With heavy lenses, it’s best to support the camera/lens combination from the lens when carrying it. This is true whether or not you’re handholding the combination, whether it is mounted to a tripod, or whether you're transporting it via a carrying strap. You want to avoid unsupported weight hanging off the front of the camera’s lens mount when the lens is heavier than the camera body. With smaller lenses (up through the f/1.8 S primes and the mid-range zooms), this typically isn’t an issue. But with heavier and longer lenses with significant mass, it is.
Most of the Nikon telephoto lenses have unremovable tripod collars. The feet on the lenses with tripod collars are replaceable, though. Most of us have two problems with Nikon’s own feet: (1) they are not Arca-Swiss compatible; and on some (2) they tend to dismount unexpectedly due to an easily moved release lever.
You can find a number of third party feet these days for the lenses that support replaceable feet:
- 70-200mm f/2.8 VR S, 100-400mm f/4-6.3 VR S, 400mm f/4.5 — Haoge LF-Z72, iShoot THZ720, Kirk LP-70, Leofoto NF-05, Wimberley LP-501
- 300mm f/4E PF (F-mount) — Hoage LMR-N372, iShoot RT-1,
- 400mm f/2.8 TC VR S, 600mm f/4 TC VR S, 800mm f/6.3 VR S — iShoot THZ863 for Manfrotto Fluid head, Jobu LF-N604, Kirk LP-72SG, Really Right Stuff LCF-22, Wimberley AP-502, Hejnarphoto, Zenelli Carbon LFZ
One lens has a replaceable tripod collar:
- 180-600mm f/5.6-6.3 VR — Kirk NC-180-600, iShoot IS-Z1860, Haoge LMR-Z186
Some lenses that you might want a tripod mount for don’t have tripod collars, at all, thus no tripod mount. Third party solutions have appeared for this:
- 24-200mm f/4-6.3 VR — iShoot Z24200,
- 200-500mm f/5.6E (F-mount) — Kirk200500V3, Really Right Stuff LC-A14
- 300mm f/4E PF (F-mount) — Kirk Replacement Collar 300PFV2,
- 50mm f/1.2 S — iShoot Z50. This low cost Arca-Swiss compatible tripod collar and plate doesn’t rotate, but it still provides access to the Fn buttons on the lens.
iShoot also makes tripod collars for some of the Nikkor PC-E lenses, available on Amazon.
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