Arca Swiss type Brackets

I have always used Manfrotto tripod gear up to now.  My geared head has a plate that clips firmly into place., with a click.

I recently bought a Three Legged Thing travel tripod, with a ball head, with an Arca Swiss plate connector. It closes with lever action. I found a Smallrig bracket to attach to my Z7 SH. I also have a 3Legged bracket for my Z8

My problem is that there is nothing to stop the camera sliding out when clamped, which seems pretty strange.  Both brackets have this problem to some degree. 

Am I missing something?

Here is the 3Legged thing bracket

This is the Smallrig bracket

Probably there is no real problem in actual use. But I feel the Manfrotto system is more secure at the end of the day.

The 3LT has stops on the horizontal face, but non on the vertical face.

The Smallrig has no stops.

I sent an Email to Three Legged thing and they told me to tighten the clamping screw. Now my Swiss Arca brackets are held firmly in place with the increased friction.

It works, but the friction grip leaver is not a design I like very much. I guess it will weaken with use as the spring looses tension. I still prefer the Manfrotto clip in solution, which is much better fixing in place design.

Hi,

I have the old Bogen/Manfrotto hexagonal quick release plates on everything. And, only one tripod and one monopod which work with those plates. Usually, I use the things in the landscape orientation, but sometimes the tripod head gets rotated into portrait. The QR system is secure enough that this never worried me, much less was ever a problem.

The medium format camera I've had have two tripod sockets, one for each orientation, so that was nice. I just needed an extra QR plate.

Enter the new (to me) Fujifilm GFX-100. I was wondering about that before it arrived. No second tripod socket for a second QR plate, and a heavy enugh rig where I wasn't all that happy with the idea of rotating the camera and lens sideways like I do the smaller format cameras.

But, wait. There are L-brackets like some have shown here. Just use one of those. So, I took one of my old school QR plates and bolted an Arca clamp to it and there we are. The screw clamps the jaws to secure the L-bracket. It has enough surface area to hold the bracket with no tendency to slide sideways. And, for portrait orientation, I just loosen the clamp and turn the camera and tighten the clamp.

What's nice here is I don't have to convert anything else over. Just release the old style plate and I'm back to where I came from.

Stan

Here is the Manfrotto system. I bought a bracket some time ago

I like this system as it clicks solidly into place.

For the Arca Swiss. Probably the screw threaded clamp is better.

I don't know.

Not for your cameras but this may be of interest:

www.dpreview.com/forums/post/67505535

Hi,

My QR plate is of a slightly different style than used on the geared head. But it, too, clicks securely into place. Here is a shot of the bare plate on the tripod head.

I already have several cameras and lenses with this style plate attached. I didn't want to change them all over to Arca to match the L bracket on the new camera. So I went and acquired a clamping base plate for the Arca dovetail and attached that to one of my older style plates.

The same idea ought to work with your plates for your head. Just pick up an extra plate to go with that geared head and make an adapter.

Stan