Just wanted to clear up some confusion on our products. The Trakker TopMount eb asked about (pic below) uses a rotary fluid damper to smooth the panning. This does a lot better job of providing the drag necessary to smooth out rope slap without sacrificing tracking accuracy. Our previous models had an adjustable tension/drag, and were sometimes difficult to find a good balance on the required tension.
Also, using the clamps instead of U-bolts allows us to make the camera pivot point farther from the skier than the rope attachment point. As the boarder goes farther out, it tracks a bit behind him, so when he cuts back in, the slight delay before it starts tracking again is much less noticable. Sorry for the long post...
http://www.wakevideo.com (Message edited by trakkerguy on March 12, 2006)
(Message edited by trakkerguy on March 12, 2006)