TIL a bent filter ring on a 50mm can be fixed with a wooden clothespin and patience

Margaret Nelson · 2026-09-30T20:35:05.462562+00:00

Last month I had a customer's Nikkor 50mm f/1.4 come in with a filter ring bent so bad the lens hood wouldn't thread on. The guy had dropped it on a sidewalk in Minneapolis and figured the whole front barrel was toast. My first move was to grab my lens vise, but the ring was so ovaled it wouldn't sit flat in the jaws without making things worse. I remembered an old trick from a guy who ran a repair bench in Duluth for 30 years: find a wooden clothespin with a nice flat side, wrap the bent section in a scrap of leather, and work it back with slow thumb pressure instead of a tool. Took me about 20 minutes of going around the ring in small steps, checking with a known good filter after every pass, and it finally threaded smooth. I did charge him $25 because it was 20 minutes of my life I won't get back, but he was happy. Anyone else have luck with wood or leather instead of metal tools on soft aluminum rings, or do you just tell customers it's a replace job?

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TIL a bent filter ring on a 50mm can be fixed with a wooden clothespin and patience | Camera Repairers - HW Forums