Sensor cleaning

[golunvolo]

I have manage to go this far without a dedicated cleaning kit at home. It may be time to revisit. There are an overwhelming amount of choices. I think I´ll go for wet cleaning with swipes. Do you have a prefrerence?

  Amazon or similar easy to get will be a plus.

  Thanks!

[Erik Lund]

I have been using Eclipse sensor swabs and liquid for many years without any issues. They are expensive and they are one time use and they work very well.

[Dogman]

I use the Eclipse liquid but I buy the cheaper swabs...don't remember the brand.  They all work very well.

I always start with a blower, then a soft brush before using the swabs.  It sometimes takes two or three swabs to remove the built up residue.

[Thomas Stellwag]

I use swaps from several brands,  today I have Rollei branded ones. I buy Isopropylalcohol 100%  in 50ml bottles in the pharmacy (here it is about €1.-) and use it inbetween max 1-2 month. It is hygroscopic and the later embedded water will make streaks on the sensor. I use the rest for cleaning normal surfaces and always buy a new bottle when cleaning sensors. Then in one job I clean all my sensors, using a fresh swap for every touch on a sensor. I do it since 2006 on Sony, Nikon, Leica, Pentax without any problem. I have an Eyelead magnifying glass to check. I tried as well a jelly pen. Better to avoid it. It is a help if the dirt doesn't go away when you blow it out, but you sometimes get residues on the sensor that make it necessary to re-clean many time with a wet swap.

[MFloyd]

I’m using the kits from Visible Dust i.e. swabs & liquid cleaning. Very good experience. Average frequency: about every 5000 shots.

https://www.visibledust.com/

[Akira]

Fortunately, I've never been in need of cleaning sensors with swabs, wet or dry.  I've been successful to blow off all the dust particles on sensors using KOH HEPA JET 2:

http://www.kohglobal.com/JetAir.html

[John Geerts]

Fortunately, I've never been in need of cleaning sensors with swabs, wet or dry.  I've been successful to blow off all the dust particles on sensors using KOH HEPA JET 2:

http://www.kohglobal.com/JetAir.html

Thanks for the link Akira.  Does the Koh Hepa Jet2 also works for sticky particles on the sensor ?  I once bought a camera which had that problem.

[Akira]

Thanks for the link Akira.  Does the Koh Hepa Jet2 also works for sticky particles on the sensor ?  I once bought a camera which had that problem.

You are welcome, John.  Hepa Jet 2 is nothing but a blower even with the hospital-grade dust filter that keeps the blower from blowing dust towards the sensor along with the air.  It may work for the particles of weaker stickiness but would not for really sticky particles.  The blower is large, but the air flow is a bit weakened by the efficient HEPA filter.

My SIGMA fp suffers from the rolling shutter effect, but instead enjoys the total lack of mechanical parts that have been the main source of the dusts rather than the dusts coming from outside the camera.

[golunvolo]

Thank you all for the useful information. I guess I just have to take a plunge and try it...

[Anthony]

I have had no success with blowers.

I use PecPads wrapped on a soft plastic spatula, and Eclipse. There is a version of Eclipse which is supposed to be flight safe. I find it hard to believe that a small bottle of regular Eclipse in the middle of my suitcase is a fire risk on a flight.

I use an Ezclean sensor loupe to check for dust https://www.cameraclean.co.uk/p/ezklean-sensor-loupe/. I have the Visible Dust loupe but find it useless.

But the only truly effective way to check is to shoot a clear image (eg the sky at f22 or thereabouts) and view the image on the screen, increasing contrast to get a more accurate impression.

I had a series of photos with lots of dust and found that the easiest way to deal with this was to use Photoshop's Spot Healing Brush on the first image, recording the applications as an Action, and then running the action on every image which was affected. It worked very well. But cleaning in advance is better.

[Erik Lund]

I always clean first with a blower to remove loose stuff floating around in the throat of the camera