Gimbal heads.

Mark Banas wrote:

happysnapper64 wrote:

Has anyone any experience with the cheaper gimbal heads like the Bieke? £4-500 for a Wimberly, RRS or Jobu is just too much. Thanks in advance.

Since you're in the UK (and its a rainy day here), I checked on (or converted to get) the local prices for Wimberley, RRS, Jobu, Feisol, Nest, and Benro (no Induro that I could find). All of them end up being outrageously expensive, even without VAT, so I see why you were asking about the Beike.

In the end, you will probably be best served by "buying local" and getting a Lensmaster, as SirSeth recommended a while ago.

I've read good things about them, and looking at the specs, photos and details, they are probably better built than almost all of the others mentioned, with the exception of Wimberley and RRS. Furthermore, it's coming from Lincolnshire, so if you have a problem there in the UK, you know who to talk to and where to send it. That's worth quite a bit, right there.

I haven't checked back on this thread for a while - those Lensmaster's look nice! I especially like the Gitzo finished ones. Too bad I don't have my Gitzo anymore.

The pound to dollar conversion shows it to be about $262 including shipping to the US, almost $40 less than the Nest would be for me here.

I'll have to consider that - although the Nest gets some raves from those who have it (as you would expect). I also see from the distributor here in the US that Nest is changing their ball heads to Arca Swiss - which I would assume should have been a no brainer.