D.I.Y. K3 battery grip

I was quite happy with my Z-1 without the grip(strap), but it's much better with it due to the wrist strap being easier to hold the camera with. For the Super-A you really want the Motordrive-A, faster, smoother and offers a vertical handle & shutter release (similar to the K-5) - heavier though with 8x AA batteries.

With the K-5, I find the camera too small top-bottom and my little finger falls off the bottom. It's better with the grip unless using a short prime - when it restricts access to the focusing ring too much. Being an old film shooter, I normally use the normal hand position for vertical shots (elbow sticking out) even with the grip.

At the beginning of the year I bought a 3rd party grip to mod to fit to the K-30, but never got around to it.

On Sunday, on the FWIW basis, I thought I would see if it would fit the "new" (Andre's!) K-3 - and it does!

I didn't even have to remove/modify the upwards locating pins at each end of the grip because they are small enough to fit into to the holes on the K-3 body (these holes are smaller than the holes in the K-5). All worked and the controls on the BG worked (with the reservations mentioned here and on the US forum)!

The only problem was that the grip was not a snug fit up to the K-3 body until I shaved some of the plastic ridge off the top of each end of the grip with a Stanley-type knife (and I will add some 2mm thick s/a rubber strip when it arrives).

The grip that works this way is a MEIKE MK-K7 like this one but if you buy one of these make sure you get one with PLASTIC locating pins and not one with metal pins as those are larger diameter and won't fit the K-3 body (so those are the ones that have to be pulled out)

For me, apart from the cost of the rubber strip, this was almost a zero cost option and for that I can live with the downsides mentioned on the US forum (and apart from the fact that I now need another grip to mod for the K-30, as I aim to sell the K-5 - too many cameras now!)

And in case anyone should mention "weathersealing", I don't like rainy conditions that much at all, so the lack of weathersealing on the grip is unlikely to bother me too much either!

I have fairly large hands and found my ME Super, Ist DS and K5 all too small in the hand without a grip - having said that the K5 is the first camera I have ever bought a grip for, I just managed with the rest due lack of cash! I regard the grip as one of the best things I ever bought and never take it off now - it just greatly helps the comfort and security of using the camera.

Might be worth a bash modding your old grip for the K3. As a matter of fact I'm amazed Pentax are so slow to release the K3 one.

Jon

Jon. The K3 grip. The DBG5 is up and running. I've got mine and so have many others. I've had grips on my cameras from my Z1p, *istD, K10, K7, K5, and now on my K5iis and K3. I have hands like baby steam shovels. NUFF SAID.
CHEERS Vic.

ergo 645 and 6x7.....

Tongue in cheek, just couldn't resist.

Best regards

Just to add my experience to the debate. I have a K5 third party grip. I filed down the "large" pin & attached the camera. Everything works normally but as has been reported the button functions are reversed: a paint job soon fixed that. No doubt it's not waterproof, but then it never was.