Luminous Landscape Forum
Equipment & Techniques => Cameras, Lenses and Shooting gear => Topic started by: jeffreybehr on January 06, 2016, 07:02:00 pm
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You know the one--that has to be adjusted--with a clumsy thumbwheel--for virtually ever different QR plate you want to use? The same one that allows you to drop--unintentionally, of course--your camera and lens to the ground with a flick of your thumbnail? BEGONE, bad clamp!
Kirk has a replacement--model SQRC-ARCA--
http://www.kirkphoto.com/SQRC-Arca_Arca_Swiss_Quick_Release_Clamp.html#
The clamp's knob stops on the panbase's tightening lever, allowing that top panbase to rotate only about 350 degrees, but that's a small price to pay for the--IMO--safer and easier-to-use twist-knob-type clamp.
(http://i89.photobucket.com/albums/k220/jeffreybehr/0%20Sony%20a7R%20Mk%20II/Kirk%20clamp%201_1800h_zpsxwnnbp8r.jpg) (http://s89.photobucket.com/user/jeffreybehr/media/0%20Sony%20a7R%20Mk%20II/Kirk%20clamp%201_1800h_zpsxwnnbp8r.jpg.html)
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Great idea.
I don't use the cube but a D4 geared with the same issue.
The Kirk is on my list.
Paul C
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Check to make sure that you can remove the disliked clamp. In more recent times, AS has attached the clamp with a particularly tenacious threadlock compound, and they recommend sending the unit to one of their service centers to remove the clamp.
Oddly, I like the AS lever clamp (on a ball head), but then I have bought almost all brackets, feet, and rails from a single source (Kirk - they make really nice L brackets). Hejnar seems to fit the Kirk standard, I have steered clear of Sunwayfoto.
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Check to make sure that you can remove the disliked clamp. In more recent times, AS has attached the clamp with a particularly tenacious threadlock compound, and they recommend sending the unit to one of their service centers to remove the clamp.
Oddly, I like the AS lever clamp (on a ball head), but then I have bought almost all brackets, feet, and rails from a single source (Kirk - they make really nice L brackets). Hejnar seems to fit the Kirk standard, I have steered clear of Sunwayfoto.
TY Nancy. My CUBE's hex-head hold-down screw came out easily with a 1/4"-drive ratchet and 7/16"(note) short socket. The internal-hex ("allen") screw supplied by Kirk is longer than the ARCA original, but it worked just finely. Kirk supplies a small container of Lock-Tite, but I didn't use that.
Note--I'm confident that the original screw is all metric, but the 7/16" socket fit just finely.
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Check to make sure that you can remove the disliked clamp. In more recent times, AS has attached the clamp with a particularly tenacious threadlock compound, and they recommend sending the unit to one of their service centers to remove the clamp.
They use a formulation of Lock-Tite that strongly resists being removed (red if I remember correctly). There is no reason to do so, as the other formulation would have done a good job of keeping the clamp from loosening. One can only conjecture that Arca-Swiss was peeved that most everyone who buys a Cube replaces the clamp because theirs is too fidgety, and so they made the removal more painful.
I was able to remove their clamp by heating the screw with a blow dryer until it was fairly hot, then using some elbow grease. Then I put a Really Right Stuff clamp on it.
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My first ARCA-Swis Cube had the quick-release clamp, which I hated. I sold it and bought the version with the knob-clamp and am a Happy Camper.