Debate: How long should a simple shutter cleaning actually take?

I spent 6 hours last Saturday fighting a sticky shutter on a Nikon FM2. Thought it'd be a 30 minute job. Pulled the top cover, cleaned the blades, put it back together - still sticking. Took it apart again, found a tiny oil drip from the pentaprism that was seeping onto the shutter. Had to disassemble the whole prism housing to clean that. So my question is: when you get a 'quick' repair that turns into a nightmare, how long do you let it go before you step back and rethink your approach? 30 minutes? 2 hours? I think I wasted time powering through instead of stopping to diagnose.

2 comments

2 Comments

the_xena23d agoTop Commenter

Oh man, six hours feels like a rite of passage doesn't it?

martin.paige23d agoMost Upvoted

Yeah, hit the nail on the head. The first time you go through something like that you come out the other side a completely different person. It's like your brain finally figures out what you're really made of. But hey, you survived, right? That's what counts.