.  Perhaps your images -
obviously made at tremendous effort and sacrifice - can help focus attention
on the desperate need for aid there.

Your images on the Net are awesome and now we know why.  Aside from a keen
eye, you place the pursuit of the image above all else including the tools.
I hope that your Leicas will soon be returned from the hospital in like new
condition.

Again, thanks for sharing your experience.

Bill Christensen
- -----Original Message-----
From: Tina Manley <images@InfoAve.Net>
To: leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us <leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us>
Date: Tuesday, December 08, 1998 2:51 PM
Subject: Re: [Leica] How often CLA


>At 06:52 AM 12/8/98 +0100, you wrote:
>>All this talk about misaligned rangefinders and maintenance makes me
>>wonder...how often do you guys send your Ms to CLA? Does Leica have a
>>recommendation, like every X years or every Y rolls of film?
>>
>>Nathan
>>
>
>Well, this guy sends them in every time I come back from weird places!  I
>guess I'm really hard on cameras.  I got back from Honduras last week and
>sent 4 M6's and 2 lenses to Leica for repair and CLA.  One of the M6's I
>dropped into muddy water.  The other three were completely drenched when
>the boat I was in was swamped.  Coming back, I put the cameras in my rubber
>boots but by then they were already wet.  My Noctilux fell off of the
>camera and into the mud!!  I had noticed that it seemed a little loose, but
>was too busy to pay attention.  Thank goodness the mud was soft, but all of
>the tiny little screws were lost forever.  This was on my third day there
>so I was without my Noctilux for the rest of the trip!  :-(    I used the
>75 1.4 but, to me, that is harder to focus accurately than the Noctilux.  I
>can't tell you what it was like in Honduras but here is part of an e-mail I
>sent home from there:
>
> Yesterday Gloria and I
>went to try to find one of the communities that had not been heard
>from. We took a four-wheel drive jeep for over an hour until we came
>to a river we couldn't ford. We took off our boots and socks and
>started wading. I slipped in a hole and one of my Leicas ended up
>underwater. We finally made it across the river only to have to
>cross acres of mud flats. Ablsolutely nothing but mud as far as you
>could see. It looked solid but several times we sank in above our
>knees. There were four of us - two CCD workers, too - and we took
>turns pulling each other out. Then came the sand - for miles around
>it looked like a desert. The sand came to the top wire of the barbed
>wire fences. When we finally got to the community, the people were
>so glad to see us. They shouted, "We are alive!" They had fled to
>higher ground when the flood came. Two men stayed to take care of
>the animals and they ended up on the roof of a house. Most of the
>animals died. All of the houses were destroyed. When we got there
>they were cleaning the mud out of their well. They had not had any
>contact with the outside world since the hurricane. Their crops were
>all destroyed and they had no food. Their comment was "Well, we have
>plenty of sand now.  Maybe we'll build our houses of cement next time!"
>I washed out my Leica and it is drying. One other lens came apart so
>I'm working with less equipment. Save these e-mails because I'm not
>taking many notes this time. I guess the kids will be home today or
>tomorrow. I'm going to try to call on Thanksgiving.
>LOL
>Tina
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>Tina Manley, ASMP
>
>http://members.tripod.com/~Tina_Manley/index.html
>