Strange vibrations from lens

[duckiewoon]

I'm not a photography expert, just occasionally taking my dad's Nikon D7000 and 18-200mm lens to shoot at events. However recently I realised that the camera had some problems, which after asking around, it's deduced that the lens could be the problem.

Recently when I took it out to test, upon mounting the lens and switching it on, it had an unsual vibrating sound. When I looked thru the view finder and tried to focus on a shot, the lens and the focal point would vibrate and jutter for a few moments. While I tried to take some pictures, the jutterring would sometimes cause my pictures to be out of focus.

My friends told me that the lens motor could be spoilt and told me to take it to the service centre to have a look. They also told me that the cost of repairing the lens might not be worth it. However changing another lens will also be very costly.

Any gurus out there can recommend me places to check on the lens, or cheap places to replace it? It would be better if gurus out there had encountered similar problems before and managed to solve it. Your advices would definitely help me a lot.

 

[EJB]

Try switching off the 'VR' option at the side of the glass and try again.

18-200 has Vibration Reduction on it and when you half press, the SWM and VR motor swings into action, so if you have any slight handshake, the AF point looks like it's shifting but actually it's the VR motor negating your shake.

Once the shake stabilizes, you can fire the shot, if not then it will end up be shakey.