I’m pretty big on the added stability, and therefore sharpness, that a monopod or tripod provides.  So, shortly after I bought my first Canon DSLR, I bought myself a Manfrotto 724B tripod.  And shortly after that, one of the leg locks snapped – snapped because like everything else these days it’s made of plastic, but that’s a whole other story.  So I rigged up a not so perfect solution involving a plumber’s ring clamp and went my merry way for several years, periodically dreaming of sending a nasty, or at least, a beseeching note to Manfrotto.

Well the time for well-meaning notes has long since past.  So last month I went online to see what was involved in getting this baby repaired, and here’s a surprise.  I’m not the only one with this problem.  There are so many people with this problem, in fact, that you can buy spare parts.

My purpose in writing this is to inform people that not only can this be done, but it’s actually quite easy to do. I got my part from the Spartan Photo Center in just a couple of days.  I’ll give them an endorsement for that.  I was going to supply you with detailed instructions and photographs of the repair process, but there is a little video you can watch that shows it all.  It proved not to be quite as easy as shown on the video.  But, the whole process took me about ten minutes, and there was no frustrated screaming or muttering under my breath.  Do pay attention to the fact that you need a punch and have to work bottom to top.  My tripod is as good (?) as new.