ultraclamp camera mount

I have know idea of how much pressure would be needed. Not like you have a way to measure it any way. Most clamps work by applying pressure to two pionts. Since its a round surface your faced with little surface area to clamp to. The surface is also nice and smooth. So go to your local hardware store and buy yourself a hose clamp it will never compress your bar and uses all the surface area. Then place your camera clamp on top of it. It will no longer spin because the screw part of the hose clamp will prevent it. An old piece of inner tube will prevent the hose clamp from scratching your bar. Carefull you don't overload your camera clamp with a bigger camera. I got 15 years as pro photographer and grip. Have fun!!!

Fritz M said:

I've seen discussion on various cycling groups about mounting a camera on the handlebar so I
bought an "Ultraclamp" mount for my camera.

Be very careful. I hope those discussion groups have talked about vibration and fatigue. There's a
lot of vibration at the bars, and I worry about it scrambling your camera's delicate bits. Also,
under that sort of continuous vibration, I've had home-brew clamps fail - clamps that seemed as
sturdy as the one you point out. Not a pleasant scenario with a valuable camera.

The clamp you point out looks to me (opinion only here) like a poor choice. I think it would be hard
to tighten it enough to keep the clamp from swiveling around the bars (and maybe even falling off)
due to the shape of the contact area with the bars.

Again, be very careful.

Regards, Mark (I've clamped lots of things to my bike, some with bad results) Janeba

On 15 Jan 2004 10:02:43 -0800, [email hidden] (Fritz M) may have

Quoted message said:

I've seen discussion on various cycling groups about mounting a camera on the handlebar so I bought
an "Ultraclamp" mount for my camera. This is a mount-anywhere clamp with a tripod-style ball head
and 1/4" tripod mounting screw for cameras. The screw-clamp is at the top of this photo:

campmor.com82058 l.jpgOpen ↗

I have to really screw the clamp down to keep the thing from swinging down when I bring a larger
camera. I'm concerned about damaging the Al drop bars on my Trek. Does anyone know what kind of
pressure is required to squish the handlebars?

It would take more pressure to deform the bar than you can bring to bear with that thumbscrew.
Unfortunately, from experience with trying to mount lights and other gear on various round objects,
I can also say that I would not put any camera more valuable than a Fuji disposable on that mount.
If you file a fairly substantial V-notch in the upper pad and build a V-notched cup to cover the
screw, you might make it a little more effective, but a full-circle clamp is really the only thing
that's likely to handle a real camera safely...and even then, don't try to mount an SLR with a long
lens, because the bounces you're likely to encounter would stand a good chance of breaking the lens
mount or internal support pieces on a lot of units. (I've had that happen with Nikons, and most
other brands are even less robust mechanically.)

--
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Quoted message said:

I've seen discussion on various cycling groups about mounting a camera
on the handlebar so I bought an "Ultraclamp" mount for my camera. This
is a mount-anywhere clamp with a tripod-style ball head and 1/4"
tripod mounting screw for cameras. The screw-clamp is at the top of
this photo:

I would not subject a decent, or even half-way decent camera to such an attachment. The vibration
and impact would not be good for either the camera's case or optics. They're not made to handle
that sort of thing; the only reason people can put up with it is because our bodies are flexible
and create something of a suspension system (plus, we see a bump and react accordingly; your
camera cannot!).

With some effort you could probably design a safe camera mount for a bicycle, but it wouldn't be
what's shown in the picture. You'd have to isolate the camera from both vibration & shock, and that
device does neither. If somebody could come up with one, I could certainly make use of it myself.
Probably a lot safer than taking my camera out of my jersey pocket and doing one-handed shots at
high speed. My Olympus D40 has a remote control, so I could tape that to the bar and control the
camera without having to awkwardly mess with the controls. My Olympus 5050 would simply never find
its way onto a handlebar, ever. Too nice a camera to do that to. Too big for a jersey pocket too,
so when I need to bring it on a ride, I have a small handlebar bag that, left unzipped, provides
easy access.

--Mike-- Chain Reaction Bicycles www.ChainReaction.com

"Fritz M" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

I've seen discussion on various cycling groups about mounting a camera on the handlebar so I
bought an "Ultraclamp" mount for my camera. This is a mount-anywhere clamp with a tripod-style
ball head and 1/4" tripod mounting screw for cameras. The screw-clamp is at the top of this photo:

campmor.com82058 l.jpgOpen ↗

I have to really screw the clamp down to keep the thing from swinging down when I bring a larger
camera. I'm concerned about damaging the Al drop bars on my Trek. Does anyone know what kind of
pressure is required to squish the handlebars?

Regards,

RFM

Thank you all for your responses. I was concerned also about vibrations and bumps, so thanks also
for pointing out that aspect of camera mounting. I like the idea of using a handlebar bag.

RFM