About 5 yrears ago I bough a bogen/manfrotto 505 fluid head. It was a great piece of gear, had interchangable springs for weight and tension, and I could do nice smooth tilts and pans even at extreme focal lenghts.

A couple of months ago it started leaking black fluid and i sent it to manfroitto for repair. They saiod they couldn't fix it and offere me $100 trade in on a 503 hdv , which I bought. The 503 is fine for must uses but there is no comaprison when super smooth tilting and panning control are needed.

Does manfrotto mke a replacement for the 505, or can anyone reccomend a head with similar quality?
I'd even consider buying another brand.
Thanks
Bruyce Yarock
Yarock Video and Photo (http://www.yarockvideo.com)

I used to use a 516 with my full sized cams and was pretty happy with it so you might look at that OR the 526 which is a very nice head. Gitzo has one also I think its the 1380 which I've tried with a JVC HM700 loaded with battery and wireless receiver and it worked very nicely. I wasn't wild about the pan/tilt locks but overall a very nice head.
HTHs