My daughter just dropped her camera, now the silver part/zoom lens wont go back in and its says, lens error 211. i tried removing the batteries and putting them back in but nothing has changed. what do i do?

If you've recently dropped the camera you may have lens damage that's preventing the camera from working properly. If you haven't dropped it, your problem may be due to weak/worn out batteries or corrosion on the battery contacts inside the camera which can prevent the full power of the batteries from flowing into the camera. Try this free fix before you do anything else: remove the batteries and wipe the camera contacts firmly with a dry cloth (heavy corrosion may require cleaning with a wire brush, steel wool, or sandpaper). Remove any residue that may have fallen into the battery compartment during cleaning, then wipe both ends of the batteries and place them back in the camera. This cleaning clears the problem about 90% of the time. If it doesn't work for you, your batteries may need to be replaced, or the camera may have a problem that requires professional repair.

When the camera was dropped, the lens was most likely twisted. So you either have to try to force it back (be gently) or send it in to Canon repairs.

I just pulled apart the camera, everything inside was intact. No cogs broken. couldnt find anything to fix (not a camera expert by the way).

In desperation even put some WD40 on the lens barrel - still no luck.

Camera turns on - barrel is stuck out. Wont zoom, wont go back in and wont take a photo.

Daughter's camera and she says she didnt drop it but just saw it on her desk with the lens out...

Would be good if someone could shed some light on the problem.

Lens errors are fairly common. Usually it's sand or grit interfering with the lens extension mechanism. Or the camera's been dropped with the lens extended. Or the camera has been powered on, but the lens had been blocked preventing its extension. Or the battery ran down with the lens extended ...

Here's some things that you can do to try to correct it. They only seem to work for less than 50% of the lens errors, but if the camera is out of warranty, they're worth a try:

http://camerarepair.blogspot.com/2007/12/fixing-lens-error-on-digital-camera.html

The lens got out of track. Try to have them back by forcing gently the lens in ou out with your fingers. If they are bent, force them straight. Hope it helps.

I think a grain of sand was blocking the zoom tubes. This will not work if the camera has been dropped & the zoom apparatus is bent. It is entirely at your own risk & may invalidate any guarantee but they may charge anyway if you have got sand in. I cut a finger of 80gm computer paper 1cm X 5cm. Inserted this first  around outer zoom tube & worked it all around. It goes in quite deep so be gentle. I switched on to open zoom & tipped out batteries before it had time to close & repeated procedure. When I put batteries back in it worked OK. I repeated procedure with lens fully extended. I found a thin bit of plastic packing worked better as it did not kink so easily. It is still working today having failed 100% before.
Chris

We had this problem for about 2 weeks, we discovered that having the camera auto retracted after the "ZOOM ERROR" message, giving the camera couples of light slaps (slap the camera's LCD side and aim the camera down), this fixed the camera right away

The E18 error is fairly common. Usually it's sand or grit interfering with the lens extension mechanism. Or the camera's been dropped with the lens extended. Or the camera has been powered on, but the lens had been blocked preventing its extension.

Here's some things that you can do to try to correct it. They only seem to work for about 50% of lens errors, but they're worth a try:

http://camerarepair.blogspot.com/2007/12/fixing-lens-error-on-digital-camera.html

Lens errors are fairly common. Usually it's sand or grit interfering with the lens extension mechanism. Or the camera's been dropped with the lens extended. Or the camera has been powered on, but the lens had been blocked preventing its extension.

Here's some things that you can do to try to correct it. They only seem to work for less than 50% of the lens errors, but they're still worth a try:

http://camerarepair.blogspot.com/2007/12/fixing-lens-error-on-digital-camera.html

Lens unit has to come out to see whether the problem can be sorted out without spares going in. But unfortunately you have to go from the back on this model which means disconnecting and removing all 3 pc boards and the LCD screen and then loosening the lens mounting to slide the lens out from the back. You may have to dismantle the free lens further once it is out to see exactly what the damage is ( if any ).