My 2 year old son may have put an end to this ball head, but let's see.
Apparently, my son unscrewed the main lever and played with it for a while, then tossed it under the kitchen table for me to find.
Problem: When I put it back, it doesn't do a thing, the ball is loose. I looked around if some other part fell out when he unscrewed the lever, but didn't find anything. The ball was mounted on the tripod and the tripod wasn't moved and didn't fall over when he took the lever out, so nothing could have fallen out from the ball head on its own.
I looked on the internet, saw which 498RC2 parts are sold separately and there is nothing there between the lever itself and the body of the head.
I tried turning the head upside down "hoping" to see something moving inside, but nuh-uh.
I am clueless. Any ideas?
There is no service in the area that could help me, so that's out as an option. I could call Manfrotto in some other country (I am not in the USA) but was hoping to maybe solve the problem one way or another before jumping into the jaws of the CS people.
There should be a domed insert at the very end of the thread on the locking knob, I think. It`s not shown as a separate component as it is part of the lock knob assembly. Check yours to see if it is still there, if it`s not you will see the drilled out end of the thread. Could it be that you haven`t set the tension and it`s backed all the way off? HTH.
There is no domed insert in the knob, the last half inch or so of the thread is hollow. I guess I should check the places my son uses to stash "his" stuff away again. If it's not there, I hope a new knob will solve the problem.
Hey I know this thread is really old but the same thing happened to me. That little piece actually ended up inside the ballhead! I heard something clanking around in there and kept shaking it until it came out. If you still have it, give that a try.
