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Master Gimbal service


Jose Ocejo

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Hi I am in the need to service my Master Gimbal I would like to do it my self so I can do it if necessary out in the field in the future can any members with the knowledge of the Master Gimbal help me with the proper procedures to disassemble also if some one already done this perhaps the model # of the berings thanks guys

Edited by Jose Ocejo
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I'm planning on shipping ONLY my Gimbal to Tiffen for replacement of both the pan and tilt bearings. When I wrote to ask them about the service, here's part of the response:

 

"It is possible for us to balance the gimbal without your sled, but we recommend that you do send your sled in. We have had success in balancing gimbals without the sled in the past, but we have also had times when the gimbal was balanced for our rig, but was not balanced for the actual operators rig, and it needed to come back."

 

Does anyone out there have any comment on the recommendation of sending the sled with the gimbal on it rather than sending ONLY the gimbal???

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I'm planning on shipping ONLY my Gimbal to Tiffen for replacement of both the pan and tilt bearings. When I wrote to ask them about the service, here's part of the response:

 

"It is possible for us to balance the gimbal without your sled, but we recommend that you do send your sled in. We have had success in balancing gimbals without the sled in the past, but we have also had times when the gimbal was balanced for our rig, but was not balanced for the actual operators rig, and it needed to come back."

 

Does anyone out there have any comment on the recommendation of sending the sled with the gimbal on it rather than sending ONLY the gimbal???

 

hey Daniel! could you write with bigger fonts? :P

 

other than that balancing the gimbal is not that hard. i balanced mkv nexus 2" and ultra2 gimbals but perhaps master gimbal is different. if you know how to do it then just sent the gimbal if not you better sent the sled along to be sure.

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that is weird...seems a good gimbal is a good gimbal -- Why would a gimbal balance differently from one sled to another? Should be just a cleaning, new bearings and lube/re-asemble?

 

Not causing trouble, just curious about why this is?

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When they fixed my gimbal, they didn't balance it at the factory for some reason and I had to do it myself. Mine actually broke right around NAB so Peter was really busy and Dan Ikeda walked me through balancing it. It's not that hard, just plan on spending at least an hour with it. If you can get the gimbal off, save yourself the cost and headache of shipping a master series sled.

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I'm planning on shipping ONLY my Gimbal to Tiffen for replacement of both the pan and tilt bearings. When I wrote to ask them about the service, here's part of the response:

 

"It is possible for us to balance the gimbal without your sled, but we recommend that you do send your sled in. We have had success in balancing gimbals without the sled in the past, but we have also had times when the gimbal was balanced for our rig, but was not balanced for the actual operators rig, and it needed to come back."

 

Does anyone out there have any comment on the recommendation of sending the sled with the gimbal on it rather than sending ONLY the gimbal???

 

hey Daniel! could you write with bigger fonts? :P

 

other than that balancing the gimbal is not that hard. i balanced mkv nexus 2" and ultra2 gimbals but perhaps master gimbal is different. if you know how to do it then just sent the gimbal if not you better sent the sled along to be sure.

 

:lol::lol:What, you don't like my posting for the visually impared??? :lol::lol:

Now Why can't I make the emoticons ENORMOUS??

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A gimbal is either centred or not centred. The sled would make no difference at all. Complete misinformation.

 

Rick.

 

Thanks for the Reply, Rick!

 

Without spending to much of your time on this, how can a gimbal NOT be centred??

 

Hey Dan,

How's it going man?

My Gimbal wasn't centered, and they're adjusting it at Tiffen while Im in LA this week (brought my rig with me). If the Master gimbal is anything like the Ultra 1 gimbal, then you can adjust the gimbal via the adjustment screws on either side of the gimbal arms, I'm not sure which direction you have to screw on the master gimbal, or how to get at the adjustment screws, but Tiffen can tell you how to go about it. I'm not sure how similar they are, but I found online the steps to center the Ultra 2, at http://www.steadicam.com/images/content/U2_GimbalCentering.pdf Which will give you a better idea of what I'm talking about, but I'm pretty sure the adjustment will be different for the master gimbal, as is the case for my Ultra 1.

 

I knew my gimbal wasn't centered because I would static balance in one direction and the rig would hang vertical, but when I spun it 180 it would be way off fore and aft. I contacted Derek Hester at Tiffen, and he gave me the low down.

 

For the Ultra 1, centering is done by tightening the adjustment screw in increments of 1/4 turns on the side where the camera tilts upwards, and loosening the opposite side in 1/4 turns countered to your first adjustement. You mirror the opposite for every 1/4 turn adjustment, tighten once, loosen once, then repeat if necessary, until the camera holds static balance when facing any direction in the pan I hope this makes sense, but with my track record it's prob not very concise! And again, it may be different on the Master gimbal. Anyone can chime in if I have this wrong! Again, Tiffen will give you better info, if this is the problem you're having.

 

It's possible that the Master gimbal uses shims or something similar to center it, if that's the case then completely disregard what I told you about the ultra gimbal :P

 

Hope this helps answer your centering question at least a little bit.

Cheers - Ian

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A gimbal is either centred or not centred. The sled would make no difference at all. Complete misinformation.

 

Rick.

 

Thanks for the Reply, Rick!

 

Without spending to much of your time on this, how can a gimbal NOT be centred??

 

Hey Dan,

How's it going man?

My Gimbal wasn't centered, and they're adjusting it at Tiffen while Im in LA this week (brought my rig with me). If the Master gimbal is anything like the Ultra 1 gimbal, then you can adjust the gimbal via the adjustment screws on either side of the gimbal arms, I'm not sure which direction you have to screw on the master gimbal, or how to get at the adjustment screws, but Tiffen can tell you how to go about it. I'm not sure how similar they are, but I found online the steps to center the Ultra 2, at http://www.steadicam...alCentering.pdf Which will give you a better idea of what I'm talking about, but I'm pretty sure the adjustment will be different for the master gimbal, as is the case for my Ultra 1.

 

I knew my gimbal wasn't centered because I would static balance in one direction and the rig would hang vertical, but when I spun it 180 it would be way off fore and aft. I contacted Derek Hester at Tiffen, and he gave me the low down.

 

For the Ultra 1, centering is done by tightening the adjustment screw in increments of 1/4 turns on the side where the camera tilts upwards, and loosening the opposite side in 1/4 turns countered to your first adjustement. You mirror the opposite for every 1/4 turn adjustment, tighten once, loosen once, then repeat if necessary, until the camera holds static balance when facing any direction in the pan I hope this makes sense, but with my track record it's prob not very concise! And again, it may be different on the Master gimbal. Anyone can chime in if I have this wrong! Again, Tiffen will give you better info, if this is the problem you're having.

 

It's possible that the Master gimbal uses shims or something similar to center it, if that's the case then completely disregard what I told you about the ultra gimbal :P

 

Hope this helps answer your centering question at least a little bit.

Cheers - Ian

 

Hey Ian!!

 

Thanks for the response. I spoke to Derek Hester yesterday and he told me that no one really knows why there is a difference in centreing the bearing from one sled to another. It's just that SOMETIMES there is. The current issue with my sled is that once I've balanced it, if I have to 'change sides' in the middle of a shot, the sled wants to lean over. Peter Abraham seems to think the Pan bearing might need to be replaced. Also, it looks like it'll be cheaper to carry the damn thing out to LA myself rather than courier it. there's gotta be a better way than FEDEX.

 

Have fun on Doyle and Fly safe!

-d.

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