Author Topic: The Ski Locker thread  (Read 126342 times)

Feanor

  • It's mostly downhill from here.
Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #425 on: 03 January, 2015, 04:27:38 pm »
Yes, the up-and-over lift is quite breathtaking the first time you do it!

On a chairlift, you normally face towards the mountain, and you see the ground below you.
Once you go up-and-over, you are now facing out into fresh air.
The mountain-side drops away steeply below you, and the ground and pylons are totally out-of-sight.
It's a bit of a roller-coaster sensation, like you are flying.

We had a big family day out on new Year's day; 8 of us went down one of the nice off-piste itinerary routes between Val Thorens and Les Menuires, called Vallon De Lou.   We approached it from Pointe de la Masse because were based in Reberty ( It can also be entered from the Cime Caron in VT ).  It was still quite fresh and not very tracked-out, which made it fun.   There was quite a lot of snow!


Vallon du Lou
by Ron Lowe, on Flickr

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/663639861


Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #426 on: 04 January, 2015, 07:02:27 pm »
Ooops, I appear to have just had a March based Alp-d'Huez-finger-click-interface incident  ;D

Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #427 on: 04 January, 2015, 09:34:53 pm »
One of my finest days on skis ever was at Le Fornet.

Up to the top, walk for half an hour to Point Pers, then ski very carefully along the ridge to the point of no return, then drop off to the right heading for the refuge almost exactly 1000m below us. April 4th 1990. (A year to the day that I had bust my knee in Verbier.) Glorious clear blue skies. There were four of us and I was the last one down. It took the preceding three 10 minutes each to get far enough down the chute so that they could clear it before the next person could set off safely. The start was an extended pitch at over 45 degrees. I haven't felt that alive very often.

I've got video of that pitch from 1.24, not my party I hasten to add. We'd come over the Col Pers and were skinning up to Gros Caval. There was a bit of a slide from a boarder above us, which added a certain amount of interest. That was in late April 2004. I was never much of an off-piste skier, but skinning suits me as an exercise, and I've always been good at kick-turns.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uiWk6IZqwDk

Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #428 on: 15 January, 2015, 08:33:27 pm »
Right. I'm going snowboarding in three and a half weeks and I've just pulled my board out of storage (under the bed in it's bag). It hasn't been used in maybe seven years. As far as I can see it was lightly waxed but I obviously neglected the edges as they are rather rusty  :facepalm:

I'll have a look at the weekend with a file and see how deep the rust is but how can I tell if it's dried out internally/delaminating?

I've spent a couple minutes clipped in the bindings rocking up onto each end in the hallway and if isn't making any odd noises at least.

I don't know whether to take it away and risk having to hire a board out there or getting a refund on my board carriage and prebooking a rental package  ??? I mean it is an old fairly budget board but it's also sentimental as I bought it on my gap year in Canada.

I think carriage is £35 and I can get board for £65 or board and boots for £90. Can't see any reason my boots won't be fine at least. I don't know if the board rental includes a prebooking discount.

Thanks in advance for any advice/recommendations.
Miles cycled 2014 = 3551.5 (Target 7300 :()
Miles cycled 2013 = 6141.4
Miles cycled 2012 = 4038.1

Feanor

  • It's mostly downhill from here.
Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #429 on: 15 January, 2015, 09:01:57 pm »
Don't have at the edges with a hand-file.
You won't be able to hold a consistent angle without a proper tool.

A wee bit of rust is not really a problem.   That will usually clean up with a gummy stone ( like an ink-erasor rubber ).

There's no such thing as 'drying out', and de-laminating is normally only caused by riding the board repeatedly when it's had a core-shot through the base PTEX.   What happens is show gets into the gouge, then melts in indoor overnight storage and weeps in between the PTEX and the core.   The next day, it gets taken out and re-freezes, pulling the PTEX further away from the core.  It will not have de-laminated sitting under your bed for 7 years.

If you are not tooled-up for ski / board fettling, then the best advice I have is to take it to your LSS (Local Ski Shop ) and have them give it a service.
They can also advise whether it remains a useful snowsport tool or should be retired as a garden bench.




Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #430 on: 15 January, 2015, 09:08:25 pm »
I've got a snowboard tuning kit including edge doofer. I'll see if I can find somewhere nearby to take a look. Though without a car getting there might be a pickle.

I might take a couple pictures at the weekend if you'd be willing to cast your eye over them Feanor?
Miles cycled 2014 = 3551.5 (Target 7300 :()
Miles cycled 2013 = 6141.4
Miles cycled 2012 = 4038.1

Feanor

  • It's mostly downhill from here.
Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #431 on: 15 January, 2015, 09:24:50 pm »
The following advice is what I'd give for skis:

The edge-doofer you will have will be for the side edges.
You can have at them pretty much as you like, and that will clean up the rust.
I'd use a medium-grade file and then a diamond stone to polish the edge.

But base edges are a whole other thing.
Basically, you can't really remove metal from the base edge because that brings it below the level of the base.
You really need to stone-grind the base and edges together, and then re-set the base edge angles.
This is beyond home fettling.

But at the end of the day, a board is a powder tool, in which case the edges become irrelevant.
In powder, the edges are not set.
The edges only get set when you are on firm snow -> ice.
And then, they only get partially set, because the flexible boots / bindings on a board mean you cannot set them anything like as hard as you can on skis.

I think your board will be fine with a wee bit of TLC.



Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #432 on: 15 January, 2015, 09:59:54 pm »
I will bear that all in mind.

I learnt to board at Kananaskis near Calgary, ski lifts all on the wrong side of the mountain  :facepalm:. I had to learn to set an edge as the place was damn near pure ice half the time.

I am looking forward to getting some actual powder time. Going to Livigno, heard it's good there :D  :thumbsup:
Miles cycled 2014 = 3551.5 (Target 7300 :()
Miles cycled 2013 = 6141.4
Miles cycled 2012 = 4038.1

Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #433 on: 15 January, 2015, 10:25:02 pm »
I will bear that all in mind.

I learnt to board at Kananaskis near Calgary, ski lifts all on the wrong side of the mountain  :facepalm:. I had to learn to set an edge as the place was damn near pure ice half the time.

I am looking forward to getting some actual powder time. Going to Livigno, heard it's good there :D  :thumbsup:
Beer's cheap there, if nothing else. Lots of duty free shops all along the high street.
Rust never sleeps

Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #434 on: 19 January, 2015, 04:23:27 pm »
First day at Yad Moss for me this year. Pennine skiing is a sort of 1970s time warp, and the drive home can be scenic.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X1pXcMT4aiQ

Jakob

Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #435 on: 20 January, 2015, 01:58:26 am »
This season is terrible so far. The local mountains have had virtually no snow and I can see big bare spots on the main runs now.
Whistler is ok if you get there on a fresh snow day, but both they and Mt Baker are struggling for snow. I haven't had a single day and usually I'm looking at 10+ days at this time of year.

Meanwhile, I found this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKP7jQknGjs

Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #436 on: 20 January, 2015, 07:48:25 am »

Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #437 on: 22 January, 2015, 07:28:01 am »

Anyone shopping for a new helmet? This one has to be better


http://www.harrods.com/product/lifestyle-lady-fur-trim-ski-helmet/kask/000000000004567037


And this keeps you warmer

http://www.harrods.com/product/may-t-ski-jacket/bogner/000000000004273369

Holy vomitworthy extravagance, Batman.

CommuteTooFar

  • Inadequate Randonneur
Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #438 on: 23 January, 2015, 05:40:20 pm »
I am going next Friday.  At the moment Alpe d'Huez and other French resorts appear to be 2/3 open. With the awkward black and some reds remaining closed. If it was just Alpe d'Huez, I would just shrug and assume they were conserving pistes for half term. Still some more snow at the end of next week might be enough to open some more runs and lifts.

Feanor

  • It's mostly downhill from here.
Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #439 on: 23 January, 2015, 06:50:44 pm »
Alpe d'Huez

<shudder>

It must be over 20 years since I were there, but it didn't end well.
Sitting in a mountain restaurant one day at lunchtime, I laughed at how some ski tracks appeared to go over the towering cliffs above.
Next day, I managed to ski over the same cliff myself.

Dislocated hip.
Hellichopper off the mountain to Grenoble.
Week in Grenoble hospital ( wine with dinner).
Air Ambulance back to Aberdeen.
6 weeks in traction in ARI (no wine with dinner).

My companions came to visit in the Grenoble hospital ( a difficult-to-arrange trip from resort ); and were set the task of finding all my kit that had been stripped off me before they relocated my hip.   They were to be found wandering about the corridors of Grenoble hospital chanting "Ou est les vetements de monsueir Lowe?"

Heigh-ho.


CommuteTooFar

  • Inadequate Randonneur
Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #440 on: 25 January, 2015, 11:26:58 am »
My worry now,  Will I be able to get to the resort?  Grenoble airport, should be OK. The transfer should be OK as far as Bourg d'Oisans where every follower of the tdf knows a left turn is made and the cyclists climb and climb and climb.  The current snow forescast is heavy snow Thursday, heavy snow Friday, heavy snow Saturday. Possible as much as a metre of new fresh powder. Great for the pistes but a problem for the well known road.

I have been up that road when it started to snow. About two thirds up we pulled over and put our snow chains on the Car.  Other cars were sliding all over the place at the famous hairpins. I believe my local, therefore experienced and adapted,  transfer bus will be able to cope with quite severe weather but there will be a load of brits and other low lying northern europeans who believe the toughest part of the journey would be finding their way around Paris.   Some of them think their Chelsea Tractor is secure, but surely not with general purpose off road and town tyres. A heavy car like that needs Winter tyres and chains.

Mrs Pingu

  • Who ate all the pies? Me
    • Twitter
Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #441 on: 25 January, 2015, 12:43:48 pm »
Given that there was snow forecast for most of last week and we saw barely a flake I wouldn't worry about it until it actually happens!
Do not clench. It only makes it worse.

Pingu

  • Put away those fiery biscuits!
  • Mrs Pingu's domestique
    • the Igloo
Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #442 on: 25 January, 2015, 08:50:10 pm »
Got back from 3 Vallées last night. Just as well it snowed on the day we arrived, it was getting quite icy towards the end. Still, we managed to find some good skiing and plenty of good noms   :thumbsup:

Pics here:



GPS tracks:

http://ridewithgps.com/trips/4017404
http://ridewithgps.com/trips/4017403
http://ridewithgps.com/trips/4017402
http://ridewithgps.com/trips/4017401
http://ridewithgps.com/trips/4017399

Jakob

Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #443 on: 01 February, 2015, 05:42:29 am »
Still no snow :(

Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #444 on: 03 February, 2015, 11:19:00 pm »
Whoops. Just started finding stuff to pack and it turns out the foam on my goggles has perished. I work till I leave  :facepalm:

I could order something online but then I risk something that doesn't fit my face. I'm hoping parents have a spare set (I expect so, my stepdad took 14 hats for a 7 day trip a couple years ago, he loves kit and accessories).
Miles cycled 2014 = 3551.5 (Target 7300 :()
Miles cycled 2013 = 6141.4
Miles cycled 2012 = 4038.1

CommuteTooFar

  • Inadequate Randonneur
Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #445 on: 08 February, 2015, 06:08:22 pm »
Back yesterday from Alpe d'Huez.

Saturday Day 1. Arrive, it starts to snow moderately. Decide to explore town rather than ski a half day.

Sunday Day 2. It is still snowing. Only the lower lifts are running. The first piste indicated my skis need waxing. Around 11pm I am feeling rotten my brother David is sick so Martin and I call it a day unless conditions improve which they did not. Explored the lower town with a bike clothing shop (selling Rapha). Roads are looking white and difficult or impossible to drive on. In the evening I discover I am well off. In the Pyrenees they got two metres in the resort and four metres high up. That is more than the height of most skis lifts. I assume nobody will be would be skiing there even if they managed to get in.

Monday Day 3. Great conditions. I discover that walking from the centre of town to the piste in my newish ski boots was not a good thing. After the first lift I announce can not continue and returned to town looking for blister plasters. I am parted from my brothers, so I ski around in the green run bowl of Alpe d'Huez. In the afternoon back with my brothers I arrive at the top of Marmotte 2. Look at the information sign "Sarrenne open piste prepared flat." I take the lift and Sarrenne  is flat as decribed not the immense mogul field I remember.   

Tuesday Day 4. Tunnel is open now. The start of Tunnel you must traverse across the piste before turning onto it.  This is a must ski single icy narrow track. No control just do it. The fencing on the low side indicated some people did not manage it.  A drop onto the piste then steep deep snow, brilliant.

Wednesday Day 5. Ski over to Oz lose my brother David in the mist. In the afternoon reunited we discover piste La Balme is now open. This marked Black rather than being a fiendish Red ten years ago.  Another unbashed piste just opened. When I first encountered this Red for the first time I could not ski it. The Black has far more challenging conditions to enjoy but I have developed and skied it without difficulty although some others were struggling. People who know it lose height all the time. The less wary skiers traverse across the curve and find themselves on top of a giant steep wall. I remembered it and turned it into an unbashed red and watched some others above me turn it into the darkest of Black runs. This is really is a black as they have reclassified it.

Thursday Day 6. Ski over to Auris a huge mistake. The valley mist is getting worse.  Really opaque, I can not see from post to post so some unscheduled off piste. Thankfully I am on safe blue. I can hear the nearby lift but I cannot see it. I get close enough to avoid one wrong lift but take another wrong one and ski back to the same place. This time I get it right and escape back to the Alpe. I give up the Afternoon lunchtime when the building opposite my apartment disappeared. I read my book. My brothers told me this was mistake it is possible  to get above the problem.

Friday Last day. The mist is still with us so skiing down to Auris, Villard, Oz or Vaujany are out of the question. The whole domaine of skiers are compressed into Alpe d'Huez with depressing queues at all the lifts. After lunch we get onto the Vaujany Alpette-Rousses cable car which was very quiet then skied down to the Pic Blanc cable car.  It is still lunch time so six of us got into cabin and waited half an hour for enough people to arrive. Most cable cars are very expensive to run so they wait for a quota or some arbitrary time like 30 minutes before they will run. Off we go then just before the arrive the cabin shudders to a halt swinging violently. I assume it was too windy to enter the station. So I hang around at 3300m for another twenty minutes. Eventually we reach the top and decide Tunnel not Sarrenne. The long Sarrenne piste would take us down into the fog. Through the tunnel the exit has soft snow on the traverse so that was very easy.  Drop onto the piste. I was expecting huge moguls but got mostly flat grippy snow. So the steepness did not matter another emasculated black. I assume they flattened it to preserve it. So I have skied Sarrene and Tunnel two proper blacks with their teeth pulled. Lunchtime is over and the queues are back. At three O'clock I have had enough of queuing at the bottom of the high lift series and leave my brothers and had a great time by myself using the lightly used single drags on the Signal hill. I discover the biggest moguls on, the unbashed since the beginning of the week, Signal Red. So I skied every Signal and Petit Prince piste and finished happy.

Overall a good trip.  Despite the big snow fall the previous weekend there was still not enough snow to open everything or too high an avalanche risk in others. I skied in snow conditions that are very rare in the big resorts at the beginning of the week. Deep fresh snow, new tracks on piste. I know I have skied down Creux blue Tignes in knee high powder. Through waist high powder in Les Arcs at the bottom of Refuge black.(Second pass all gone). Sunday was one of my best ski days.  The end of the week was spoiled by queues. I have grown accustomed to small queues since the ancient three seaters and single drags have been replaced by various magnificent machine with huge uplift. Marmottes 1 and the  older DMC (I know its slow like DMC everywhere) are bigish lifts that could not cope. French half term starts this week so it will be worse I should stop moaning.                       

CommuteTooFar

  • Inadequate Randonneur
Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #446 on: 17 February, 2015, 09:08:27 pm »
I have decided to look after my own skis and not rely on the shops.
Please feel free to contradict my opinions.

1. In resort if I just hand over my skis to a small random resort shop to wax my skis over night.  They will slap the cheapest new wax on top the old dirty wax without thorough cleaning.  I read someone saying that is what they do.  It seems to me that is all they can do. A proper job takes too long when they have a lot of skis to do.  The big shops/chains/resort just hand the skis over to their giant ski processing machine, great for when hundreds of hire skis but not for my personal ski.

2. If I hand it over to my local shops for a 'full service' (~£35) they are too happy to grind to remove problems on the base. This shortens the life of the skis and the ability of the base to take up wax because there is less of it. This was certainly the case with the shop I used to use.

3. I will learn a rewarding skill my doing it myself. I might be capable doing a better job myself. For example when I build a bike I use thread locks and other assembly compounds that the LBS only does on command.

4. After the initial outlay on tools I will start to save money. It seems to me this obvious. A youtube waxing tutorial suggested that I might get as many as ten pairs of skis waxed from a single 180g bar of wax. Looking at a Fischer demonstration the skilled race tuner hot scraped three times to clean the ski. I only expect to hot scrape once so I might expect to do my skis four or five times from a 12 euro bar of wax. It costs me 10/15 euro to get a shop to do it. 

So far I have just bought a Swix wax kit (www.xspo.de/artikel/swix-wax-set-alpin-8-teilig.html) and a ski vice (www.xspo.de/artikel/swix-t149-50-world-cup-skihalterung.html) (a long time to get my money back). My ski does not need edges done for my late March trip (maybe in the first hour of the morning). I will look at edge maintenance and base repair in the Autumn for next season.

For my mid-March trip I plan to use my Swix CH8 red hydrocarbon wax from the kit for -4 to +1. Or should I ignore it, use it as a cleaning wax and use a universal wax?

What wax do you use?
Swix and Toko seem a little pricey to me. Is is there any problem using the lesser known makes? I am only a recreational skiing and have no interest in the high fluro waxes.


Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #447 on: 17 February, 2015, 09:58:33 pm »
congratulations, you will enjoy it. The good thing is that once you have made the outlay, you no longer have to splash out so each time you use it, it feels like you are saving. And, as you say, you look after them much better.

I use Dominator wax as sold by Jon http://www.jonsskituning.co.uk/component/page,shop.browse/category_id,10/option,com_virtuemart/Itemid,1/ - the universal is excellent for general fun use, you will find that you schuss that little bit more than others, it's quite fun. I tend to use that and the Toko universal, of the two the Dominator seems better in most conditions.

I also use the purple base renew to store them. Then come the new season a quick hot scrape does the job before slapping on the universal.

Oddly, your kit doesn't seem to have a brush, something you will need.

Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #448 on: 17 February, 2015, 10:03:24 pm »
Forgot to add, the one thing you will have to get used to is not putting too much wax on, that way not only it take longer to scrape off but you use more than you have to. Having a proper iron helps, set the temp, keep it moving, add more if you have to.

CommuteTooFar

  • Inadequate Randonneur
Re: The Ski Locker thread
« Reply #449 on: 18 February, 2015, 10:21:50 am »
I use Dominator wax as sold by Jon
Yes I looked at the "Piste Office" website.
Quote
Oddly, your kit doesn't seem to have a brush, something you will need.
The kit came with an "all purpose" nylon brush.  I added a bronze brush with the vice order. I should get a horse hair brush to complete the set. The annoying thing was the 8 piece kit counted the box as one of the pieces. The base cleaner may not have much use.  The majority of videos I watched suggested the base cleaner should only be used in exceptional circumstances. Jon wrote that it's good for cleaning your tools do not use it on your skis.
Quote
Having a proper iron helps, set the temp, keep it moving, add more if you have to.
Yes the kit came with a ski wax iron, Swix T76. Bottom of the range but probably good enough. I worked out a proper iron should make things a lot easier.  Adjustable to ski was melting points mine are between 120oC and 135oC. I read Ski bases melt around 150oC but googling UHDPE I found 135oC. Clothes ironing is done at temperatures from 130-230oC so I thought it best to avoid them.