Sony's NEX and Alpha range of E and FE-mount cameras have a lot going for them, but some users have reported a 'wiggle' in the lensmount, especially when heavier lenses, or third-party optics via adapters are used. Fotodiox thinks it has the answer with its new 'Tough E-Mount' - literally a replacement lensmount for E and FE-mount cameras.
The Fotodiox Tough E-Mount is a one-piece metal replacement lensmount for Sony E and FE-Mount cameras. According to the manufacturer it provides a movement-free coupling between camera and lens - a problem reported by some Alpha users, especially when long, heavy or third-party lenses (via an adapter) are used with the cameras.
With a single metal ring replacing the two (one metal, one plastic - shown above on the left) originally attached to the camera, the Tough E-Mount should (according to the manufacturer) eliminate any movement between camera and lens. The Fotodiox Tough E-Mount is available now for $39.95.
I have a Nex6 with the problem of the slight rotational looseness causing the lens to reset (18200LE). Very irritating. Does anyone have experience of using the Tough mount to try to fix this problem?
A little tip for those who may be concerned about dropping the tiny screws inside the camera.
Before undoing the screws, place some black plastic electrician's tape, the sort that won't leave any sticky residue when removed, across the throat of the mount. Remove the screws, and then the tape so you can insert a flat headed screw driver to prise loose the mount as shown in the video. Place tape over the Fotodiox mount in the same aforementioned manner, position the mount and replace the screws. Remove tape. That's it, done.
Addendum: Having slept on it for 24 hours, there are a couple of things that are potentially problematical with the Tough E-Mount Kit as supplied by Fotodiox:
(1) Although there is a Video on the Fotodiox Website there are NO instructions whats so ever supplied with the kit. This is potentially dangerous (2) The use of the CORRECT Cross Headed Driver to remove the screws and re-attach them is neither provided or the correct size quoted. This is a potentially serious ommission as it will be easy to strip the tiny heads of the screws by using the incorrect size Driver. I think that the Driver AND 4 replacement screws should be provided in the Kit. I appreciate that it will increase the cost of the Kit but it is too important an issue not to have one. The danger is that DIY'ers will make do, so to speak, and employ the incorrect Driver to the task. Disaster may well follow.
After a 4 week wait, my Fotodiox Tough E-Mount arrived from the USA today. There was an Out of Stock situation.
Removing the original Sony Mount and replacing it with the Fotodiox Tough E-Mount was straight forward. There is now no wiggle when the Sony E70-200mm f4 G OSS FE Lens is attached to my ILCE-7R body. In addition, my Metabones Canon EF to Sony E Mount Adapter Mark III also fits without any issues. I was worried by the fact that the Sony E70-200mm f4 G OSS FE Lens without the Tough E-Mount detached itself twice from the body when attempting to mount the Camera Body + Lens to a Manfrotto tripod. Very disconcerting. The new mount feels really secure with this lens. I will keep you posted if any issues arise.
Should one be worried of alignment problems, when playing with the mount? I.e. removing one mount and mounting different mount. I think that on camera such as A7r with crazy high pixel count, any slightest misalignment may cause some visible decentering issuses, when looking at the image at 100%.
For example, I have A7 with kit lens 28-70mm and Sonnar 35mm/f2.8. Kit lens has slightly softer left-hand side of the picture. Sonnar has slightly softer right-hand side of the picture. I thought to send Sonnar to have it re-aligned under warranty, but now that I think about it, it could very well be the mount, maybe the lens is just fine. I'll try few more tests, re-mounting the lens and flexing it a little in the mount to see if it changes the location of the softness in the image.
Anyway, I'd be pretty scared to replace mount just like that, I'd be afraid of alignment issues. Should I be worried?
I have a year old nex 6 with a cracked mount and am happy that they make a product like this. All i see on here are negative comments why are "photographers" such angry people? The broken mount on my camera I take blame for, yes sony should have made it better but I think they still have some of the best prosumer cameras out there. I was using a 40yr old 3lb lens on a camera that comes with a plastic lens weighing less than a pound something was eventually going to give and I'm glad it was the mount and not the body.
More i think about this, more i find-it just stupid. If Sony had chosen to put a plastic spacer, it is probably to save weight. I can imagine this spacer is stick between the two metal rings: imagine the force needed to compress-it, even a micrometer ! Anyway, the lens is pressed against the ring by springs situated behind the mount. They remain the same, and, so the force needed to spread the lens from the mount remain... the same.
I got the adapter yesterday, installed on the A6000 and... a miracle: no wobbling. Came home and tried on the A7r with the Otus 85 via Metabones. I got a noticeable axial wobbling that I've never experienced before and a light leak with the SEL5F18Z. My review is on Amazon, the light leak pics are here: https://www.flickr.com/gp/maximenco/tNYgSe/. Not good...
Hello. Bohus here, the guy from the demo video. Our A7 is out on assignment, but when it gets back we'll test for this issue that you bring up. Yours is the first I've heard of this being a potential issue. Other customer reports have been very positive.
My understanding is (and we'll be testing for this too) that there is concern over light leaks in the A7 that have nothing to do with the mounting system. This is anecdotal, so we want to test for it ourselves before making any conclusions.
Has anyone else here run into issues that Fotodiox should know about?
Just a quick note about our testing. A7 Our photographer is out on location, but he did some quick tests of the mount, and found no light leaks. We will do more extensive testing the moment the camera walks back in our front door, but I think that this is a very positive sign.
Poking around online has revealed even more people pointing at there being a known light leak problem in the A7 that isn't related to the mount. When we find out more, we will post a follow up here, and we'll try to put out a video (getting ready for PPE in NY, so time is really really short - but I want to make sure that you're taken care of.)
Hello Bohus, thank you for your response! As I've mentioned in the review, the light leak is not bothering me. You can clearly see the leak @ A7R-FD-DSC06189 picture. Another picture A7R-SONY-DSC06193 demonstrates no leak on the native mount. The images are converted straight from RAW to JPEG in LR. I tried 2 times both mounts - results are consistent. So the ring introduces some leak, but again, I don't care. What I do care is the lens tilt. The Otus 85mm is not a TS lens, but the ring transforms it to a "tilt-but-no-shift" one. The Otus was attached to my A7r via Metabones MK4 adapter, it's very stiff on the native mount - no movement at all. On the Fotodiox ring the tilt is noticeable and visible. I actually like Fotodiox stuff, I have a few large soft boxes, they are awesome, especially considering their price.
I spoke to the engineer about your issue. Can you send me your shipping address? I want to mail you something to see if it improves your results. You can email me at "bohusblahut" at gmail. Thanks!
I sent my a7 in for repairs recently...I thought I had a bad sensor alignment. Sony checked it out and they found the problem - it was my mistake in how I setup my test chart. In any case, the camera came back with an improved mount...very tight fit now. It was covered under a service bulletin. So Sony is aware of the issue...and will repair your camera if you ask them to. I however, am leery of the plastic gasket mount (yes it is still there after the repair) and will order this mount and replace if and when the new one starts to fail.
It's like I'm missing something... to remove a little wobble, that only affect big heavy lens strapped to the most compact full frame camera in the market that you supposely bought for its portability; that does not affect image quality in any way; and that never caused breakage or other kind of problems (in my knowledge), you are supposed to: -spend 40$? -void your warranty? -perform a dangerous operation close to the sensor? -give up water proofing? Looks like a very good deal...
I'm sure this has to be embarrassing for Sony. I know If it was my company, i would be embarrassed. This problem should've never exsisted in the first place. Can't say i'm suprised though- it is Sony after all. Not really known for their durability these days...
There is a hefty lens adapter *with a mirror* for this mirrorless camera. Yesterday I also saw a funky "cage" that makes it more sturdy and ready to accept accessories. Now.... a replacement lens mount. Is it only my impression, or by the time you turn it into a professional piece of kit, it's both bigger and more expensive than a dslr.
Otherwise, great camera, don't mean to troll this thread.
Ha ha! I was never keen on owning a Sony and have frequently said so, this is another reason to avoid this brand, Ive had a couple of full frame brands and all the mirrorless brands and have never seen such a rubbish situation that the camera cant even hold the lens in its mount properly - absolutely pathetic sony!
Oh dear, Sonys are just rebadged Minoltas which were pretty disappointing by the end. Sure they make excellent sensors, pity they are in other brands cameras.... Sony made very average tellys and HiFis and have zero cool in photography. Presumably you would walk around with a camera by Hotpoint, Brasso or Anusol and you wouldnt feel embarrased
If this is needed, it should come from Sony. Fotodiox imports some nice, cheap accessories but a lens mount? I don't think so. At least if you get a bad or mis-aligned adapter you can toss it.
I own the Sony ILCE-7R and experience wobble with the Sony FE 70-200mmf/4 OS lens. I strongly suspect that the Plastic Shim/Seal is there as part of the weather sealing design to prevent the entry of moisture. You probably need to be aware that its removal may make the camera system less weather proof. I don't take images in the rain so it is not an issue. Regarding fitting the Fotodiox Tough E-Mount, I would suggest cutting a clean lens cleaning tissue to a size such that it can carefully be placed inside the opening above the sensor, preferably not directly on to the sensor. You want to avoid at all costs dropping the screws onto the surface of the sensor. Common sense and some care will suffice. If you are one of lifes ham fisted individuals then forget it. I have mine on order and will report the efficacy of "the fix" in due course. Steve
You can also unscrew these type of things from below, so the screws fall away from the subject. If you don't have a clamp you can use a tripod pointing the camera down. Assembly is a bit trickier, but with the cam facing forward instead of down it is doable and a lot safer if you want to minimize risk of sensor damage.
"You can also unscrew these type of things from below, so the screws fall away from the subject. If you don't have a clamp you can use a tripod pointing the camera down."
I totally agree and have thought of this option as well.The interesting observation is that the Metabones Canon EF to Sony E Mount Mark IIIworks perfectly from a mechanical perspective. The Distagon T* 2.8/21 and the Makro-Planar T^ 2/100 are both heavy lenses but are really locked onto the body.
It's the same that with all A-Mount cameras, they have a metal mount, except the entry level A58, but all of them are screwed over plastic to avoid that kind of breakage.
If one is so worried, use a magnetized driver so the screws come off with the driver, and don't fall on the sensor. People start to patch together all manner of adapters and parts into flimsy rigs, or no rigs at all, then complain when the camera that wasn't designed for said use breaks - and breaks predictably. The A7 and A7r were initial extensions of the NEX line if memory serves me right, so the two part composite mount was a carryover design. Sony replaced the mount on the A7s with a single metal piece - that is just evolution of the design, be glad Sony did that.
No one is stopping anyone interested in this product from acquiring it, but having said so, you replace the mount at your own risk. A good technician would notice signs of tampering (if you put the original parts back, and didn't give it to your cats), so if you bring the body in for "warranty repairs", be aware that your repair may not be covered by the warranty.
And btw, when the guy says "really good screwdriver", for Japanese products such as cameras and other electronics, you want to use JIS (Japanese Industrial Standard) drivers. He clearly used the wrong phillips Wiha driver for the job. Wiha doesn't make JIS drivers - trust me, I looked - but they are indeed a "really good screwdriver" brand ;-)
On my 5D3, I have never felt that big lenses could harm the mount.
On my A7, with metabone EF-FE adapter and Sigma 35/1.4 Art attached, I usually feel that the mount is going to detach from the body. Lets forget about 70-200/2.8 - -"
By the way, This upgrade is not needed. Because we won't see any big lenses from Sony in near future.
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"But... but I lost that piece of plastic a long time ago!"
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My A7 that was purchased right at the release time most certainly has a lot of wiggle in the mount with the 24-70 lens on it. I double checked all the fasteners on the camera and lens, nothing loose. It doesn't seem to effect the excellent images this combo makes, but it is kind of annoying. I very well might buy this product, just for piece of mind of fixing a problem that's not really a problem.
I was really surprised to find that the flanges on the OEM E-mount that couple to the lens flanges are made of plastic. Sony engineers should have done an FMEA on that one with respect to possible failure modes.
Kudos to Fotodiox for having decided to develop the product, it was clever of them. Did the plastic thing have anything to do with the light leaks the mounting suffered, or were the leaks around the periphery of the mount?
Looks like a nice idea, but in the professional world a camera that undergoes such a procedure is usually checked on a collimator to ensure the backfocus is perfect. Not something widely available for the common shooter.
It's easy enough to figure out. Take your fastest lens, figure out how much tilt it could tolerate before the image was noticeably effected, then find out how much flex there is in with the mounting.
This mount is for those who don't believe that every little bit of engineering that goes into a camera is to make it better, instead of making it cheaper. For those who think engineering exists solely to make products as good as they can be, they probably won't ship the ring to your planet anyway.
If it's OK for the A7S to have an all-metal mount, then why all the hand-wringing over the ability to have the same feature on a 7 or 7R? All I'm hearing is that the metal mount, which is in the 7S, will absolutely kill a 7 or 7R (apart from screws mangling sensors). Why no concern over the 7S frame being mutilated in the same fashion? If the break-off feature is to prevent a costly repair, then why is it not a feature on the most costly of the A7 series? One must then ask the question: did Sony cheap-out on the A7S by not including such an essential safety feature, or did they realize something when they made the 7S? If I buy a 7S, can I expect to replace the entire camera when the mount eventually blows completely off because it is metal? Sounds like the 7S is the one with the engineering issue.
If the A7S is designed to be deployed in heavy-use situations, wouldn't it be more susceptible to higher stresses and thus warrant a break-away mount even more so? What I want to know is why is it OK to expose the 7S to break-point stresses by incorporated a metal mount, but it is not OK to do so with a 7 or 7R? Is Sony claiming then that the plastic mount has nothing to do with relieving stress on the magnesium frame by breaking under a specific load because it is apparently not needed by the 7S, which was clearly and specifically designed for use with heavier cine lenses? If this is true, then the claim that plastic=cost-cutting should the accepted theory.
Do you know the difference between compressive and tensile strength? If not, then you should probably leave this to the engineers, yes? Can you tell me which one has better tensile strength?
Sony haven't actually said anything at all about this. And no one to date has once complained about their mount breaking as far as I know, from loading heavy lenses on their cameras. So you are manufacturing a crisis that didn't exist until Fotodiox released a part that no one actually needs, but a few idiots who think metal is always better than plastic might void their warranty over.
No, I don't know the difference, but so far the engineers have overlooked the obvious questions I have stated above. You have also not answered any of my questions above, but instead accuse me of manufacturing a crisis.
Wow, from the video the wobble looks pretty bad. What were the Sony engineer thinking about when they design it? I wonder if a reasonable weight from a lens can cause the focus plane to shift a bit.
Does your NEX-5 wobble like that? No? Nor do my two E-mount cameras either. So maybe the one up to marketing trickery is Fotodiox? What happened to everyone's thinking caps? How did so many people get trolled so easily this weekend?
I admit I'm a nervous Nelly about the plastic mount in the A7, and it looks like the same sort of hing in my Nex6 and 3 ; so I was debating whether to go for the metal mount plate,but then I came here and read the LensRental comment..which seemed to come from a year or so ago on his site, and now I'm not nervous any more. If you kind of try to analyse why Sony might make some part out of plastic as well as metal, when they could have just made 1 part out of metal I'm sort of stumped. It must be cheaper to make one part and therefore Sony must have had something else in mind when they produced the 2 part solution! Do any other makers do similar things; from the Lens Rental site it looks like all our Heroes do and so now I'm not a WorryWart any more. I will just carry on and trry one day to take a picture I really like. Thank you Sony for the beautiful Nex camera!
My friend dropped her a7 from eyes height and broke the LCD, the sd-card reader and wifi module. What's the point using a plastic mount as a save point for protecting the lens or the body?
On the other side, all Sony lenses are made of plastic barrel and optical resin to keep light weight, zeiss primes are reasonably moderate in weight and tele lens has shoe mount collar for the holding, why would people need full metal mount?
It appears to be a brilliant marketing scheme that boosts it's public awareness on forums and profits from the people undermined by these tidbits, videos and tutorials.
As time goes on I seem to be proven correct on my theory: The sony A7X series has gone through some of the most outrageous scrutiny of any camera to date. Strap lug quality, adapter planarity, light leaks, and reflections off the IR filter on long exposures at wide aperture have already been covered by many in the forum crowd; and now the potential strength of the mount when improperly handling lenses 10x the weight of the camera is under a microscope. Seems many forgot that the A8 has IQ only dreamt of years back in a body not much bigger than an old compact. Relatively inexpensive too. Compromises of course will have to happen.
Cutting corners or not, an engineer who works on such products has far more knowledge of these things than 99% of the people posting responses on these forums. If you don’t trust a product’s engineering, why would you spend thousands of dollars on it? I know I’m happy as a clam with my A7, and this new mount seems like a bad idea to me…
It doesn't kill the concept at all, it's simply one of the limitations of the engineering but that doesn't mean that the body suddenly loses its mirrorless characteristics for every other lens the photographer owns...
My A7R doesn't have a problem when 24-70L/2.8 II, 17mm TS-E, 70-200L/4.0 IS or 70-200L/2.8 IS II attached. Sure I hold on lens to keep balance anyway. I don't think a 1DX or D4s owner will hold on body when 600L/600G attached ;-)
Most of the people complaining here seem to think you hold a camera like you do a smartphone. Which tells you a little about the kind of photography they do
Yes, I thought exactly the same, although I bought Oly - but not Sony either! It feels a bit better to spend $$$ for stuff like lenses and not replacing the clumsy camera parts :o).
Wow, well, I never had a Sony so I thought it's really a Sony problem! I mean: who produces a fix-it gadget when there is no real need :-o?! If it's really not a problem, Sony should stop them as it makes look the Sony cam look like bad designed..
A rental shop should have good perspective here. Anyway, I think this could be the biggest mountain out of a molehill since the 5DIII plastic mount business.
DPR may have nothing to post on a saturday night but the Alpha NEX forum begs to differ. Not much denunciation about this product or to feature it on the front page, it's more about the quality (or lack thereof) of the mount itself...
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