Lens Date Code

[Doug West]

Just out of curiosity, when selling a lens, one of the questions
I get/see is...what is the date code of the lens.

What does the date of the lens prove/disprove...and is there
a place on the net to do this proving/disproving?

Doug

[LeeOtsubo]

On Canon lenses, a date code is simply the date a lens was manufactured. It takes the form XX#### where XX is a 2 letter code for the year, the next 2 digits are the month and the last 2 digits are some sort of internal code. Google for "Canon lens date code" and you'll find lots of hits. All things being equal, a lens mfg in 2007 (code UV) is preferable to a lens mfg in 1997 (code UL) because it will have all the current ECOs (engineering change orders) but all things aren't always equal. HTH

[Jason Ambler]

Check this site out.

http://www.the-digital-picture.com/C...ens-Aging.aspx

Jason