WARNING: LETUS ROD SYSTEM not 15mm

C

chagchag

Well-known member
I got my letus rod system today an I must say I am quite disapointed. (Main gripe at the very bottom of post.)

First of all the overall impression is that the overall quality is a few notches below the redrock railsystem which I also own. Basically it looks like reversed engineering of manfrotto/cavision stuff milled in not all that duarble aluminium. tightening the cameraplate for instance does not have the same solid feel of the manfrotto one found on the redrock. Let's just say, you think you've locked it down but then find your camera shiftiting and making you realise you have to use more force on the lock than one would think if you are used to higher quality equipment.

It's a bit flimsy, and the aluminium does not take much abuse. Tighten the screws on the risers a wee bit to hard and they just eat into the aluminium.

It is very impractical with the raisers sticking out at the bottom unless you have it at full height (which also is less than great, due to impractical ballance etc).

Also tightening the different modules of the system on the rails requiers a hex-key, and it is only tightening in the middle of each block, which is impractical in many ways, basically because you have to tighten/untighten both rods at the same time, wheras on redrock/zacuto you have handles on each side of each block making it possible to for instance slide one of the rods back and forth while everything attached on the rods stays in place because the other rod is still tight.

Other than that having the locking mechanism in the middle of each block in stead of two separate ones makes the with of the blocks shrink when you tighten it (at least in the Letus design, not so much in cavision which is similar) so that sliding a non-tightened block all the way in to a tightened one is sometimes difficult because the distance between the rods is slightly narrower near the tightened railblock.

ANYWAY, THE MAIN PROBLEM IS: The rods are not 15mm, they are probably 15,3 or something because none of my cavision and redrock gear fits them. This my friends is just ridiculous...


I really urge anyon who have need for a railssystem to suit a flipped 35 adapter to rather go for some sort of z-riser soulution, or wait and see what Redrock comes out with to match their flipmodule. I regret I didn't.

I hope letus make som sorely needed upgrades on ther rails-design.


Sorry about bad english and typos. I'm hurried and worried :-)
 
That's interesting. I agree with you about the inconvenience of using a hex key because some of the screws are in an impractical place. The riser sticking out of the bottom is also a problem for me because I can't slide the 516 head on with it down.

But other than that I found the system to be rock solid, not to mention sexy as hell. I've used the Redrock rail (I'm assuming you're talking about the one that comes with the M2) and I'm not sure how you can say that the quality isn't up to par. The RR is not height adjustable nor are you able to adjust the baseplate for balance. It was functional, but nothing special. The only other rail I've used is the HysonFilm one, and that one was nothing to compared to the Letus.

I don't have any 15mm rod with me so I can't test whether the system is actually 15mm or not, but I do recall a post by Aaron (DeGrey) when the sytem first came out that the Letus baseplate is compatible with all other 15mm rod. It's possible that you got a bum unit. Try contacting Letus and I'm sure they'll set it right.
 
Same thing happened to me with the 1st generation Brevis Rods/Rails. Too fat for my 15mm Petroff Mattebox. Returned it immediately. I think they changed it. My guess Letus will probably do the same. At the least they should send you standard rods.
 
Proper rail/rod setup

Proper rail/rod setup

If anyone reading this doesn't know who Tim Naylor is, he's like a real cinematographer. He works with famous people and everything. He's used lots of adapters and has a wealth of valuable experience. I would go with what he says. I'm sure Letus and co. will resolve this issue immediately. Tims advice to me on a seperate thread was to take the time and make absolute certain the product is ready before it goes public. With that advice I've been working very hard on an adapter/ seperate rail system that will work properly.
I'm proud of the results and will be releasing some long awaited HVX footage next week. Anyway, here's the rail setup I've come up with. It's compact and solid. We're using carbon/steel composite rails and they are exactly 15mm.
Shipping a unit to Germany soon to a DVXUSER. We'll see what he thinks.

The 3d dvx camera shown is not complete, but all mounting positions are accurate.

http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?t=110922 This is my thread.....
 

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I reckon you just can't go wrong with Zacuto. Lightweight yet extremely strong and durable, plus hey are threaded so you can have them to any length you need. Just screw in another 4 or 10 or 12 inches. The red plate is superbly designed, lightweight and completely adjustable. Best I have ever used. But you pay for the detail. And it's worth it.

I owned the redrock plate and rods ( still their 24 inch set) and they were built rock solid but heavier. But good quality.

I looked at the Cavision and Letus rode desins for the Letus Extreme, and hated the thought of having to raise the camera off the base plate. Terrible terrible terrible. Again Zacuto get it spot on with their Z-Riser.

Rods are extremely important peice of kit. They needs to be lightweight and strong. They needs to slide easily, be customizable, and fit tight when you tighten, by finger not hex-key.
 
Tim, the Cinevate rails system has been using the 15mm standard for quite some time now. The 5/8" (15.8mm) stainless (inexpensive, yes, but compatable with nothing) was abandoned early last year. We learned our lesson very well there, and the new rails systems have been refined based on a lot of user feedback:

1. We exclusively use 15mm solid carbon fibre rod which is nearly twice as stiff as .040 wall stainless tubing, and half the weight. This material is 14.97mm in outside diameter and conforms to our specification of no less then .01mm variance. That's less than .001". This rod itself represents a very large tooling investment by our manufacturer, and required nearly 8 months lead time.

2. All of the rails components now use tool-less design, and the Brevis-to-rails mount is not only toolless, but uses a brand new quick release design. Our rails blocks retain the ability to interface to standard 5/8" stainless grip rod risers which make them etremely easy to integrate with car rigs etc.

So yes, we've learned a great deal, and our rails system is likely now the lightest/stiffest system available anywhere. Factor in their low cost, and we feel they are a good match for our market.
 
HMMMM,
Here direct from the website:

Letus35 Support Rods Features:
- Precision milled solid aluminum components
- Custom milled quick release for camera plate
- Fully adjustable camera plate in both forward/backward and left/right movement
- 90mm height camera support risers
- 70mm height Letus35 Extreme support bracket
- 30cm or 45cm silver anodized support rods
- Optional 2 15cm rods with 2 red anodized couplers
- Industry standard 15mm diameter on all components for third party accessories


I just got mine too and agree the way it is built is not that great.
The way you adjust it is far from desirable. I have not bought a mattebox yet.
Has anyone successfully used a mattebox with the Letus rods.
I still have all the shipping boxes, I wonder if they take returns?
 
OK, in my first post maybe I was a bit overly negative. Not much, but a little, as I had been fiddling with my new rod-system and was quite disapointed. I do not mean to be harsh on the Letus guys who are trying to meet the demands of their eager customers, on a tight schedule. But, I still ended up with something that was not as described: The rails are NOT industry standard 15mm. They can't be, because I have two pairs of other rails that are 15mm standard (redrock and "generic" stainless stell, and they work with equipment that the Letus ones does not.

The rails are a tiny bit larger than the standard 15mm. Barely measurable, but is most definetively is. I tested cavision handgrips, cavision shoulderpad, redrock followfocus and adapter and a vocas mattemox and none of them fitted. The handgrips I could fit but I really had to use force to move it back and forth. The rest of the equipment I could barely fit the rails into the opening and not shove them through.

The railsystem is ok, and more than usable. It's not bad, only I'm used to the redrock one and found it superior in some ways, especially the tighetening/release function of the railblocks and overall feeling of quality. However Letus' extension rods and couplers are really really great (if only the rods fitted). It is a very nifty way to stay flexible when adding longer lenses etc, and not having to change rails.


Just as a bottom note: I really do support all of the smaller adapter and gear manufacturers, you all make good affordable stuff but every now and then some of you fail to deliver what you promise. Especially for stuff that is first gen.





Now I want to add this for ballance: I was one of the first to get the Redrock follow focus, when the gearbox had conciderable spill. I contacted redrock about this but they more or less renounced my findings and did not admit this to beeing a problem. Still, some months later they started offering a gearbox-update on the followfocus unit, charging $65 for it. I also asked in their forums (redrock's) about vignetting and they told me it had nothing to do with the adapter, but my lens (which showed no vignetting on my slr). Well, we all now that's not true.

Now, here I am at a forum crying my heart out over some Letus equipment and before I have actually contacted them, Hien is offering me a new pair of rods throug PM...

...service-vice the winner is rather obvious... and the Extreme is great (but I'm glad I also have a spinning adapter for the sake of shutterspeeds and bokeh...)
 
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I just ordered the Letus Rod Base and Rails but I am hoping to use it with my existing Red Rock rails.

Hmm...I didn't know that you need an Allen wrench to adjust the rails, that is inconvenient when you are in the midst of a shoot.

Well, I can't afford the Zacuto stuff and I wanted to try mounting my HVX low and the LEX higher so I decided to give this setup a try.

Will report back on how it all works when I receive it. I already have the Cavision setup and it stripped two holes when I tried to tighten up a piece of the lowest height extension. I really wanted to mount the camera low so we'll see how it works. If it doesn't work, guess I will have to sell off my kids and get the Zacuto setup.

Dan

Dan
 
Yep, I just tried putting my newly arrived Red Rock follow focus on the Letus support rails and they definitely DONT fit. Not close. So flipping annoying. I had to cancel a shoot. Let's see what they do to fix this. I emailed them this morning. I'll let you know what happens. Very disappointing.
 
I have to say I love my letus so far, but I'll have to add to the complaints that the rails mount support needing to be adjusted by an allen wrench is a major pain. And if the whole rod system is like that, then that needs to change in addition to making the rods standard 15mm. A completely tool free design would be great.
 
Sucks about the rails! I was gonna order some m'self. They always fix issues, though, and have no qualms about them.

Contact the Le brothers first when you have an issue, they're always up to correct their mistakes and have no problem with admitting if something went wrong or they may not have known. Thanks for letting everyone know, of course. The first Letus unit wasn't perfect, they didn't defend it as so and suppose the rails first edition isn't either.

Thanks to you guys, I'm sure there'll be a more refined solution in the near future.
 
If they considered doing a new redesign for free for those that are
unhappy with their purchase that would be for helpfull. But might
not likely happen.
It looks like this system is less than par with cavsions or others I've used in
the past production yet they want a lot for it. Just a few clamps
and a riser still they couldn't get the important components to be tooless.
 
Update

Update

I just got an email from Hien and here's what he said:
"Steve,

The new rails are are on the way to you. The CNC shop messed up some of the rail. It is supposed to be 15mm - (minus) and they made it 15mm +/- ."

This is good customer service. I emailed this morning and he's already taking care of it. Very much appreciated.
 
Can't argue with that. Sounds like very good service and rather than turning a blind eye have done something about it straight away. Companies such as Letus, Cinevate, Redrock etc need good reports from forums like this to generate sales. Bad threats hurt business so its important for them to jump in and rectify mistakes.
 
Update on Letus35 rods...

We had a problem with one of the CNC machines in the first batch of rods. Instead of consistent 15mm - (minus) rods it was turning out 15mm +/-. Some of the early shipments will be fine, some will not.

If you received rod(s) that are not working with your accessories, we will ship a replacement to you right away. We applogize for the inconvience but will make sure we get everything taken care of.

Please contact us if you have found that your rods are not working with your accessories. Submit a ticket here with your original order number, shipping address, and rod lengths needed to replace your existing setup.

New orders that has not been shipped or orders shipped last week are fine as the issue has been resolved with the CNC machine.
 
Well that's great news DeGrey.
I guess I need to get a hold of some accessories to test out my rods (I'm guess they would be considered among the 'first shipments' if I got them at the beginning of January?).

I have to say, I can understand people's issue with the allen wrench, and perhaps not liking the risers - but I've been very happy with the rail system. Then again, I haven't had alot of experience with other systems to compare to.

But all in all - the rails are completely solid, my rig feels totally secure and that's what I was looking for from a rail system.
I just finished a shoot this weekend with the LEX on the Letus rails - we shot on sticks, on a jib, and handheld on a shoulder rig - and it felt rock solid the whole way through. I'm really happy with how the system held up to what we put it through.
 
Hi Luis:

Thanks for the report, my confidence is now restored with the Letus rails that I have on order. I have not had the best result with my Cavision setup and I really do not have the bucks to spend for a Zacuto so I it seemed that the Letus system was a good alternative.

Thanks,

Dan
 
Received mine last night.

hv20-letus-support.jpg


Love them :)

ps: that tripod plate may get laughed at, but doesn't it look cute :engel017:
 
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