Ef 75-300mm lens causing camera to stop taking pics randomly

[Izak]

Hello everyone I have a Ef 75-300mm 4-5.6 three Lens and it has began to have some issues

so it will just stop taking pictures after a while and I have to shut the camera off usually and back on and it will start working again 

does anyone have an idea what could be causing this ?

I am shooting on a rebel sL2 camera I bought the camera and lenses new and take good care of them.

[deebatman316]

Is it just the 75-300mm lens causing this or other lenses too. 

[Izak]

I believe it’s just this lense specifically the 75-300mm.

I was shooting with my 50 mm and it did not have this issue.

[kvbarkley]

Probably lens to camera communication. You might try cleaning the contacts as recommended in the manual. (Though this rarely does any good). I had a 70-300 that did something similar, as I recall, it usually happened when I changed lenses with the camera power on. You can try to send both to Canon, but I doubt they will be able to find anything.

[Izak]

What do you usually clean the gold colored metal contacts with ?

[deebatman316]

Isopropyl alcohol. DO NOT use a pencil eraser to clean the contacts. But it also could be the internal flex cable in the lens. This lens IS NOT worth repairing and its NOT a very good lens optically in general. Look into the EF 70-300mm F/4-5.6 IS II USM lens if that doesn't fix the problem.

[kvbarkley]

As the manual says, Canon recommends a soft cloth.

[zakslm]

lzak,

I owned the original version of that lens when it first came out when I was shooting with an EOS film camera.  As others have opined, it wasn't a great lens and I didn't own it very long before I upgraded to an EF 100-300 USM lens.

If you decide to move on from the 75-300, you may wish to look into the EF-S 55-250 family of lenses for your camera.  Without going into too much detail, I think there are 3 versions of that lens out there.  2 verisions of that lens have IS (image stabilization) and one version has IS and an STM focusing motor.  I have verison II (not the STM) that I purchased used and have been very pleased with my results.

Check with a reputable used equipment dealer or Canon Refurbished for details and prices if you are interested.   

[Tintype_18]

I'm going to kiss my 75-300 lens. So far, so good. Just hope I haven't jinxed it now.