10D with " Error99 "

About a month ago I bought a second-hand 10D as a spare body. It was sold to me as faulty because every second or third shot would result in the ever so helpful "Error 99" (don't worry, it was cheap). After reading several threads on here I naturally assumed this was a shutter fault. The fact that the previous owner said he'd taken about 80,000 shots seemed to confirm this.

Anyway, after playing around with the camera for a little while I noticed that if I hold the mirror in the lifted position while releasing the shutter, the error doesn't occur.

I sent the camera to a repairer to get a quote with an explanation of the fault and my own findings. A week later they came back to me with a quote for the repair of about AU$400 and mentioned that the shutter would need to be replaced.

I have since contacted Canon about pricing for parts... The shutter (Part#CG2-0961) can be shipped to me for under AU$70... I guess there's a lot of labour charges in that repair! That being the case I thought I'd do it myself since I consider myself fairly good at repairing mechanical faults. Plus I have found a bunch of info on disassembling a 10D which will help.

Question... if it is the shutter, why does it work fine when I keep the mirror lifted? Is there some linkage between the shutter actuator and the mirror? Have the repairers just got it wrong?

While I was on the phone to Canon, I asked the cost of a new mirror box assembly (part#CY3-1432) because to me it sounds more like a problem with the mirror than the shutter. That is about AU$230 shipped to my door. If it were to be replaced by the repairers, it would cost major money and be a pointless excercise (I could likely buy a working 10D for much less)
I guess, for the moment I'll go with doing a shutter replacement and if that doesn't fix it I'll consider replacing the mirror box.

Has anyone had any experience with a failed shutter and how the mirror would affect it?

One other thought is that the mirror actuator might be clogged up... the previous owner used it for nightclub shooting so there's a possibility it may be gummed up with tar from cigarette smoke. I've had to clean that crap off stuff before and I can certainly see it causing issues in small mechanical parts. The camera did smell like cigarettes when I first got it...

Sounds like a very expensive repair quote. That is extremely high mileage on a 10D.
Mine is at 9 000 and is still sweet as.
I would say go for the DIY repair, if you can keep it cheap. Be careful how much you have to spend on the fix though, other parts may also be worn out. Maybe not worth it. Lower mileage 20D might be a better option. Not to many of us like to scratch around in the internals of our cameras. If you do not know what you are doing you might cause even more damage.

Try this out:
http://www.richardsnot​es.org …50mm-lens-contact-points/

Goshawk wrote in post #3773058
Sounds like a very expensive repair quote. That is extremely high mileage on a 10D.
Mine is at 9 000 and is still sweet as.
I would say go for the DIY repair, if you can keep it cheap. Be careful how much you have to spend on the fix though, other parts may also be worn out. Maybe not worth it. Lower mileage 20D might be a better option. Not to many of us like to scratch around in the internals of our cameras. If you do not know what you are doing you might cause even more damage.

I was considering that but a 20D will probably cost me twice as much... I'm pretty confident I can repair it myself. I've disassembled and reassembled one of my old EOS film bodies before.

Steve Whittaker wrote in post #3773110
Try this out:
http://www.richardsnot​es.org …50mm-lens-contact-points/

I had a look, but that seems to document cases of lenses causing error99. Mine is happening when I "dry fire" with no lens attached.

If you are going to attempt the repair yourself you might want to have this:

http://www.f20c.com …n/partslist/EOS​%2010D.PDF

JWright wrote in post #3775060
If you are going to attempt the repair yourself you might want to have this:

http://www.f20c.com …n/partslist/EOS​%2010D.PDF

Yep, been there done that

That's where I got my part numbers from above...

http://www.pbase.com …n_10d_disassemb​ly_project
hi you may or may not have seen this before, it may help in a small way if youre still going to go ahead and repair your 10d yourself............ma​cca

Thanks, yes, I have that bookmarked too

An update for anyone who's interested...

I ordered the shutter assembly directly from Canon which arrived today so I decided to go ahead and install it. The shutter replacement procedure for the 10D is an awefully arduous task and I can see why the repairers quoted me $350. You nearly need to strip the thing down to components. Anyway after the 5 hours or so it has taken me, I just tested the result and bingo, no more error message! Looks like it was actually the shutter after all. Doing this myself has saved me about $270 which makes me pretty happy as you can imagine.