Arca-Swiss authorized service facility has moved location

To my knowledge, Precision Camera Works is the only authorized Arca-Swiss service facility in the United States. They have moved from Skokie, Illinois to Fairfield, California. Their new mailing address is:

Precision Camera Works
5055 Business Center Drive
STE 108-436
Fairfield, CA 94534

Arca-Swiss are pedantic about service, and I believe they will nullify the warranty if a malfunctioning Arca-Swiss product has been tampered with. Bob Watkins is a very experienced technician and does stellar work at Precision Camera. He's the go-to person if you if you want to remove the A-S double-decker clamp and replace it with a RRS clamp for example. They carry stock of RRS clamps in various sizes. Better to be sure than sorry and Precision Camera will be operating out of their new facility as of 1/13/2020.

Any idea why Arca sometimes skips out on using Loctite? Last Cube I saw had it but not a Core Leveler 75 or P0 hybrid.

simonbarker wrote in post #18999361
Any idea why Arca sometimes skips out on using Loctite? Last Cube I saw had it but not a Core Leveler 75 or P0 hybrid.

Criticism from users. A lot of users (including me) didn't like the double decker clamp on their ball heads and geared heads. Arca-Swiss took umbrage and dug in which was really stupid. The main reason I didn't like it is because the safety stops on plates were raised and rendered inoperable, or as in the case shown below the safety stops on the clamp became useless. Now they seem all over the place with respect to thread lockers and apparently haven't discovered low strength thread lockers like Vibra-TITE 111 which can be broken by hand.

I only use their geared heads which are expensive and it's just really annoying when you have to pay an additional 20% more to get a clamp installed that you can use without worrying about the safety of your camera. The only reason I tolerate this is that Arca-Swiss are far and away the best geared heads you can get.

peter_n wrote in post #18999454
I only use their geared heads which are expensive and it's just really annoying when you have to pay an additional 20% more to get a clamp installed that you can use without worrying about the safety of your camera. The only reason I tolerate this is that Arca-Swiss are far and away the best geared heads you can get.

Oh I very much felt the same way, it stings to buy such an expensive head only to find out you're not 'permitted' to use the clamp you like.

They've won, you like their products enough to buy it and recommend them yet somehow it's still not enough!

Well I wouldn't characterize this as some kind of competition; it's not win or lose. Arca-Swiss as a company seems to be very mixed in performance. The product marketing and sales side seems to be bone-headed, but the design and engineering is really excellent. I think both are based in Switzerland and the heads are manufactured in France. It's a very small family-owned company that has had an inordinate effect on photography; they are not short on ingenuity and execution. I respect Arca-Swiss a lot; it's just a pleasure to use their geared heads and yes they're expensive but you absolutely get what you pay for in the long run. Very sadly, the Vogt family who own the company suffered a terrible loss early in 2019 when their son Martin died. He was one of the lead engineering designers and very influential in product design.

peter_n wrote in post #18999454
The main reason I didn't like it is because the safety stops on plates were raised and rendered inoperable, or as in the case shown below the safety stops on the clamp became useless.

Hosted photo: posted by peter_n in
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forum: Tripods, Monopods & Other Camera Support

This is probably the first time I've seen one (well, a picture of one) up close. Is the clamp designed that way to accomodate an optional, narrower kind of plate?

It's designed that way to accommodate specific Arca-Swiss designed and manufactured plates that are used on Arca-Swiss cameras and can be used on some other European camera manufacturers bodies as well. The Arca-Swiss plates are narrower than the "Arca-Swiss type" plates that have become standard in North America. Arca-Swiss developed the dovetail concept for equipment attachment back in the 1990's, just one of the innovative ideas they've come up with. They design and manufacture cameras as well which have their plates attached to them.