Sirui Tripod Questions

After being able to play with the T-2204X and K20X for a few days, here are my initial thoughts:

Build quality:

This thing is solid! You can tell it was built well. Tolerances are very exacting. The threaded portions under the twist-locks are aluminum. The twist-locks themselves are beefy, and lock/unlock with a 1/2 turn twist as advertised. The K20X ballhead is rock solid for my setup. The tension on the main ball has a fine level of control, and is very smooth (no jerking, no sudden flopping-over of your camera, etc). The panning motion is also silky smooth. The spider is aluminum, anodized I believe.

Functionality:

Being a travel tripod, it's not the tallest. Fully extended with center column extended, it's plenty tall for me (I'm 6'0") Using the short center column only, and fully-extended, the camera sits somewhere around 5 feet tall. Not a big deal as I rarely need anything higher for what I do.

It does fold down rather compactly, but only when the longer center column is used. If you have the short column on, then the legs won't close all the way when reverse-folded up and over the ballhead portion. Not a huge deal as this is already a compact tripod, but something to consider.

The center columns, long and short, are kind of weird. The short column can be used with the long column to get the max extended height. It can also be used by itself to get very low to the ground shots. Unfortunately, if you use the short column only, then you're left with a threaded bolt hanging out the bottom, unable to make use of the hook to hang your bag (because they are completely different thread-patterns). Would've been nice if that hook could be attached to the small column, instead of a bolt hanging out :/

Also, I'd like to be able to attach the ballhead to the spider directly instead of using any column, but of course this isn't the case

Rigidity:

Overall I'm very impressed by the rigidity. Movement (like me tapping on the legs) does not transfer much (this is a very good thing!) Any movement is well controlled, and quickly diminished. This is the main reason I bought a higher-end tripod. If you angle the legs out to the 45 deg position, and then splay and extend them out, there is about an inch or so of flex I've noticed (basically it reacts like a trampoline, bounces up and down, but still well controlled, and diminishing quickly) In that position, you'll want to take care not to accidentally touch or bump the tripod. In windy conditions, I suspect you could notice some movement (this is untested by me as of yet)

Conclusion:

I'm very happy and very impressed so far. For the price I think you're getting quite a bit for your money. It's compact, relatively lightweight, and plenty solid for my uses. If you need more beefiness, get a 3 section with no center column. If you're a pro and demand the most of your gear, maybe look at Gitzo and RSS (I have no basis for comparison)

Sorry for being a little off the topic, but I'm curious on what are the differences between Sirui's series? Like the M, TX, N, S, ET and other. I can't seem find them on Google..

danisnug wrote in post #16844984
Sorry for being a little off the topic, but I'm curious on what are the differences between Sirui's series? Like the M, TX, N, S, ET and other. I can't seem find them on Google..

Company page
http://www.sirui.com.s​g …category&id=83&​Itemid=470

mine1 wrote in post #16843676
Which benro's were not sold in the us? I do know that for example the one you have and the one I have are both just old models and used to be sold here but are still being marketed overseas. Not saying you are wrong, just checking if i should have looked into models that are not offered here.

We're OT but briefly: My C2680T was never sold here in the US, but the prior model which was labeled under their old naming convention was when it was superseded by the C2680T.

My Benro Versatile model is A2970T, a tripod with twist lock legs that you can't buy in the US. You can buy the A2970F here but even though the Benro flip locks are great I prefer twist locks.

Their best tripods are probably the systematics which they call Combo; never sold here. Apparently you can get them for excellent prices in HK stores.

I just don't understand it.

Just to add a bit to Peter's OT-ness, in general, they don't seem to sell the Benro models here in the US if Induro has an equivalent model.

klr.b wrote in post #16846416
Just to add a bit to Peter's OT-ness, in general, they don't seem to sell the Benro models here in the US if Induro has an equivalent model.

this makes sense.

I took Sirui T-025X to Istanbul. Reason I took Sirui instead of my travel tripod Gitzo 1550T was small foot print. I didn't want to risk people tripping on my tripod. It worked out better than expected.

^that is a great shot. looks like something from a disney movie

Just wanted to throw my thoughts on the Sirui legs. I recently got the 3204 legs with the K30 ball head and they are pretty incredible. They can be disassembled and cleaned easily and are by far the sturdiest legs I have ever used. I use them with my 5Dmk3 and 85L/70-200 2.8 and they are very steady.

One thing to note though is while the legs fold up around the center column if you take off the longer portion of the center column to shoot very low to the ground and are using this or another ball head you will not be able to fold it up like that because the ball head will be in the way of folding the legs close together.

Personally for me I prefer the setup with the short center column and I just close it like normal with the ball head up top and legs below. it is a fairly large set-up but it does fit just fine packed on the front of my Thinktank Streetwalker Hard Drive backpack and they are not very heavy.