Replace a Leica M8 Cracked Front Cover

As I mentioned in my previous post about my Leica M8, although I fixed it successfully, the front cover was cracked. That meant that the top cover (the one with the glass windows for the rangefinder and the shutter speed dials) was hanging on only by one screw, instead of two, and someone had glued it in place, rather than replacing the front cover. I ordered a new front cover from Leica, at about $150. Not the cheapest, but it’s cast magnesium, so the chances of welding/brazing the cracked one were near zero, at least for my skill. the following pictures show how I stripped down every single piece of the M8 in order to replace the front cover. It starts half way through the disassembly, where we left off in my other post.

This is roughly where we left off in my previous post about the M8, remove the screw that grounds the flex cable to the front cover/frame.

Remove this screw

Remove the guiding spacer and washer

Remove this screw, you’ll need a long and thin phillips screwdriver to go through a whole in the front cover, to be able to reach this screw.

Remove

Remove the E-clip and the washer

Now you can remove this arm

Gently lift the motor assembly and undo those two screws

Gently remove the whole thing

Remove screws and braket

Move the light meter to one side, be careful not to break the very thin flex cable

Remove the rangefinder arm and stop eccenter

Disconnect the flexcable of the rangefinder

Remove screws

Remove screw

This is the last screw that is holding the rangefinder in place, be careful not to drop it while you unscrew it

Scary! :p

Unscrew

Free the flex cable from the braket

Gently push the top part of the battery compartment downwards

The flexcable and red/black wires are still holding the top part in place, so be careful

Free the red/black wires from the glue

Gently and slowly pull out the battery contact from the plastic slots. They are not glued nor screwed in, it’s a friction fit. You will need to carefully push them out with a screwdriver from the inside of the battery compartment, and pull them out from the outside. Do it alternatively, baby steps, and take your time.

Now you can get rid of the top part of the battery compartment, and undo the screws

Remove screws

Lift the bottom part of the battery compartment

Unhook the spring from the top, not the bottom. You see how that transistor is very close to the bottom of the spring? You don’t want to risk damaging that, so work from the top. Put your finger on the body of the spring, so when you unhook it the spring won’t snap.

Remove screws

Remove the frameline selector assembly

Remove screws

Lift out the circuit board

Remove the E-clip to release the lens mount button

Undo all the screws of the mount

Only one spring for the lens mount, no other screws to remove, way better solution than in the M3

Remove screws

Gently lift the bit-code reader and the shims

I had to take this picture and record the mess I made. I had no more space where to work on!

Unscrew the brass piece

The whole thing comes out

You’ll need a spanner wrench to unscrew the cap of that lever. I shimmed one of the spanner wrenches that I use for the M3, by shimming it with a couple of brass pieces.

Unscrew

Remove this bracket

Remove this bracket too

These screws, two on each side of the front cover, that hold in place the strap loops, are the devil. I could not for the life of me get a good grip on them and I could not unscrew them. I used a very good phillips screwdriver too, to no avail. They might be pozidriv? Who knows, I had to drill them out and order a new set. They are M1.7, so not very easy to find.

That pesky strap loop, hanging on the front cover. Once you remove those, you’re done, and you can start reassembling everything on the new front cover.