Which Ball Head? Manfrotto

Original Poster

Original Poster

Suspended / Banned
Messages
1,118
Name
Chris
Edit My Images
Yes
Hi all,

Need advice on which ball head to buy. I've decided on the Manfrotto 055XPROB tripod which seems to fit my needs perfectly however cannot decide on the head.

It needs to support a gripped 7D with a 24-70 MK2 as a max weight.

Any ideas? Happy to pay decent money (up to about £140 I guess).

I was looking at these - http://www.parkcameras.com/19387/Manfrotto-MH054M0-Q2-MAG-BALL-HEAD.html

But get the impression they won't fit on the 055XPROB tripod?

Any help will be greatly appreciated, I love the idea of a ball head and want it to be as stable as possible.

Thanks in advance!
 
I use a 498RC2 on a 055CXPRO4 and with my 5D mkii and a 100-400L zoom it's rock steady.
 
Should fit ok, standard thread for heads is 3/8" which the 190 and 055 share

Only thing you need to watch out for is that the head base diameter isn't too small compared to the mount diameter on the tripod. Apart from looking rather odd it can affect stability, but pretty sure the 190 and 055 are near enough the same.

One other consideration is the q/r plate, Arca Swiss are very good and pretty much the standard so might be an idea to see if the ballhead you are looking at could be converted at a later stage.

My daughter has a Manfrotto head, 496RC2 I believe which seems pretty solid when locked up, think they make a larger model in that range too. The smaller one (494) suffers from the small diameter I mentioned above.

I do know from experience that some cheaper ballheads suffer from creep and are very hard to get locked up solidly especially when using heavier lenses.
Not in your budget, but can recommend the ones from Markins, never had any creep with mine and has a weight limit of someting around the 40kg mark

It appears that you go from the individual companies and their own q/r systems up to about £150 then onto the so called top range heads from the likes of Arca, Kirk, RRS and Markins

Chap on here tested about ten heads and reckons the Feisol model was very good, but cannot really comment having no personal experience
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top