
Nikon Issues Small Recall for a 16-Year-Old Film Camera - tobijkl
https://petapixel.com/2020/07/16/nikon-issues-recall-for-16-year-old-film-camera-due-to-european-law/
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supernova87a
I love how the idea of Japanese conscientiousness has become almost a meme for
how we wish companies were run. Other examples you've probably seen come
across the webs:

\-- Hotel apologizes in advance for a brief 1 minute planned disruption of in-
room internet at 4am
[https://www.google.com/search?q=japanese+hotel+internet+apol...](https://www.google.com/search?q=japanese+hotel+internet+apology&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiR0fyo19LqAhVZHjQIHWLwBWkQ_AUoA3oECAsQBQ&biw=1751&bih=1211#imgrc=cZGXwwqZeLmVcM)

\-- Japanese train company issues apology for train leaving 20 seconds early
[https://www.google.com/search?q=tokyo+rail+apologizes+train+...](https://www.google.com/search?q=tokyo+rail+apologizes+train+leaving+early&oq=tokyo+rail+apologizes+train+leaving+early&aqs=chrome..69i57.6899j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8)

~~~
gruturo
To be honest, a train leaving early SUCKS. You show up on time, and you find
out you missed it. Maybe the next one is in 40 minutes, maybe it's the next
day.

(I realize 20 seconds early isn't _that_ bad, but still, leaving early by any
amount of time is a lot worse than leaving late)

~~~
renewiltord
In this case, it's annoying because you'll have missed a semi-rapid and the
next comparable train to Tsukuba will leave 9 minutes later and arrive 17
minutes later.

It's not a 40 minute thing, this isn't Caltrain, but it's still annoying.

~~~
supernova87a
I loved (not really) how sometimes on Caltrain, if the trains were delayed,
you could get on a delayed train after you had planned to travel, and get home
sooner than if the trains had been running on time.

(I'll let you think on that puzzle.)

~~~
lstamour
The same often happened when I travelled by train in Ontario (Canada) where
the trains shared the line with freight service, and so sometimes a train was
poorly timed such that it always had to wait for freight to clear first. In
those cases, if a train was delayed, the delay occurred at the station such
that by the time the train left the station, the freight had already cleared
and the time spent on the train was less than it normally would be. Also,
delays often meant the train had fewer passengers, so it would stop for less
time at each stop... am I on the right track? ;-)

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Thorrez
The freight reason is not it. If the freight got out of the way at the same
time it normally would, you would decrease your travel time, but arrive at
your destination no earlier than a normal arrival.

The second reason is closer, but not exact. Caltrain has a variety of
different types of trains, some stop at all the stops, some stop at only a
few. Here's the scenario: there is a fast train then a slow train. Your normal
schedule doesn't allow you to get to the station on time to take the fast
train, so you normally take the slow train. If both trains are behind
schedule, you might be able to make it to the fast train, and since it goes
faster you might get to your destination earlier than normal.

~~~
supernova87a
Yes.

The frustrating thing of course, is that even if the trains are severely
delayed, they have (or had, depending on whether they go out of business soon)
a policy of running the exact schedule for each train as if normal. So even if
all the trains are piled up, delayed, they would make local stops, etc. even
though everyone wanted just to get to the end by express.

Sad that this kind of issue was so common (1x per month at least) that I blame
them for not having efficient accident backup plans.

Yes, yes, I realize that there's the problem of having trains go express when
they're all stacked up.

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perardi
Nikon still sells the Nikon F6 film camera. All existing stock was probably
manufactured a loooong time ago, but it is still technically a current
product, so I imagine they’re obligated to provide support and government-
mandated environmental fixes.

[https://imaging.nikon.com/lineup/filmcamera/slr/f6/](https://imaging.nikon.com/lineup/filmcamera/slr/f6/)

(I’d love to see the sales numbers for the F6. I can’t even guess the order of
magnitude of global sales per year. 1? 10? 100?)

~~~
formerly_proven
I still occasionally use a now over 40 years old Nikon FE that, despite having
never been serviced as far as I can tell, still works flawlessly. It even does
some things better than even the most modern DSLRs, it can, for example
automatically expose exposures several minutes long correctly (far outside
spec, but works). Impeccable quality. The old Ai-S lenses, too, entirely made
from glass, brass, aluminium and some steel with a touch of cement, it pleases
the gods. Zeiss still makes them like they used to.

~~~
perardi
Which is why I’m always surprised the F6, to borrow a phrase from Apple,
“remains a product in our lineup”.

There’s so many used and seemingly indestructible film cameras floating
around. I guess there’s some market for a factory-warranty film SLR, but I’m
not sure what said market is. If I was going to shoot film, I’d find a Nikon
F5, which would also double as a medieval flail for self-defense.

(Or I’d pull my 1983 Pentax off the shelf.)

~~~
paulmd
The F6 is the most advanced and capable film DSLR ever built. If you want/need
to shoot film and you shoot subjects that are commonly done with modern
digital SLRs and considered out of reach of a film camera, the F6 is the best
game in town. The fastest and lowest-light-capable autofocus, the best matrix
metering, digital recording of exposure data (just like EXIF but for film!),
etc. It is a modern pro camera that happens to shoot film.

Most people don’t need it but it’s certainly unique. If you do need it, there
is no substitute.

Nikon actually has a history of doing that as well. The Nikonos series
underwater cameras were really the only thing in their class, with unique
water-contact optics that avoided rainbow diffraction from the port by putting
the optics right against the water. They also made unique 180-degree
orthographic lenses for atmospheric surveying - measure cloud cover/etc by
photographing the sky every day and get the full horizon to horizon in one
frame. etc etc. They really are a fascinating company.

Check out the 1001 Nights of Nikkor, a fascinating series of stories about all
that stuff.

[https://imaging.nikon.com/history/story/](https://imaging.nikon.com/history/story/)

~~~
PetitPrince
> digital recording of exposure data (just like EXIF but for film!

Wait; how does that work ? Where is the camera writing the info and how do you
retrieve it ?

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paulmd
It has an internal memory bank and you dump it to a compactflash card with the
MV-1 accessory that the other person mentioned.

Personally I think that's a little clunky and it would be better to go with a
little transflash card, but the F6 was designed in 2004 and I guess at that
point it would have been a SD card and maybe even compactflash and they didn't
want the size.

This approach is probably still preferable to direct USB connection though,
because presumably that would require utility software that would now be
incredibly out of date and tied to like Windows XP or something. If nobody
bothered to write an open-source utility then that function would be unusable
for modern PCs.

That's a problem on some hardware, I have a scanner where the only software
that supports it is tied to Windows XP, or you can use third-party software
(VueScan)_that talks to it directly and bypasses the official drivers. It is a
scanner designed to do 4x5 film directly (not a flatbed) so replacements are
thousands of dollars.

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jacquesm
What really impresses here is their ability to document the recall to the
point that a product that old still has its full history available, allowing
them to work out which specific cameras to recall.

~~~
loa_in_
We somehow got used to the idea that we can expect companies not to do this
because it's not profitable for them

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abeppu
I've never worked in a context that made complex physical goods. Is it
surprising to others that they even know which specific 152 cameras were over-
plasticized?

~~~
thetinguy
The f6 is high end low volume product. They only make and sell a couple
hundred a year.

~~~
ars
Looks like it costs $2,549. Which doesn't really seem profitable in volumes
that low.

~~~
sudosysgen
It's quite mechanically and electronically simple, though, by modern
standards.

~~~
meatmanek
And some of the more complicated or precision components (shutter, mirror,
viewfinder screen + prism, lens mount, autofocus motor, autofocus and
autoexposure sensors) exist in similar forms on newer products and may be able
to share production lines to some extent.

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dayjobpork
Meanwhile Pentax is still avoiding the issue of multiple models dying from
cheap apature solonoids.

~~~
wtallis
I found out about that issue the hard way last week. Pictures started coming
out too dark, and searching online quickly revealed that it's a well-known
issue and that a class action lawsuit was filed back in May. Repairing it was
pretty straightforward, but sourcing a replacement part from before production
moved from Japan to China was unpleasantly expensive.

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BooneJS
Meanwhile, my 2 year old mobile device...

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dirtyid
> In fact, only 152 units are impacted… so few that Nikon actually lists every
> affected serial number in the recall notice:

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piinbinary
[deleted]

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perardi
Yes, I’m sure the viral marketing for…a film SLR…that was introduced in
2004…is absolutely priceless.

~~~
ErikVandeWater
TBF the benefit is to their entire business.

