Lynkspyder vs The Fence Clip

[tritonfastpitch]

Looking to order a mount for my gopro this week and it looks like these are the two options out there. I know most people have gone with the Lynkspyder, and the fact that the owner has a presence here on the boards for support/advice is a big deal....but I like the compact size of The Fence Clip (www.thefenceclip.com).

I used a friends lynkspyder over the last week, and had no problems with it...worked great. Does anyone have any experience with The Fence Clip? Would like to hear some thoughts.

Dave

 

[grcsftbll]

Hmm, following. I hadn't seen this before. We LOVE our LynkSpyder. This looks cool too though.

 

[Eric F]

I haven't seen the Fence Clip, but my first concern is how well it would work on the curved/bent/tweaked fence often found on the backstop. The range of adjustment of the LynkSpyder has been very helpful for me in dealing with those issues.

 

[1bucketmom]

Haven't seen this clip before but....the added ability to hang an external battery on the Lynkspyder makes it even more useful...along with what Eric stated.

 

[grcsftbll]

I usually hang the extra battery on the fence next to the Spyder anyway. I emailed the company, and they said it works fine on a bent fence, that it swivels up and down and side to side. But he also said they're about 10 days away from the newer, improved model being available and it would ship then.

 

[4 girl's dad]

The $39 price is a little better than the lynkspyder but I like that my battery pouch also works hanging on it and I can put most of what I need in it. It is pretty nice looking that it is small.

 

[DiamondDad316]

Never seen the fence clip. Have the Lynkspyder and love it.

 

[80catch]

I got the Fence Clip about 2 months ago and have used it at a number of tournaments (a few times it has been on the fence right next to the other teams LynkSpyder ) so I think I am ready to give some opinions of it based on my personal preferences.
First off background on how I like my shots: I like to have the lens of the camera as close to the inside of the fence as possible without it crossing to the "inside" of the fence where it could interfere with the ball (I got spoiled with my contour and Sony action cams that could fit inside the hole of the fence and get as close as I wanted... the GoPro doesn't let me get that close due to its size.) My daughter is a catcher so I like to have the camera directly behind the right batters box and pointed as down as possible; this allows me to see ball and strikes (on right handed batters), the catchers' framing, blocking, etc, and allows me to cut out as much of the sky as possible (since no action is occurring up there and it is often significantly brighter than the field which can throw off the cameras' metering.)
What I used before the the fence clip:
1) GorillaPod: not very stable and a PIA to get set at the right location... I now have to be desperate to use these.
2) Pedco Ultra Clamp (2.5 in) (http://amzn.com/B003MS1RL8 ): This was my go to for the past 3 years when there was a post available... unfortunately sometimes I had to chose less than optimal locations due to the fence posts locations. That said I have used this over the Fence Clip a couple of tournaments ago when the backstops were severely dented/mangled and there was a fence cross post at the perfect height and location (even the guy with the Lynkspyder was having trouble with these backstops, but this Ultra Clamp made it easy for me.
3) Home made Fence Clip: when I ordered my Fence Clip I found out they were backordered for a couple of weeks... I didn't want to wait so I tried to make my own... it turned out ugly but very functional (in some ways I prefer it over the Fence Clip.) I'll try and post a picture at the bottom of this post of my homemade version

The Fence Clip:
Pros:
- Small: I can easily fit it in a jacket pocket and can even fit it in my pants pocket (if I take the go pro off of it)... it also fits in my small camera bag with no problem (something I was concerned would not be the case with the LynkSpyder based on photos)
- Sturdy: this thing is well made and feels like it can take a beating
- quick to setup: If I leave it in the stock configuration (more on that later) I can put it up on a flat fence in under 10 seconds... even on problem (curved/mangled) fences I am faster than the guys with the LynkSpyder .

Cons / Issues (for my preferred way of doing things):
- Designed for an ideal fence:
-- The grooves that grab the fence wires are too narrow: it is like the grooves were cut to the spec of an ideal chain link fence... unfortunately most of the fences I encounter are either corroded, roughly galvanized or rubber coated which makes them all slightly to wide and the groove does not get a lot of surface contact (My homemade version has much wider, v-shaped, grooves and grabs on to these imperfect fences much better in my opinion.) I'm sure the maker could improve this, but I can see why he did it the way he did.
-- The attachment does not deal well if the two wires you are attaching to are not nice an parallel: I think this has to do with a combination of a 1" wide "jaw", the fact that they jaws are held perfectly parallel, and the above mentioned narrow grooves; if one of the wires is bowed one way or another, there isn't enough surface contact to get a good purchase. I can normally make it work by trying an adjacent "hole" in the fence or moving it around some, but it is annoying. (note I can still set it up in under a minute despite this annoyance.)
- the stock configuration does not allow me to move the camera close enough to the fence: the stock configuration hold the lens 2-5mm away from the outside of the fence... this means that in Medium view you can still see the fence in your frame (and if you have to angle your camera due to a bowed fence, you will see even more of the fence)... Like I said above: it is my personal preference that I like the camera to be as close to the inside of the fence as possible; in the stock configuration, the lens is about a half-inch from the inside of the fence (which is too far with a wide angle lens IMHO). Now I have made two "mods" in an attempt to deal with this: 1) I machined a hole ~3/8" close on the bracket and made my own thumb screw to hold it in place; this works but the camera case is now press up against the fence and there is little to no room to adjust the angle, so I moved to number: 2) I move the mounting bracket back one hole (the bracket has a number of holes for different cameras and such) and used a "Straight 20mm Extension with Pivot Arm" ( http://amzn.com/B00F8JHU7O ) to move the camera closer to the fence and provide a little more flexibility with the angle. This is still not perfect on bowed fences, but it at least makes the Fence Clip usable given my preferences.

Again this last item is some what of an issue due to the size/shape of a gopro camera and I'm not sure if a LynkSpyder can do better or not (I've not held a LynkSpyder or examined one up close to see the details and in this case it is all about the details.)

I will be sticking with my Fence Clip, my Ultra Clamp, and my homemade version of the fence clip going forward; I don't regret my choice of the fence clip over the spider as it fills my needs better than I think the spider would, but everyone's needs are different.

If anyone has any questions or wants more details about anything I might have missed or about something I said, just let me know,
Daniel

 

[Fastpitch86]

Love the LynkSpyder. Highly recommend it. No issues other than I need to be about a foot taller to hang the camera higher..LOL!

 

[grcsftbll]

I went ahead & ordered the Fence Clip for our backup camera. I'll post after we try it out. From reading 80catch's review I'm pretty sure my husband's going to like the LynkSpyder better but the Fence Clip is satisfaction guaranteed so I suppose all I have to lose is shipping. I like the simplicity of it; we'll see.