EX3 Handle has cracked twice: Cause? Solution?

[Don Greening]

So the crack is just to the rear of the zoom rocker on the horizontal part of the handle? What’s the condition of the vertical support piece just below the rocker that connects the handle to the camera body? Do you have any sort of bottom reenforcement plate such as the one at the following link:

https://shop.dm-accessories.com/collections/ex3-products

I don’t really see a relationship between the cracking handle issue and the bottom mounting area of the EX3 but you should know that the stock camera tripod mounting plate is terribly weak. Shortly after the EX3’s first came out Sony realized there was a design fault on the bottom because it wasn’t completely flat and was prone to flexing causing tress cracks. Sony came out with a piece of plastic to reduce the problem but in my opinion a proper 3rd party plate is a must.

In my opinion, once you start to add weight to the bottom with such things as a universal camera mounting plate, matte box, an Anton Bauer battery etc. you should never pick up all that weight with just the handle because it obviously wasn’t designed for it. I’ve got a rod support rig for a Ki Pro Mini on my EX3 and I always have one hand supporting the bottom when I pick it up. I have no cracks on the handle. There’s a small chance that a proper mounting plate will distribute the extra accessory weight across the entire bottom of the camera instead of just the stock tripod plate and that may help the handle issue, but this is just an untested supposition on my part.

– Don

Don Greening
A Vancouver Video Production Company
Reeltime Videoworks
http://www.reeltimevideoworks.com