ERGO Handle on Tiffen gimbal?

[Evrim KAYA]

Well, the title explains it all. A while ago i contacted XCS in order to ask about the compatibility of their ERGO handle with my Ultra2’s gimbal. Unfortunately the handle is incompatible with Tiffen gimbal design.

 

I could very well buy the whole gimbal from XCS’ and have the ERGO handle on my Ultra2 as the XCS gimbal is compatible with 1.58 Tiffen post but replacing a perfectly good gimbal seemed excessive to me and I decided to drop the idea.

 

Now, cruising in older forum posts (http://www.steadicam...13&hl=ergo&st=0), my desire to have an ergo handle on my rig flamed again. I just want to express that I’m a potential buyer if XCS (or someone else depending of intellectual property rights) would have made a Tiffen-compatible version of ERGO handle. And even better, if such product could have a stage remote cradle on it.

 

I know some people will have something to say about the Tiffen incompatibility issues with other brands but this will be out of the subject. I’m aware that Tiffen’s product is more or less incompatible with other brands parts, but I bought my rig being fully aware of the trade-off. Meaning that I personally preferred what Tiffen has on their rigs better than the other options elsewhere.

Now I want to have my cake and eat it too by putting an XCS ERGO handle on my Ultra2’s gimbal along with stage remote (and even compatible with G-series arm-post diameter) and don’t have to buy a whole new gimbal.

 

Any thoughts on this subject?

[Evrim KAYA]

I’d like to retract my statement of talking about incompatibility of Tiffen with other brands would be out of the subject.

 

Firstly because (in)compatibility is one of the main issues here. And second, just because I am the one who started this topic doesn’t give me the right to limit what will be discussed.

[Erwin Landau]

Well...

The XCS gimbal design is based on the PRO design which copied aspects of the 3A gimbal (and improved apone them).

It all comes down to the spindle design and the used angle of the cone as well as the used tolerances. Which differ greatly between the XCS/PRO and the Master/Ultra set up.

Several weeks ago I was visiting with Christian Betz in Munich and he checked out my Ergo Handle as he was asked about the compability with his "the Rig" sled. Again the design is similar but not compatible. It can be done, if you want to invest the resources

, time and effort. You have to reverse engineer the part of the spindle that goes into the Ergo Handle and mate it with the design of the Ultra yoke.

At that point, unless you want to go into production of replacement spindles, or as you stated above, also accomodate the larger arm post size which would force you to totally make an Ergo from scratch... Is cost prohibitive (and would get you into trouble with Greg)...

 

It would, at that point, be cheaper to just get a complete Ultimate Gimbal with Ergo. I am sure that Greg could make you an adapter for your stage remote!

 

But anything is possible... Given, as always, how much time and effort you want to spend on it... I know I'm a hard head in those things and always have the approach... Why the hell not?

 

Good Luck with your endeavor!

 

Fly safe!

 

Erwin

[Evrim KAYA]

Hey Erwin!

 

Thank you for not letting this topic to be left forgotten :) I also talked about this issue with Christian when he was visiting Istanbul 2 mounts ago. Your conclusions were the same as ours. The ergo
handle, in its current design, is totally incompatible with anything other than XCS/PRO. It doesn’t make sense to build one from scratch as it will be too expensive and will be an infringement on intellectual propriety rights of XCS.

 

So, as I was creating this topic one of my goals was, people with Tiffen gimbals would chime in expressing their interest in such a product. And if we had enough people, XCS might think about making a compatible version of their handle.

 

As you said anything is possible. If enough potential buyers show interest, it might be viable for XCS to make it for us.

 

Thank you Erwin for giving this another chance buy replying and putting it on top again. Now we will see if there are actually other people who would want to put an ERGO handle on their rigs.

[Jens Piotrowski SOC]

well, I think Erwin makes a good point and gives you the best solution. buy the complete XCS gimbal and with it you have a choice of Ergo or standard handle. You will end up with one of the best gimbals in the industry.

 

Since the Ultra2 is hardwired you will have to bring the sled to Tiffen to exchange the gimbal.....as far as I know

 

http://www.xcsinc.com/gimbals/1399.jpg

[Jerry Holway]

Jens-

 

FYI, the U2 is not hardwired.... but it does take a bit of time to undo/redo the connectors in the post.

[Evrim KAYA]

I am sure that XCS gimbal is great. Even though I never tried one yet, the fact that so many veteran operators praising it, is proof enough for me that if I were to buy one, I would be happy. But I already
have a great gimbal on my sled which makes me happy and also used by so many great operators. Having an ergo incompatible handle is in no way excuse enough for me to retire a perfect gimbal.

Unless XCS or Tiffen would produce a compatible ergo handle I don’t think I will have the pleasure of flying one in the near future and it’s not a big deal.

[Robert Starling SOC]

I have both the Ergo and the standard handle for my XCS. The standard handle I only use on live TV with the Stanton or when I'm teaching a workshop and students are using my rig or for demos. It's definitely my preference to have the Ergo along with such a sweet gimbal but if it comes right down to it I can live with a standard handle and do the same exact shots.

 

Having the option to build up a system exactly the way I wanted it makes a world of difference and was well worth the little bit of extra money.

 

Robert

[Jens Piotrowski SOC]

Jens-

 

FYI, the U2 is not hardwired.... but it does take a bit of time to undo/redo the connectors in the post.

thx for the clarification