you are talking about the gimbel heads, and yes there are othes, Wimberley, Sidekick, King Cobra, or Black widow but they all are $$$. there is a Jr. model that is cool, but still you have to have a good ballhead and tripod or it wont work! It's called the sidekick.

why do you want a gimbel head? they really are good for panning, but that's about it. A good ballhead with do the same that a gimble head will do, albeit not as nicelcy, but it will. Again panning is the big deal and balance, the gimbles are nice to use but not for the money in my view. If money were no object I'd own one. I put the money into good tripod legs and a good b1 or super foba or something like that.

here's a link to some discussions from another board, hope I did not break the rules by posting this. . .

http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=000P71&tag=

Your leggs should still be in fine shape, youre not very old!