Leica GTS-20 Tripods

Don't clamp them down tight when not in use. Let them shrink and expand freely.
jud

> My thoughts are to replace them with Crain Trimax or Dutch Hill tripods, but I sure hate to scrap 10 tripods that should have 5 or more years of life left in them.:beer:

If you do decide to scrap them, you can send one my way;-) I probably don't need all 10 but one or 2 might fit in the van:-D

I heard it was pretty hot over your way, that's probably got a lot to do with it. How long have you had them? How long have they been sticking like that? It'll be in the mid 70's here today:party:

Using a hammer seems to be a bit to much, putting your foot on it and pulling up on the top plate has always worked for me.

Have a great day, you know I'm going too
Dugger

Steve-
I have been using Topcon aluminum legs for 30+ years and have had no problems except the thumbscrews needed replacing at about 15 years.

No, there is no temperature difficulty.

I have used 'wooden' painted legs that stuck.

A royal PITA when they let go.

Have you considered usiing very fine steel wool or emery paper to 'sand' / rough up the painted inside contact faces of the legs, only sufficienty to not get to the beech wood base ?

A judicious dusting with baby powder (only if in dry climate) will assist, something along the idea of what gymnasts use on their hands when using the parallel bars.

Cheers

Derek

PS-

Do not use any wax or oily compound as it will cause iregular slippage and gumming up (yes, from experience ! 🙁

The aluminum tripods I have used were very hard to keep level under a T-2 or the Kern center leg tripods under a DKM-2. We had to use umbrellas on sunny days. Around here there is a lot of dust and fine sand when the wind blows a little. The aluminum thumb screws wore quickly and became hard to use. When we put the tripods back in the rig, if we didn't back off on those screws, it often took a wrench to get them loose, same way with wood if the moisture went up over night. Still put all thumb screw tripods away loose and do not use aluminum tripods at all.
jud

A good scrubbing with Ajax cleanser and rinsing seems to make it better. The best thing I've found is just don't lock them down when putting back in the truck.

They are about as good a tripod as anyone makes, and one of my sets has to be 15 years old of regular, if not daily use.

I used to keep a bar of paraffin or a candle around for that... a little rub of the mating surfaces keeps everything sliding smooth... wood or plastic or metal legs, it works on all of them, wet or dry.

You should slap the crew members up along the side of the head for letting that happen more than once and not seeking a reasonable remedy... there are some Good People out there looking for work.

It absolutely drives me nuts when they stick like that.
I always figured the locking down brackets were to tight. Nothing I ever did made a difference except for to just grab a different set of legs.

Silicon spray will work also.

We use aluminum tripods for targets and the instrument when in the woods. They work fine if you get the sets done fairly quickly when traversing. I have a heavy wooden Sokkia tripod that is very stable but heavy to carry through the woods especially since we move the instrument to the foresight tripod as we go.

I personally have a Tri-Max which I like a lot. It has a convenient carrying handle but isn't as light as an aluminum tripod.

yep always leave the screws loose. If you leave them tight and the wood expands with moisture then they can become very tight and hard to unclamp.

At my previous job they have a dozen or so old Wild tripods and we learned to always leave the screws loose in the truck.