I have found that a lot of the Olympus "C" series of cameras are very similar
and was lucky to find this excellent tutorial on how to disassemble an Olympus 2040.
Here is the url. http://www.jr_worldwi.de/photo/mod_oly_dis.html


I hope to do as good a job with this presentation:
“How to disassemble an Olympus c-3020z”
Now I am no expert, just a guy who likes to tinker.
So if you do this DIY project you are on your own.


I bid and won this camera from eBay with a Jammed Lens. The fellow told me
he dropped it nose first with the Lens Barrel extended. When I got it the
lens was retracted as far as it would go. Nice looking camera with no marks,
not even on the nose of the lens.


When you turned the power on the camera would emit a series of terrible
sounding gear noise, but no movement of the lens barrel. Placing the Mode
Dial to the View position, I could view previously taken pictures on a
Smart Media card. This led me to believe that the electronics were still working.


NOTE!


Before starting to disassemble any camera, remove the batteries and the memory card.


The beginning part of this presentation will be about opening the camera up
for repair by the removal of the covers with some pictures. The second part
will be on the lens barrel with more pictures and some of my notes.


I started the disassembly of the c-3020z, took pictures as I went and put
all the little screws etc. into an old ice cube tray. I used basically the
same setup and tools as I did for the c-2100uz repair.


A clean well lighted work area is a must.


The first item to be removed is the Mode Dial Knob. This is held in place
with a small screw in the outside diameter of the knob. Under this Mode Dial
Knob is another screw that holds the top cover. The Top cover has to be removed
to access other screws. There are two more screws that hold this top cover on.
One from the back of the camera and another on the side of the camera. The cover
now lifts off. Do not pry, just wiggle a bit and off it comes.


The Front cover is next and from the back of the camera is another screw way down
on the left bottom. Open the memory card door and find/remove two more screws.
Open the battery cover door and here again are two more screws to remove.
Now with the camera facing you and with the top cover off, at the top right
you will see a recess, this has one screw to be removed. Very hard to see.
Way down in and a hard to take out. As difficult as it is to find, it is much
more difficult to re-assemble. The front cover of the camera should now come
off. Do not pry anything. If it does not come off recheck for a screw that you missed.


CAUTION!


With the front cover off the camera, you have now exposed the area where the
capacitor is for the flash. Handle the camera with care and keep your fingers
OFF this area. To identify this area, look for regular fairly heavy red/white wires
leading up to a plug. Now I don't think this camera will kill you, but it sure does bite.


You now have the camera frame still sitting down into the back cover. It will
depend on what you are trying to repair as to how much more you wish to take apart.
In my case I wanted to remove the lens barrel so that meant removing the back cover
and exposing the cables and their plugs that come from the lens barrel to the main
circuit board. They are plugged in near the bottom edge of the camera frame and to
remove them you have to remove the back cover.


To remove this camera frame from the back cover. On the very top of the
camera near the top LCD, you will find a cable. Slide the little dark color clamp
forward just a little bit and pull the cable out. It is not necessary to remove
the eye piece diopter adjusting knob. I did and you will find a picture with the
little spring and ball. I real frustrating job to reassemble. If you lift on the
side of the camera that has the zoom lever, you can ease this main frame of the
camera up and to the left to clear the eye adjusting knob and the USB/Power plugs.


You now have the camera apart with the back still attached via its cables.
There are some pictures following that show some of this tear-down.


The following has to do with removal of the lens barrel. Mine was damaged
so I decided to take it out of the camera and then take it apart.

I should mention that at the start of this lens barrel disassembly I had
hopes that I would find some thing that would be a easy fix. Not so. If any of you
are thinking of repairing a lens barrel in order to salvage an otherwise good
camera, I would recommend the purchase of another "Parts Camera" ( one without
a lens problem) and do a swap.


I did manage to take the Lens Barrel apart and there are pictures following.
Some very small parts to handle and reassemble. After taking the Lens Barrel
apart, I identified and smoothed out the tracks that cause the lens to move
back and forth. They were damaged in the camera accident. I reassembled this
Lens Barrel after a long time of finding out how. Lots of little gears both in the
top and bottom halves of the case that have to mesh.
This is where I knew that this project was very likely to fail. I am sure that there
is some order that this assembly must be done, position of the gears relative to the
shutter and diaphragm as in timing.


Anyways after a couple of weeks picking this little assembly off my desk and turning
it this way and that, like a Rubik's Cube, I discovered how to align all those little
gears at least to the point where the top and bottom half of the case went back together.


Previously, I failed to mention that this Lens Barrel when it is first removed from
the camera frame, that it has the Sensor circuit board assembled to the rear of the
Lens Barrel. I think it is the last picture in this gallery that shows this circuit
board. When you take this circuit board off the back of the lens assembly you will
see the Sensor and a small piece of filter glass which is the IR filter. There are
some pictures of this. I was taken by the fact that from such a small unit we think
nothing of seeing such a clear picture on our monitors or in prints.


Putting this whole thing, Lens Barrel, main frame and the covers presented
a real challenge, as not only the parts were small, but a period of time had
passed while I was fooling with the reassembly of the Lens Barrel. As I progressed
with the reassembly, I noted that I was going to have a small silver clip and a screw
left over. Now I had taken a bunch of pictures when I took this apart, but as luck
would have it the little clip and screw did not appear in any of them.


So I took my good working c-3020z camera apart slowly, looking for this clip.
Yep,it was on the back side of the Lens Barrel, the last part to be taken
apart from the good camera.
Happy to report that the good c-3020z is now back together and works well.


Finally the broken camera reached the point where it also was back together.
The moment had arrived, after a few weeks of on-again,off-again repair. Put
a set of batteries in, a memory card and turned it on. The lens came right
out like it is supposed to do. Took a picture of my wife who was supervising.
Hmm, no flash. Looked at the LCD for the Flash setup. Hmm #2 No LCD.
Took the camera apart again and found a cable that was not seated correctly
and put the camera back together again. Batteries and a card, turned it on
and the lens barrel went crazy. In and out, lots of noise.


Result of this whole project: I now have a "Parts Camera"


Moral of this whole story. If you wanted to see how cameras
work and wondered what is inside, this project is for you.
You will also discover how complex these little machines are
and have a better feel for their cost.
Again, If you have a camera that has suffered a like mishap to
its lens I would recommend finding another damaged camera, only
one that still had a good lens assembly and do a swap.


Hope you enjoyed my essay. I did have a ball with this project, only
for now I think I have had enough.


Till I find a damaged camera with a good lens??
Click on any thumbnail for a larger view.
Enjoy the pictures.