I'm in the middle of upgrading housing (first dives this week) and next task will be strobes and arms. BUT im currently stuck with my old setup.

I find it VERY bulky and messy, especially "folded" (it doesn't - it flops). Its huge, its bulky, its negative. They're DS161s from Ikelite.

I currently have:

2 x 8" Float arms

2 x 7" normal arms

2 x 4"ish normal arms

I use 2 x SUPE video lights on a 3 way elbow mid arm.

This is my WA setup for a Tokina 10-17 on APS-C to give FOV ideas. Its bulky, messy and due to 10 year old clamps, floppy.

For my wide angle, am i better off keeping this setup OR make it neater by replacing the 7" normal size arms with my 5" arms i found in a cupboard (so 1 x 8 and 1 x 5 per side).

Are there any real trade-offs for WA here vs improved in neatness?

Now I've gone mirrorless the abomination of strobe wiring and arms is even more obvious.

Pictures are the 8" and 4" on the WA setup. Can see its not neat at all, especially when "stowed" and holding the camera by the rope it just flops forward off balance. No easy way to carry. I find it ridiculously ungainly and so do boat crew trying to handle it.

So sugestions:

(i) best compromise WA arm length combo

(ii) Best order of arms and clamps to make it usable U/W but also neater to stow/fold.

Edited Monday at 08:52 AM2 days by Rich W

Replace the orings on your arms so they don't flop around.

Put the carry lanyard at the top of the first arm segments so you can carry it all without anything flopping over.

I like my carry handle to be on the center pivot with a "M" set up. So why do I have the additional bolt snaps? They lock the arms together at the upper pivot. The strobes are locked in at the outer pivot to the inner with bungee. Thus when folded up the rig is a secure package for handling especially when the crew has it handing off, no flailing about of the arms whacking the strobes about.

I have at least two regular dive buddies that use TG cameras. Both have three strobes and two video lights. One of them has two YSD3 on the outer arms, two high power video lights, triple clamps and over the top an Atom strobe! They cannot even get their rigs into the rinse basin yet mine slips right in neatly. And they try to call me out for the "huge" camera rig and I repeatedly point out that mine fits in a Sams bag and theirs need a porter! One of their issues in addition to multiples strobes and video lights is that they are using a single arms which makes folding up compactly a challenge for them.

Rigged as shown below your rig will not flop about. And I can set it up to clip off to my shoulder D rings and center crotch scooter ring. The two center pivot bolt snaps in such case go to each D ring, and the lanyard is wrapped around the lower grip intersection and off to the scooter ring. Configured so the rig is held flat to my chest and will not swing and flop about for beach entry/exit or even arms free climbing the boarding ladder with the camera still in my keep.

I do not shoot video and have no interest in video at all. But, I did get my new strobes with the video lights (for potential resale). But for those who try to do everything, combo strobes with built in video lights might be one way to get rid of two video lights cluttering up the rig?

Edited Monday at 02:58 PM1 day by Nemrod

I have another dive buddy who has decided to go off the deep end with minimalism. He wants to get rid of all strobes and lights and then use AI enhanced programs to edit his photos. Not getting any deeper into that (AI) discussion, my reason for bringing it up is we either think we need lighting or we think we do not. If you think you do, then there has to be arms and cables.

We can do single arms, longer or shorter arms but if there be strobes then there be cables and joints and connections. Is there another way?

Edited Monday at 03:39 PM1 day by Nemrod

11 hours ago, Dave_Hicks said:

Replace the orings on your arms so they don't flop around.

Put the carry lanyard at the top of the first arm segments so you can carry it all without anything flopping over.

Agree, makes life a lot easier this way, new o-rings do make a difference. Putting the short arm on attached to the handles and the long arm attached to the strobe generally allows the strobe to sit on the ground when folded into an "M", seems like that should be neater and more stable. The ikelites are good strobes but there's other more compact lighter options available these days.

2 minutes ago, Chris Ross said:

Agree, makes life a lot easier this way, new o-rings do make a difference. Putting the short arm on attached to the handles and the long arm attached to the strobe generally allows the strobe to sit on the ground when folded into an "M", seems like that should be neater and more stable. The ikelites are good strobes but there's other more compact lighter options available these days.

After a current-heavy trip to Galapagos about a dozen years ago I came home with super floppy arms. I had cranked them down hard so many times in the current the o-rings were shot. Fresh o-rings made a word of difference.

Then I ended up selling all of my ULCS clamps and bought all new ones for good measure. The old ones were still in good shape, but I cleaned them up and sold them for about half the cost of new ones. They were well over 10 years old. Sometimes it's just good to start fresh.

ULCS makes these or anyone handy in the shop could do something similar to convert a double or triple clamp to allow lanyard attachment to the center pivot.

https://ulcs.com/product/ac-lhc2-camera-lanyard-holder/

9 minutes ago, Nemrod said:

ULCS makes these or anyone handy in the shop could do something similar to convert a double or triple clamp to allow lanyard attachment to the center pivot.

https://ulcs.com/product/ac-lhc2-camera-lanyard-holder/

I used them for a while, and they're nice because they're cheap and can "upgrade" an existing clamp.

However, I ended up buying new clamps with an integral shackle due to a few issues. First, the lanyard metal would frequently bind with the screw so adjusting the clamp meant wiggling the lanyard holder to move things. This was most noticeable when loosening because the spring wasn't strong enough to push the metal out. Second, when I was getting out of the water and had the clamps tightened, any swaying of the lanyard would work the clamps loose enough that the (heavy) strobes could swing around and hit the housing or flop out and get much wider.

40 minutes ago, akarnani said:

I used them for a while, and they're nice because they're cheap and can "upgrade" an existing clamp.

However, I ended up buying new clamps with an integral shackle due to a few issues. First, the lanyard metal would frequently bind with the screw so adjusting the clamp meant wiggling the lanyard holder to move things. This was most noticeable when loosening because the spring wasn't strong enough to push the metal out. Second, when I was getting out of the water and had the clamps tightened, any swaying of the lanyard would work the clamps loose enough that the (heavy) strobes could swing around and hit the housing or flop out and get much wider.

I understand, that is why I too have the clamps with a shackle. And lock my arms at the center pivots with bolt snaps and at the outer to inner pivots with a bungee loop, tight or loose, my strobes cannot flail about like I see so often and with damaging results. I also beach dive often enough and need to be able to walk and enter and exit hands free.

Edited yesterday at 02:43 AM1 day by Nemrod

16 hours ago, Nemrod said:

I understand, that is why I too have the clamps with a shackle. And lock my arms at the center pivots with bolt snaps and at the outer to inner pivots with a bungee loop, tight or loose, my strobes cannot flail about like I see so often and with damaging results. I also beach dive often enough and need to be able to walk and enter and exit hands free.

Have you had any instances with the bungee loops at the end of your arms presenting any sort of entanglement issues during the dive?

4 hours ago, akarnani said:

Have you had any instances with the bungee loops at the end of your arms presenting any sort of entanglement issues during the dive?

No, not once in over twenty years. If having the loops on the outer arms bothers one then put them on the inside, the method works either way. With all of the stuff folks have hanging on their cameras like optical and electric sync cables those little loops provide little issue compared. And because they are 1/8 bungee if they were to ever get entangled my shears would make quicker work of them than the heavy electric cables on those Ikelite strobes!

Edited 14 hours ago14 hr by Nemrod

I sometimes use this configuration for fisheye and the Laowa 10/12mm F/2.8 rectilinear lenses.

Thanks for that. I hadnt considered putting the rope on the strobe arms to stop it flopping. Not sure if i tries it not to just pull the clamps off though (?).

Changing O-rings is needed if i can source them (arms are different brands) and i suspect my 15 year old clamps arent great. I have to tighten to the point i need a large screwdriver to lever them open and it still flops.

Any suggestions as to which are length combo to use for WA/10mm fisheye on APS-C (180 FOV or so)? Both long arms? Long and short each side ?

Overriding factor is the massive, heavy (and for me, underpowered) Ikelites need to be supported. Video lights are fairly lightweight.

The o-rings will be the same or close enough between different brands, this thread covers what size they are:

https://scubaboard.com/community/threads/o-ring-size-for-ball-joint-aluminum-arms.581917/

you can get Buna-N or silicone models - some say the silicone is a bit grippier, from an engineering supply store they should be very cheap.

This prompted me to fish out some spare o-rings from the drawer and replace them on my arms. I have INON arms that I use the most and popped on some Nauticam arm o-rings I had. Visually the Nauticam o-rings are a little smaller but still fit the INON arms and they grip noticeably tighter than the old INON were doing. I measure the Nauticam ones to be 16mm ID and 3.75mm cross section.

On 5/11/2026 at 9:58 PM, akarnani said:

I used them for a while, and they're nice because they're cheap and can "upgrade" an existing clamp.

However, I ended up buying new clamps with an integral shackle due to a few issues. First, the lanyard metal would frequently bind with the screw so adjusting the clamp meant wiggling the lanyard holder to move things. This was most noticeable when loosening because the spring wasn't strong enough to push the metal out. Second, when I was getting out of the water and had the clamps tightened, any swaying of the lanyard would work the clamps loose enough that the (heavy) strobes could swing around and hit the housing or flop out and get much wider.

I have these lanyard holders on my ULCS clamps and have no problems with them. Did you install them between the clamp handle and the clamp, as in the picture? Ken actually recommended I install them between the spring and the clamp. This gets rid of all the problems you mentioned, except they do not stay in one fixed position - a small annoyance. Since I also clip them together with a double ender, I fit a split ring into the holes so I only use one double ender.

10 hours ago, Nemrod said:

No, not once in over twenty years. If having the loops on the outer arms bothers one then put them on the inside, the method works either way. With all of the stuff folks have hanging on their cameras like optical and electric sync cables those little loops provide little issue compared. And because they are 1/8 bungee if they were to ever get entangled my shears would make quicker work of them than the heavy electric cables on those Ikelite strobes!

After reading how you secure your gear neatly some time ago, I have been doing the same: a double ender between the middle clamp lanyard holders and bungee loops on the strobe clamps that loop around the handle clamps. It is so much easier to carry the gear or slip it into a rinse tank or bag!

1 hour ago, Adrian Gresores said:

After reading how you secure your gear neatly some time ago, I have been doing the same: a double ender between the middle clamp lanyard holders and bungee loops on the strobe clamps that loop around the handle clamps. It is so much easier to carry the gear or slip it into a rinse tank or bag!

I originally used a double ender instead of the bolt snaps. But I visited the Reef store in Fort Lauderdale and saw those Nauticam shackle clamps and just had to have them and thus went to the dual bolt snaps. But, I have been considering going back to the single double ender. It is more comfortable to hold and slightly more compact and removes some clutter (the bolt snaps) from the camera while in use.

The lanyard would seem redundant sometimes perhaps since I usually carry the rig by the bolt snaps/double ender. But, boat crews fixate on that lanyard, they instinctively know that is where to grab. And during safety/deco stops I will sometimes let the camera hang from the lanyard clipped to one pivot to my shoulder D ring and clipped back to the other pivot afterwards and of course the coil lanyard is still attached until hand off for two point security, the two points being my hand and the coil lanyard or the white lanyard and coil lanyard. Sounds complicated maybe but it is not in practice.

A couple of years ago on the Spiegel my buddy assigned me was a relatively new diver and with camera, a bad combo. I agreed to dive with her and all was well until her fin strap broke near the end of the dive. And the current had gotten worse. She had her fin in one hand, her camera in the other and thus no way to hold the buoy line and got blown off. So, I let the current take me, zipped my camera rig up to my chest as described earlier, intercepted her and then took her broken fin in one hand and grabbed her now free hand and swam her back to the boats tag line. The point of this story being that sometimes it is nice to be able to rig for hands free and know your rig is not flopping about. And that is when the two bolt snaps come into play, each one goes to a chest D ring.

Edited 1 hour ago1 hr by Nemrod