Spent two hours cleaning a lens only to find the haze was on the inside element

Picked up a nice old Pentax 50mm at a flea market for $15 last month. The front looked perfect but there was this faint foggy haze I couldn't wipe off no matter what. Tried lens cleaner, microfiber cloths, even a bit of isopropyl alcohol and it just wouldn't budge. After two hours of frustration I finally looked it up and turns out the haze was between the glass elements inside the lens. Never even crossed my mind that could happen. Has anyone else run into internal haze on an old lens and found a way to clean it without taking the whole thing apart?

2 comments

2 Comments

wren8061mo ago

that's the worst, man, such a letdown after all that effort.

leohart1mo ago

Saw an article the other day about how people get super invested in stuff like this and then crash hard when it doesn't pan out. Happens with kickstarters all the time where the hype builds way up and then the delivery just falls flat. Feels worse than just having it not work from the start because you built up all those expectations. That's the part that sticks with you longer than the actual fail itself.