Lens assembly my digital camera was damaged and the zoom lens will not extend out. I haven't really done anything mainly so as not to do futher damage.

And you are sure, the battery does have enough power? because that could have caused the problem in the first place. But if it has enough power, you should check if anything could block the free movement of the lens barrel. Did you drop the camera, or bumped to anything, while the lens was out? When you don't see any damage on the outside, still it could be some damage on the inside, or a motor that won't work.
I should try to recharge the battery, and if after replacing the battery, the lens won't move, I should visit a service centre, or if a good photo shop is close by I would ask there with the camera in my hand, what they think of the problem.

Unfortunately this is a well known problem with digital cameras. And in most cases this doesn't end up pretty well. Your camera contains a lot of servomotors and small lens and sensors. They work togheter in order to produce sharp pictures and expose the main CCD sensor to correct amount of light. When you start the camera, it's main circuit board, wich contains it's microcontroller (some kind of a camera processor) will run some tests to see if the lens assembly works correctly and if there isn't anything that can block the lens extension procedure. If this test fails you will be given a message telling you to turn the camera off and back on. Your camera obviously passed this test since you can take pictures. However the camera can't test the zoom function at the begining because this is done by using zoom motors and the ccd sensor at the same time. The sensor isn't turned on at the initial stage when the test it's made. When you try to zoom with your camera, in your case, the speed on wich the lens are moved back and forth doesn't correspond to the speed value stored in the camera's microcontroller and used for calibrating the ccd sensor. The camera will inevitabily give you this message as it thinks that this is a small problem with the lens and because of a shock received, the lens alligment got messed up. It thinks a reset will do the job, as when it retracts the lens back they will come again up with the correct settings. In your case the most probable thing that's rong inside your camera is a small servomotor that has the function to extend the distance between two lens in order to "zoom". The 2 lens are contained in separate mooving parts of the lens assembly, and those parts moove apart one from each other by sliding on some small channels. If this becomes altered or decalibrated, the movement of the motor woun't produce an acurate movement of the lens. These are very fragile components on any camera so they can get out of balance from all sort of reasons. Maybe a mechanical shock, maybe something inside got loose or change it's possition, there are many reasons. In order to fix this, the camera needs to be dissasembled and the lens unit should also be opened. You will need very delicate tools and it's recomandable to work in a dust free environment. If you aren't the electronic/mechanic type of person I strongly recomand that this operation should be performed in a camera service center. That's because if you damage or decalibrate something inside the lens assembly, the whole mechanism will need to be changed as it's imposible to repair in most cases. In your current situation, a repair can be done and shouldn't be that expensive. If you however for whatever reasons decide you want to try fix the camera yourself (I, again state that this involves pretty much risks) you may reply to this and I will try to guide you throught. I'm sorry, however, for I am the one who delivers the bad news about your camera. This is a hard to do repair, most specially in a DIY fashion. Good luck and please feel free to reply if you need more informations.

Return it. It's defective.

I've got the answers...

Problem: Lens error.
Symptom: Lens will not extend upon power up.
Cause: Lens is impeded while trying to extend.
This is usually caused by one of two circumstances. (1) The user dropped the camera while the lens was extended causing a mechanical failure. (2) The lens attempts to extend while in a pouch or pocket without the user's knowledge. This usually happens when the user is carrying the camera with the battery in. When/if the REC button or power button is pressed accidentally, the lens will attempt to extend but can't. This causes the main drive gears to be damaged.

Solution: Replace the main drive gear assembly. This should only be done by a qualified tech.
If you've experienced this you know exactly what I mean. This should clear up any notion that the "Lens Gods" have cursed you. Although this may have appeared to be a mystery, it's always caused by something!

Problem: Lens error.
Symptom: Lens extends, makes a few buzzing noises and retracts, resulting in "lens error" message.
Cause: This is caused by damage to the focus lens often by impact, or sand in the mechanism.
Solution:The focus lens gears either need to be replaced or the assembly completely rebuilt. Again, this should be done by a qualified tech. It's a very delicate process.

Problem: Aperture unit failure
Symptom: images appear to be washed out, over exposed and often have horizontal lines through them.
Cause:The aperture unit is either stuck, damaged or not receiving the proper electrical signal to activate. The result is that the aperture remains open after the picture is taken and CCD is over exposed.
Solution:Completely rebuild the aperture unit, which requires complete lens dis-assembly and rebuild. Again, this should be done by a qualified tech. It's a VERY delicate process.


Additional details in THIS LINK.

Hope this helps.

Hi, this is a lens assembly mechanism problem. It is a delicate part of any camera. The lens assembly is composed of several servomotors, coils, some sensors and the actual lens. It does the following jobs:

it extends the lens back and forth

achieves focus by moving the lens

zooms the lens by rotating them in the same time as the whole objective is moved back and forth

Each of these operations is controlled by some servomotors who actually move these parts and are also connected to some sensors that pass the readings back to a main processing unit. When you open the camera this processing unit will check to see if the lens assembly is able to do all of these 3 things. Failure to comply with even one of them will result in the error you see which doesn't mean that the lens itself are damaged, could be the connector to their servomotors, sensor failure, some coils that are out of position and things like that. They are all related to the lens assembly. Because this is a VERY fragile part of any camera I don't suggest you to try a DiY repair because you can damage the lens even further. Even service centers have problems repairing this, most time it is done under a microscope and some times it simply can't be fixed.
This problems occur most of the time in corelation with the camera being dropped or received some shocks but it can happen out from nowhere, just like that.
I would recomand you to go to a service center. Try not the big ones that represent large corporations (because they are expensive), instead look for a smaller one. Tell them you have a lens assembly problem, ask them to make you a diagnostic and then ask for a cost estimate BEFORE they actually repair the camera. If the lens assembly is damaged beyound repair it will need to be changed as a whole, including all connectors, CCD sensor and so on. This could cost from $70 - $200 excluding labor parts that can be about $100. Therefore you should ask them a cost estimate.

If your camera is still in waranty you just need to call one authorised service center to have it fixed for free.

Hey,
I too dropped my digicam...my lens got damaged they told cost would come around 9k so i gotta new one.It s the only thing that can be done..

I had the same problem with mine after I dropped my camera when it was opening up after turning on. It feel directly on the lens and ever sense has told be to remove the lens cap.

I’ve disassembled the camera and discovered that the zoom motor drive assembly has a small set of plastic gears inside that are quite fragile and like mine are easily broken. You’ll find the zoom motor after taking the back assembly of the camera off. It’s located on the bottom left side of the lens assembly if you're looking at the camera as if you were taking a shot.

Here’s the part no. from the Panasonic support web site.....
L6DAAAHB0001
ZOOM MOTOR
46.07

Does the lens extend and retract as normal?
If so then the internal drive gear for the zoom / focus has been damaged and will need to be repaired/ replaced.
If the whole lens will not move or is stuck then it needs to be removed, stripped and re-assembled.

The power leads that are soldered from the main circuit board to the LCD are near the lens assembly ( about 7 o'clock). Did you break one of these? If so, it will need to be resoldered.

(EX-S100) You need a new lens assembly. I know this from experiece because I have the same camera and it tried to extend while in its case as well. I found that there are plastic gears that extend this lens assembly and that they are basically destroyed when the lens assembly is not allowed to extend on power-up. I have searched for a replacement part with little success. I found one repair shop that would ship me the part for more than the original cost of the camera. Good Luck!