smoothness questions for you folks that have Arca Swiss B1 heads

So I bought a used B1 to experience what the elliptical ball experience is and I'm a bit confused about how

smooth it's supposed to be. It's great that it prevents camera flop over, but it acts a bit weird in a few ways:

- after you use the side slot, then bring the camera back up to the top, the tension is a lot more loose than it

should be (I suspect because it was "stretched" by the elliptical ball)...you have to tighten the lockdown knob

and then loosen it again to get back to the previous "loose" position

- the camera has forward backward play while in the side slot...the brake appears to sit up slightly so instead

of the ball neck sitting in the bottom of the slot, it sits on this flat brake portion

- after you lock down the head, then loosen the knob, it seems to be "stuck" for a little bit until you break it

loose and it becomes smooth again

- the "sweet spot" where tension is right and the ball moves around smoothly seems to shift a bit after you push

the camera downwards (I think this is the effect of the elliptical ball again)

Is all this normal? I've only used regular ballheads where tension is relatively smoother and this is a slightly

different experience...

My somewhat aging B1 will stiffen up as it sits and not fully release unless I tilt the ball into the notch. Thereafter I can tighten the head until the camera can be moved but hold its position or loosen it as needed. The head will get very tight as it is tilted unless you have a camera mounted. The out-of-round ball is designed to handle the offset weight, and works very nicely in this regard to keep the camera from accidently flopping. This feature is very important to me since I usually keep the head under moderate tension and continue to hold the camera (and point it as needed). I only lock it down when using a cable release with my hands completely free.

The Arca has a rather complicated lever mechanism to clamp the ball. The RRS BH-55 has a much simpler system using a split-ring type clamp, as does the Acratech Ultimate. I suspect the BH-55 would be trouble-free, but somewhat less effective in tension control. The Acratech is basically on or off with tension control sacrificed to the goal of minimum weight.

Thanks for the feedback, Edward. I finally figured it out after playing with it for a bit more. Regular ballheads have roughly 3 zones that you can set tension for...nearly straight up, tilted a bit, tilted more (roughly 15 degrees of motion each). The B1's tilted more zone kicks in the elliptical feature but it's non-intuitive (you expect it to creep faster and need the most tension but it's the tightest and needs the least tension while regular ballheads need the least tension while straight up). When you push the B1 into the elliptical zone (this include the side notch) while setting tension for one of the other zones, it'll actually stretch out the brake. If you move it back into a more upright position, tension seems to be lost, but can be easily reset to your original tension setting by spinning the tension knob tight then loosened. None of the reviews I read mentioned this "quirk" so I never expected it.

The Arca Swiss lever clamp is a clever design to keep you from unlocking it by mistake if you catch the lever on something. Definitely won't work w/ gloved hands though since you need to use your fingernail to get it into the fully open position. It also doesn't have a detent pin for the newer plates w/ detent pin safeties. The one I have also has enough play in the mechanism that it's hard to get into the fully locked position so you need to pull that pin at the tip. I think I prefer the Acratech screw clamp...faster screw and nice detent pin and comes w/ a nice spirit level. I didn't think the GV2's tension control was on/off but it doesn't work for really heavy lenses (worked fine for my K10D w/ Sigma 17-70 lens when I tested it).