Patent ID: 8398110

Claim:
A slope compensation mechanism for automatically adapting an angle between a mounting beam, for supporting a ski boot, and a plane of a ski to a terrain being traversed by a skier wherein the mounting beam is rotatably pivoted to the ski at a toe end of the mount beam so that a heel end of the mounting beam is rotatable upward and downward about the pivoted toe end of the mounting beam during a stride of the skier, the slope compensation mechanism comprising: a tower mechanism including: a tower base assembly mounted to the ski and a tower pivot mechanism rotatably and slidably mounted to the tower base assembly, a resilient pivot mechanism acting between the tower base assembly and the tower pivot mechanism and allowing the tower pivot mechanism to rotate and to axially move with respect to the tower base assembly during the stride of the skier, the tower pivot mechanism including a plurality of elevation angle catches for engaging with the heel end of the mounting beam, each of plurality of elevation angle catches corresponding to one of a set of slope index angles corresponding to a range of angles of the terrain being traversed by the skier wherein a desired one of the plurality of elevation angle catches, engaged by the heel end of the mounting beam during a stride, is determined by the angle of the terrain being traversed, and a slope angle adaptation mechanism acting between the tower base assembly and the tower pivot mechanism for determining the slope index angle corresponding to the terrain being traversed and maintaining the tower pivot mechanism at the slope index angle during at least a part of a stride when a weigh of the skier is imposed on the tower pivot mechanism.