Fixing my Gitzo 3541ls?

My Gitzo 3541LS has a small problem. Sometimes when I extend the last tier of the three-tier leg system the foot pops off and the tubing then slides inside the larger tier's tubing adjacent to it. It can then be a real PITA to get the smaller tubing out, especially with cold fingers in cold weather! By the time it is fixed my photo opp is likely long gone. The problem only occurs on one leg. I am unsure why I am having this problem. Am I missing a part? Can I just gorilla glue the piece connecting the screw-on foot with the tubing so the tubing can no longer retract without being attached to the foot (which prevents the small tube from sliding all the way inside the tripod)? I hope this all makes sense!

First photo- the foot attached to the connector piece.

Second photo- I unscrewed the foot to show the connector piece, whose widened brim prevents the tubing it is attached to from sliding all the way inside the tripod. The brim stops the tube right where it should. Should I gorilla glue this piece to the tubing?

I'd go with glue as well. I think that's what hold it in the first place, opr perhaps a plastic "weld" though I don't know if such a thing would adhere to carbon fiber.

Gorilla Glue seems to be all the rage, but I've never used it so I can't actually advise on what glue would be best. when I Google "best glue for plastic to carbon fiber, the first hit is Cyanoacrylate (AKA Crazy glue)

Permabond has an info page on bonding CF;
https://www.permabond.​com …w-to-bond-carbon-fiber-2/

Thanks for the helpful response

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I've had the same problem with my Gitzo. . It seems to happen quite a bit, actually, with all 3 of the foot inserts.

I've used various kinds of glue to put them back on with. . I know I've used Gorilla Glue and the construction adhesive that comes in a tube that you dispense with a caulk gun (just because that's what my brother had lying around when the foot came off at his place). . I've also used the glue that comes in a tiny squeeze tube, such as Crazy Glue, but I have no idea what brand it was ... whatever kind the Dollar Store sells.

Whichever glue I've used, eventually the inserts come off again and have to be re-glued. . Well, actually that isn't exactly correct. . Usually the feet come off out in the bush and I don't notice until it's too late to recover the foot. . The feet also often come off in the mucky bottom of a marsh, where the mud clings to everything and wants to pull the boots of my feet. . When that marsh bottom claims a foot there's no sense even trying to look for it. . Then when they come off in Pika rockslides they typically fall through the crevices between large boulders, and there's no way to recover them.

Sometimes I just have to go and shoot for a day or two with no foot on the bottom of the tripod leg. . Of course, this exposes the bottom of the leg to potential damage and breakage. . But the shoot must go on!

Salt water really wreaks havoc on those foot inserts. . It seems to erode any glue bond, so when I use my tripod in salt water, or even brackish water, I pretty much expect to lose the feet.

I gave up ordering replacement foot inserts from Gitzo a couple years ago. . It's too expensive for something that's just gonna fall off again. My brother is a contractor and hobby machinist, so he makes up things that work as replacement foot inserts. . When he's not around (which is often) I just get thin-walled black plastic pipe at Home Depot. . It fits very snugly over the lowest leg section. So I cut it long so that it protrudes an inch or three past the bottom of the tripod leg. . This keeps the exposed end of the carbon fiber tubing from coming into contact with the ground (which could eventually cause it to fray apart). . Of course, this prevents me from being able to retract the tripod legs all the way, so there is that caveat.


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If this were a recurring problem for me (I've not run into it yet) I would glue those inserts in, and then cross drill each one and use small button head bolts and acorn lock nuts to make sure they never came out again

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Jake,

I've thought of doing that, but been afraid to drill into the carbon fiber. . It's not so much the drilling or the hole I'm concerned about, but rather the fact that there would be pressure on the carbon fiber from the head of the bolt on one side and the face of the washer on the other.

The uppermost leg sections of my Gitzo have collapsed and broken where they go into the metal part at the top, so seeing how weak and damage-prone carbon fiber can be is what has caused me this concern. . I had to buy new leg sections and they are costly. . But these tripods do tend to fall apart and sometimes there is no way to avoid the need to buy replacement legs.

Do you have any experience with carbon fiber and how it responds to holes where bolts or screws go through it? . If you do, and if in your experience the carbon fiber has held up with the screws/bolts through it, then I will give it a try.


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I would not use Gorilla Glue! One of the properties of Gorilla Glue is it expands tremendously when it cures. That is one reason the Gorilla people recommend a very thin coating and good clamping during the cure. Then the excess oozes out and can be removed.

I could possibly see the Gorilla during expansion damaging the carbon fiber portion. Personally I would try a Loctite product called “60 sec universal glue”. It allows repositioning for 15 seconds and is cured in 60 seconds (hence its name). A full cure is obtained in 24 hours.

As a test, and before doing the glue, wrap the outside of the joint as tight as possible with some electrical tape for clamping. Then see if you can rotate the foot. If you can do that easily, try to improve the clamping method until the parts seem snug, then disassemble and attack it with the glue and your clamping method.

When I shortened the center column on my Gitzo 3530 (carbon fiber), I used epoxy to reattach the metal piece that holds the hook. It's held up for 15+ years now. I don't remember the specific epoxy, but it was one that I had to mix two components and use right away.