So normally the comment sections of photography sites are completely unbearable… but sometimes weird things happen and you’re just like “okay”.
Image text; Old Cameras: “Aircraft grade aluminum”. Good lord, just say what it is. 6061-T6, 7000 series, or whatever the heck. It’s not that special. It’s more likely “bicycle grade” than “aircraft grade”. Androole: Especially since a lot of aircraft grade aluminum alloys are utterly unsuitable for consumer products. If you told me you were making my tripod gadget out of 2024-T3 (the king of alloys, right?!), it would take you a long, long time to convince me that you had the proper process control in place for corrosion protection, and the right shop set up to ensure suitable tolerances during machining. Old Cameras: Or how about 8000 series “aluminum lithium”, which IS aircraft grade and utterly unsuitable for making a tripod. 99% of all consumer products made from machined aluminum are 6061-T something as it is easy to weld.
Source: https://www.dpreview.com/news/6598970733/hitch-hiker-balanced-motion-tripod-head-boasts-smooth-uniform-rotations