- The ball joint has a plastic liner between the metal ball and metal shell, so once it's loosened you get a nice smooth movement without any grinding or stickiness
- The knob to tighen/loosen uses a thrust bearing! (See photo). If you're not a mechanical engineer, the thrust bearing basically avoids metal-on-metal grinding/sliding when you really tighten down the knob, so it's not going to get stuck no matter how hard you tighen it. I was blown away when I noticed it - you don't typically see attention to details like that on relatively cheap hardware
- The knob has a spring-loaded rotation feature - if the knob happens to be sticking out and getting in the way once you've tightened it, you can pull it out, rotate it in 60 degree increments and let go to tuck it away (see video). Again, really nice attention to detail!
Build quality is excellent. The only thing that's a minor negative is the included arca swiss plate; it's a little cheap feeling compared to the rest of the ball head and it doesn't have a finger ring on the 1/4" thumbscrew, so you really need a coin/screwdriver to tighten it into your camera securely (I also wish the rubber on the top was textured for better grip and to prevent it from rotating). But It's still a perfectly functional arca swiss plate, so I can't complain and it's certainly not bad enough that I'd take a star away for it.