Standard tripod thread size?

[Jeff Toogood]

Anybody now off hand what the standard mounting thread on a standard tripod?

Is it 1/4"?

What about the depth? 1/2"?

Thanks

[Jeff Donald]

You should measure for yourself. Some cameras have a shallow mounting thread and can be damaged by too long a screw.

[Mike Rehmus]

The depth is 6 mm on most Sony consumer and prosumer cameras. That's about 1/4 inch.

You need 3 complete threads of overlap in a normal nut-bolt relationship to create the maximum holding power. So that means you need a minimum of 3/20ths of an inch of the hold-down screw to engage the threads in the tripod socket.

(the thread is 1/4-20 or 20 threads per inch)

So the 'correct' range is between 3/20ths and 5/20ths of an inch. Not much margin.

I have to shim some of my tripod tops to avoid bottoming-out the tripod screw in the socket on the bottom of the camera. OTOH, I once measured a tripod setup and found that I only had about 1.5 threads holding my PD150 to the top!

To further hide what is truly happening, the tripods frequently have a soft rubger cover on the top of the mounting plate and cameras sometimes have a recessed tripod socket. So you have to measure the engaged-depth of the socket with some care.