Do any companies besides RRS make rails or plates engraved with a scale like many of the MPR rails? Thanks, I didn't find any on B&H.

Probably Kirk.

Barry

There is a E*ay company that has sold something similar, but with engraving that is less often than the RSS ones. If you search E*ay for "Really Right Stuff", you will see they are using the RSS name in their add listing for their own rails, which "fit" RSS and Kirk and other brands. I have one rail from them, but found the accuracy of the width of the rail is off, because you can push on it and have it slip with it clamped in any of my RSS lever releases. So I need to use it only in a screw clamp.

I am totally happy with my RSS rails, including the ones with engraving, which I use in macro and panorama setups. Price is about the only negative on RSS products, but I find great value in almost every item I have purchased from them.

Don't believe Kirk does, though there's no way to easily see all of their lens plates - you have to individually select each lens one at a time...

I have one of the fleabay rails and really like it (with a screw clamp), but it doesn't have any engraving, don't think any of his do. I emailed him about it and he's checking into it.

There was a guy who was posting on these forums a couple of weeks ago, Stephan Wei, who works for a Chinese company; http://www.sunwayphoto.com

He got bawled out for "spamming".

They do however make a couple of rails that are marked similar to the RRS rails; http://www.sunwayphoto.com/En/Products.php?Cid=000326|000330

(no I don't work for Sunway Photo. I haven't even handled their products )

hard to tell if the scales on teh sunway units are engraved or silkscreened. from the pix, I'm leaning toward silk.

I'll probably just bite the bullet and get RRS, already deep in it...lol.

Check out Acratech.

Ooo forgot about those guys, emailed them to see if the nodal rail is available without the clamp.

I asked tehm and they said 'yes but we'll have to check on what the price would be'. they are planning on eating into RRS's territory re: rails & support goodies.

howardm4 wrote:
I asked tehm and they said 'yes but we'll have to check on what the price would be'. they are planning on eating into RRS's territory re: rails & support goodies.


Competition is good! Maybe prices will come down.

I don't know about the engraved part, but Hejnar Photo, an eBay store, has some nice looking AS compatible products. I have a couple of their smaller mounting plates and am happy with my purchase.

http://stores.shop.ebay.com/Hejnar-Photo__W0QQ_armrsZ1

-howard

I've got a Hejnar rail and suggested he engrave a scale - he's checking into it. Laser engraving is expensive, but he might be able to do it with a PCB board engraving tool on his CNC mill. That's what I'm planning to do with the rail I already have, since the tools are cheap on ebay and I have a vertical mill with a digital read out. Just have to pay attention to the position, every 2mm is a lot of little lines to do manually!

Frankly Speaking, i really don't trust Chinese products. But those rails look good. Does anyone has experience with them?

i have the '192 ppp' but with the likes of autopano pro (2) i dont need the markings as the software is really great at correcting mis-aliments. i tend to use my tripod for optimising framing and the plate helps the software. just get the MPR-CL and use lenses with least amount of distortion. older ais lenses are great for this.

howardm4 wrote:
hard to tell if the scales on teh sunway units are engraved or silkscreened. from the pix, I'm leaning toward silk.

I requested some of their gear for a future review and it arrived earlier this week. The Sunway scales are engraved.

howardm4 wrote:
I asked tehm and they said 'yes but we'll have to check on what the price would be'. they are planning on eating into RRS's territory re: rails & support goodies.


From my communications with them they say they are focusing on the Chinese domestic market at least for now.

BTW: I've probably got $1500 invested in various RRS products.

so what are your impressions of the Sunway gear so far?

Positive. bars are lighter than the RRS bars -- same ideas but different. Definitely not knock-off clones as I feared.

Clamps work well. So far everything seems solidly constructed. Best match to actual Arca-Swiss clamp bevel angles and width of the various (Acra-tech, Kirk, Foba, Novaflex, Graf, RRS) clamps and plates I own. No problems mating with any of the above (except for the clamp I salvaged from a Graf Studioball).

Waiting for one of their panning clamps.

E-Vener wrote:
Positive. bars are lighter than the RRS bars -- same ideas but different. Definitely not knock-off clones as I feared.

Clamps work well. So far everything seems solidly constructed. Best match to actual Arca-Swiss clamp bevel angles and width of the various (Acra-tech, Kirk, Foba, Novaflex, Graf, RRS) clamps and plates I own. No problems mating with any of the above (except for the clamp I salvaged from a Graf Studioball).

Waiting for one of their panning clamps.

Are you suggesting the bevel angles aren't all the same? I assumed there's a standard angle that all the manufacturers follow, seems crazy that any of them would deviate from it.

Drew,

I am not suggesting it. I am reporting what I've seen using a mix of clamps and plates from various manufacturers. If you check RRS they'll tell you the same thing, as will Arca-Swiss.

In the real world I haven't found it to be such a big deal as long as the clamp makes pretty substantial and solid contact with the 'foot" on the plate along the length of the plate. The basic Arca-Swiss design is over engineered for DSLR and medium and small format cameras as it was orginally designed to support 8x10 view cameras where you can apply a lot of imbalanced pressure on one end simply by inserting and removing film holders especially if you have a lot of extension. The comparison would be using large aperture super telephotos on a DSLR where the front end is really heavy.

The problem comes if you use a lever type clamp when a manufacturer makes a "foot" that is wider or narrower than the clamping mechanism. With screw tightened clamps it's only a problem if the "foot" is narrower than the clamp.

My general rule conclusion is that if you want assurance that you absolutely have the best fit get plates from the company that makes your clamps.

Ah, I expected slight width variations across manufacturers (which isn't good for the lever clamps), but assumed the angle of the dovetails would be consistent, since that's a pretty easy thing to set on the machine.

You'd have to ask the different makers why they do that. probably thought they were improving the wheel. Different width is a more serious flaw than differing bevel angle. I have a generic Novaflex L bracket which I really like but for the RRS screw drive clamps on a PCL-1 and their MPR-CL II "nodal slide" to lock down tight on it I need to add a paper shim the thickness of a standard business card.

Hello everybody
It is old post but i want let you know that i do make a rails with laser engraved scale