Tell your flimsy tripod horror story

I have a massive old aluminum tripod I lug around for night work. I'm interested in a lighter manfrotto, like an mkc except one hears anecdotal horror stories about the wind blowing them over, etc. Hard to believe. Has anyone had a first hand accident or issue they attribute to a flimsy tripod?

Thanks!

When set up properly they shouldn't fall over.

Got one off of amazon for $50ish, and the attached head was shaking on it right out of the box.. The connector to the tripod was cracked
Never let the 7D meet this particular item.

1st post:

I wish I knew what equipment my friend was using at the time, but he had, from what I can remember, a Kodak DCS Pro 14n which did manage to topple over on a tripod on a windy day. Needless to say, it rattles quite a bit now and was going to cost over £1000 to repair.

He then splashed out on a Canon 1Ds. Mounted it on a tripod, slung it over his shoulder to walk down some stairs at a shopping centre and the mounting head detached itself from the tripod. He could only stand and watch his £5000 investment bounced down 20 steps "grinding" to a halt.

You can just imagine the sickly feeling!

On inspection, there was only a tiny dent in the casing, everything else was OK

This has nothing to do with a flimsy tripod but a tale of what can happen if you're not careful and careless..

Some years ago I used to work for the photographic unit of a large industrial plant.. I was sent out to get overall shots of one of the huge machine shops on the plant..

I was using a Nikon F mounted on a Benbo Classic, one of the strongest/toughest tripods built.. I was on a crane track getting shots using available light.. I'd finish the shoot and was unscrewing the tripod screw when the crane started moving towards me.. I grabbed the tripod but my camera was only just hanging by one thread.. The camera fell off the crane track, fell about 25 metres, bounced onto a piece of rolled up conveyor belting and slid to the concrete floor..

I ran downstairs in horror finding the camera's pentaprism (which is detatchable on Nikon F cameras) had popped off and the film cover off (the Nikon F's film cover slides off as opposed to a latched door) had slid open fogging the film.. The Nikkor 35mm f/2.8 lens had a few dinges in the filter thread.. I re-assembled the camera, one of the pentaprism mirrors was cracked but everything else was fine except for a huge gouge in the body near the film advance and where the film cover locks to the body.. I reloaded and reshot the job..

I still have this camera. It looks badly battered and bruised but still works well.. Tough old cameras those early Nikons..

yogestee wrote in post #11656976
This has nothing to do with a flimsy tripod but a tale of what can happen if you're not careful and careless.

DING!

my induro CT313 w/acratech GV2 and 5D w/17-40 (the head/legs are way overkill for the camera) almost went face first into the beach Sunday AM. It was that windy...

if you're dealing with a windy day, put your gear bag under the tripod, and attach the tripod to it with a bungee cord... that should take care of most winds...

MiniMe wrote in post #11656888
1st post:

I wish I knew what equipment my friend was using at the time, but he had, from what I can remember, a Kodak DCS Pro 14n which did manage to topple over on a tripod on a windy day. Needless to say, it rattles quite a bit now and was going to cost over £1000 to repair.

He then splashed out on a Canon 1Ds. Mounted it on a tripod, slung it over his shoulder to walk down some stairs at a shopping centre and the mounting head detached itself from the tripod. He could only stand and watch his £5000 investment bounced down 20 steps "grinding" to a halt.

You can just imagine the sickly feeling!

On inspection, there was only a tiny dent in the casing, everything else was OK

If that won't convince my girl to let me get a 1D MkIV, nothing will.

I am pretty sure that most tripod related accidents happen due to human error. Some people, when handling a tripod, often don't spread the legs enough *cough* or place the tripod in a leaning position with a heavy lens on. Im pretty sure that most blow overs have to do with that the tripod was almost falling over anyway. I've seen quite a few of these accidents through the years.

A tripod can blow over, but you'd need a really strong wind. I have a hook under my Gitzo, but I havn't used it ever, and I do a lot of coastal stuff.

SMP_Homer wrote in post #11657707
if you're dealing with a windy day, put your gear bag under the tripod, and attach the tripod to it with a bungee cord... that should take care of most winds...

yeah, but then my bag is wet/sandy...

viktorsundberg wrote in post #11657767
I am pretty sure that most tripod related accidents happen due to human error. I'm pretty sure that most blow overs have to do with that the tripod was almost falling over anyway.

they could be from that, but my case was NOT. The head/legs were perfectly level and a big enough gust came through it went up on 2 legs as was about to go over, luckily I was standing right there. I then leaned the setup INTO the wind and had it almost happen again with another nice gust? And it was only blowing 20~25kt?

jacobsen1 wrote in post #11657945
yeah, but then my bag is wet/sandy...

Wet and Sandy bag beats camera/lens doing faceplant into that same wet and sandy surface

Thom Hogan has an article on his site explaining why you should buy the good tripod and head first, even if it costs a lot.
(No link; sorry. However I found it easily last time by googling Thom Hogan tripod...)

edit: here's the link...

http://www.bythom.com/​support.htm

Not a flimsy issue but reason enough to invest in a good quality tripod. Second time out with my new 40d and 17-40. I had a chepo 30 year old tripod from my film days and I was setting up to shoot some fireworks. I was adjusting the view and luckily I was also holding my 40d by my left hand; the plastic mount cracked and my camera and lens came off the tripod. WOW; a cold shiver went up my spine and needless to say no photo's that evening.

I've been doing this photography thing since the mid-1960's and I realized a long time ago if you cheap out on something as important as a tripod, it's going to come back to bite you... Hard.

One of the adages of photography is that there are three desirable qualities for a tripod: rigidity, light weight and low cost. Pick two, because you can't have all three...

I have three tripods. One is aluminum, is fairly rigid and reasonably inexpensive but heavy. A second is also aluminum and it's lighter and didn't cost much, but is a bit more flimsy. I have a nice rigid, light carbon fiber tripod that does everything I could ever want, but it was expensive...

Since you are thinking about the Manfrotto, I'll tell you my story. I think I had the Canon 650 film camera at that time, but it may have been a 10D. I had it attached to Manfrotto's first carbon fiber tripod, the Carbon One. The legs were spread out fully to the click stop, but in the tallest position. The center column was either fully down or minimally raised. I stepped away from the tripod and a mild gust of wind blew it over backwards. The camera popped open at the seam. I pushed it back together until it snapped together. It had a small mark or two on it, but worked fine ever since (as related to this incident). It seems that in order to obtain and advertise the tallest possible height, the legs do not angle out very far on the first click stop. It's fine indoors, but I'd never leave it unattended in this position outdoors unless it was secured with additional cords, weight, etc.