[sil (Steve)]

I was wondering about making a small extension tube/column/pier to attach to the turning part of the vixen polarie and have my ball head and camera on top of that. Mainly to get the camera away from the polarie body, as it can sometimes be impossible for me to angle the camera enough for the direction I want without the camera body or ball head adjusters touching the body of the polarie. I figured if I add an extension layer to get it up away from the polarie body it should give me a little more angle freedom, but the I was wondering if it would make any difference to the function of the polarie (ignore flex and weight). The Polarie and similar have no mention of height of the focal plane above the turning mountand they are fine with dslr and compact cameras so it cant be critical.

So it got me wondering if it has any difference at all, or if there is a critical height where tracking is badly effected by the offset? I'd guess a 6in extension wouldnt matter but a 6ft one would. Conic sections are coming to mind here.