PP 80-200 AF

I just picked up the 1st generation of this lens for $250 locally. This thing is in mint condition, no wear, dings, scratches, looks like it's nearly new. It came with the original box, manuals, and case to.. One issue however is the focusing is a bit stiff and squeaks here and there. I'm thinking that with it's condition that it had really low usage and may be contributing to the stiff action. Anyone have one of these or ahve any ideas?

handheld, wide open

Took it out to the soccer field.

nice lens!

I had one before I upgraded to a 70-200 VR1. It was a pretty good lens, though it had seen better days before I bought it for cheap. Biggest issue for me was slop in the barrel but I put that down to the poor condition of my example. The optics were definitely capable of delivering great IQ though. I'll dig through some old shots later tonight

Here are a couple from the Athletics NSW Novice Cross Country Championships in April this year. The D4 made it hard work for the poor old lens as the body refused to track properly at the time so the lens was required to snap on to moving targets quickly enough to get the athletes in focus, effectively in Single Shot focus. In the two main races (around 80 athletes in total) it managed to get every single finisher in focus (though I binned more than a few for being out of focus)

They look good! Even though this lens has a production date of 88'-92', the optics still hold up pretty good.

Yes, focusing is down right slow. Beyond slow actually lol but I find that as long as I'm pre-focused to the area the D810 does a good job at micro-focusing.

At $250 I have absolutely no complaints and f2.8 is an absolute must for this time of year. Today at 9am it was dark with torrential rain fall. These old pro-optics allowed for some keeps still.

50 % crop on the first one

AF speed on this (well really all of the non AF-S lenses) is very dependant on the speed of the body's screw drive. I think the D4 helped mine a bit