Taking lesser shots with any pano setup is always on my mind and I found I can take as little as 4 shots with the Peleng on the 40D. Even with the crop 1.6 sensor of the 40D. 4 shots around and there’s no need for a zenith shot.
My initial test with the above setup on a Nodal Ninja 3. There has to be a balance of taking less shots yet have a small nadir afterwards to save patching time.
NN3 upper arm tilted to up +10 degrees.