I have a Nikon DX SWM ED 18-55mm Autofocus lens that broke down. It got stuck and I decided to take the lens apart. It turned out that the flare cutter had come out somehow. Now the problem is with the Lens Straight Keys, provided it's the accurate term. They are bent. I want to know if that's normal and if not, is it okay to use pliers to straighten them?
I have attached pictures to show what I mean. Any sort of help would be highly appreciated.
Repair manuals for this lens appear to be readily available online. From that manual:
... we can see that the straight key is indeed intended to be straight. You might be able to be bend it back carefully using a bench vice, but... I'd be super-concerned about how this happened in the first place. Your note that "the flare cutter had come out somehow" indicates there was pretty severe trauma somehow. This is not a very expensive lens and it's already clearly pretty messed up so there's not much you can really lose in trying. Worst case you'll snap it, or it'll later snap in place from trauma now. Maybe you can find another broken lens cheap online, where that lens is broken in a different way, and steal parts from that?
