RRS Plate lever tension.

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BCcanuck

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My new RRS lever plate seems to need an inordinatly huge amount of effort to lock and unlock when attaching to/from an Arca Swiss plate. Can this be sdjusted? I really struggle to unlock when a camera and long lens are attached.
 
What brand is your plate? Some brands claim arca-swiss compatibility but they are not. I think RRS says their lever clamp will only fit their's and Wimberley plates.
 
I don’t have an answer for you, but wouldn’t you prefer a very tight clamping force rather than risk inadvertent unlocking? Why not just call RRS and ask Joe or Lyle or anyone who answers?

I’ve been a RRS customer from back when Bryan Geyer founded the company. He always had the best product, but he was one of the most ornery, old fashioned business people I have ever met. For example, he refused to have a website for ordering and didn’t accept credit cards. You got a catalogue and you could call to get info (and he was SUPER knowledgeable and always quick to provide valuable advice), but if you wanted an item, you sent him a letter ordering the part together with a check.

My point is that when other manufacturers began selling lever clamps, i once called to suggest that he might consider producing one. He told me in no uncertain terms that he would not produce a lever mechanism because springs could/would stretch and he felt that introducing a potential weak point in a clamp holding expensive camera gear was crazy. He insisted that screw knobs were the only way to go. Once Bryan retired and his son in law Joe and his wife took over, the company entered modernity with a web sithe, online ordering with credit cards. Apparently, Joe was able to satisfy himself that levers were viable; I imagine that lever clamps outsell the knob clamps by a wide margin, but I have just never gotten over Bryan’s warning and to this day, I only have knob clamps.
 
The only thing I can thing of is to start by machine of 0.02 of material. Machine off a little and remove more as required. You also need to take into account the thickness of the repaint. You also need to keep track of the cost as it might be better to just by another.

Every part that is made has a size tolerance yours plate could be on the large end of the acceptable size. Buy paying more for the plates from a quality vendor like RRS you are paying for tighter tolerance control and higher quality control. The company's making low cost part may accept a larger range of bad part because they can afford to trash bad parts. Sorry TMI.
 
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If it is like their BH-55 there appears to be washers stacked on the shaft. Maybe removing one at a time would give the right amount of tension. Looks like it would be a simple operation. Obviously too little pressure would end badly but too much causes stress also.
 
There was a problem with some of the QR clamps last year and you may have one of those. I had a couple on a BH-40 that were like that. They got to the point you can't even close them. I'd send it to RRS for a fix.
 
I assumed to was the mounting plate not the ball head. The original part was call out in the post as ( Arca Swiss plate ) trying to mate onto the RRS lever plate. Dose anyone you know have a caliper to measure your plate. My RRS camera plate us 1.5005 wide. If your plate is 1.530 or higher by much this is your problem if not your clamp is the problem.
 
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