Can anyone tell me something about this tripod...

I used a lot of Quickset equipment back in the '80s and still have a few pieces around. Some adjectives that come to mind are: strong, sturdy, indestructible, heavy, inexpensive, inconvenient, rough. If you've got a massive piece of equipment you need to hold absolutely steady and don't need to pan or tilt it smoothly very much, the Quickset stuff will do it for you. Using their equipment in the field was typically a pain because it's very heavy, and the smoothness of movement from their heads (even the fluid models) was pretty lacking compared to almost anything else you could buy today. But boy, are they ever sturdy and rugged. I would think their best application today would be to support a jib or slider, or aiming something like a microwave dish that has to be held rock-steady. I would also want one of these if I were, say, mounting a locked-down camera next to the launch pad to shoot a rocket taking off, and wanted to be sure it wouldn't blow over.

There's definitely a use for this sort of thing, but general support of a video camera for routine production work ain't it, now that there is so much nice (and relatively cheap) equipment available. I jumped to a much lighter and smoother Manfrotto (aka Bogen) just about as soon as they hit these shores to replace my big ol' Quickset, and have gradually worked my way up to Sachtlers and Vintens today.

Quickset equipment was VERY popular in the educational/industrial/cable TV studio marketplace back in the day, so there must be tons of spare parts or tripods ripe for cannibalization out there if you need to replace that top plate, and assuming the company can't still find one. Finding where they are may be the challenge, though. You can probably even fabricate your own (or have a machine shop do it) if you want to. Quickset parts are big and sturdy and use all American-standard screws and such, so fixing them in the field was always pretty easy using bits and pieces from the local hardware store if necessary.

- Greg
 
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Thanks for the reply, Greg. i used it in college a little bit but I guess the plate didn't make the move out of the dorm. You're right, the thing takes forever to set up/move and is like a tank. Imagine how silly I looked using a handheld camcorder on that thing!
 
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