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Thread: Plum guide tech binding
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05-29-2014, 09:44 AM #1101Registered User
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I would have just replaced them with dynafit toe pieces, the steel is less likely to break and dynafit toes would cost less
shit happens ehLee Lau - xxx-er is the laziest Asian canuck I know
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05-29-2014, 10:01 AM #1102
Both uphill toe pieces broke from the same "impact" of me slarving a turn in 25cm of pow onto a firmish traverse track where the snow had been compacted by skiers. I wasn't going that fast and there was no air involved.
Until then they had inspired nothing but confidence to ski relatively aggressively in them. I didn't ski them like a 916 but I trusted them with small airs and moderate to fast speeds in most snow conditons. They were on Lotus 120s.
Initially I replaced the toes with speed radical toes. Then I bought a new PLUM Guide to put on another ski before I realized that shipping and the wire to France would add $80USD to the price.
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05-29-2014, 11:13 AM #1103Gel-powered Tech bindings
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Eek!
Glad that you're still okay (or at least okay enough to type on a computer).
We've all seen some other Plum toe wing breakages, but something about simultaneous breakage on both toe pieces is really scary.
(And although technically it may have been out of warranty, I'm surprised they didn't offer to replace the toe units for free or at a nominal price given the catastrophically dangerous nature of the failure.)Mo' skimo here: NE Rando Race Series
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05-29-2014, 11:28 AM #1104Gel-powered Tech bindings
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So in defense of Plum, I (being only 145lb, and no airtime) have:
- Guide @~120' vert (mainly Manaslu, then swapped to Logic-X)
- Race 165 @~163' vert (Hagan Cirrus)
- Race 135 @~270' vert (Movement Fish-X)
- Race 165 @~116' vert (remounted to Fish-X for shorter bsl of new race boots)
- ISMF-prohibited Speed/Classic toe + Plum 135 heel @~184' vert (remounted onto Trab Duo Sint Aero for its final yrs)
Only problems have been the usual notching of the Ti heel pins on the 135 heel units, and a gradually emerging problem with the Guide toe lever not wanting to stay in the ski position. The former problem will be fixed eventually with replacement heel pins, and the latter problem was fixed with new toe levers from Ian at a very reasonable price.Mo' skimo here: NE Rando Race Series
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05-29-2014, 04:26 PM #1105
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05-29-2014, 06:25 PM #1106not awesome
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I don't have any experience with Plums, but have looked at a number of pictures of broken aluminum and steel bike parts and handled some myself (including my own broken rear axles and pedal spindle - never broke a crank though). It would be interesting to see some closeup pictures of the fracture surface on a Plum toepiece. Shasti's last picture comes close, but need a more face-on picture of the surface and sharper focus.
The reason for asking (just curiosity) is that often a part will develop a crack that propagates through loading cycles, and final breakage occurs when the remaining uncracked cross-section is small enough that it snaps under a seemingly normal load. The straw that breaks the camel's back. The break surface often shows light and dark parts, or scalloped features as the crack propagated, then a rough surface on the part that finally broke under load. There's some good pictures here: http://materials.open.ac.uk/mem/mem_ccf4.htm. Not that this prescribes a solution, but it might be interesting to understand what is happening.
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11-25-2014, 12:03 PM #1107Plum Guide exploder
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So, after getting my replacement toe pieces from Plum this summer, I decided to take them for a test run at Copper yesterday. I was cruising down a blue in some powder on the side of the run,when my ski gave out. I bailed, and went to put the ski back on, when I found that the heel had exploded. I had checked to make sure none of the screws were loose when I mounted the replacement toe pieces too. Maybe the plastic was brittle from the cold? I have no idea what happened! Being early season, it's not like I was pushing the limits on an in-bounds blue run....
I dug around in the snow a bit to try to find the broken piece, but couldn't find it...
The new forum rules seem to be blocking me from posting links or pictures. Can a mod update this post with them for me? Basically the pictures show a completely blown out plastic layer, ripped nearly the whole length of the heel block.
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11-26-2014, 09:34 AM #1108Plum Guide exploder
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//picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/7h7W9qTZS3kpMho-r_XheBIPMgAyWvisHd7oAMNTD8s?feat=directlink
//picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/_ljv-6OIAmoiaBWDF4s_ytz5VuWaynTbFb5GETIjgVU?feat=direct link
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11-26-2014, 11:32 AM #1109
wow.. now that is a failure! I'd suspect that is one of a kind. Do the fractographic marks provide any insight into starting location?
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11-27-2014, 01:52 AM #1110Registered User
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Holy f***!
Please report back if Plum comments. I have - knock on wood - had zero issues with my 11/12 guides til this date.
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11-27-2014, 09:56 AM #1111
That's pretty impressive. 2.5 seasons with three iterations of Guides and no problems, and I haven't heard of a heel housing failure like that either.
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11-27-2014, 01:19 PM #1112Registered User
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Check http://www.escaperoute.ca/
Notta plum to be found...
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11-27-2014, 01:36 PM #1113
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11-27-2014, 04:34 PM #1114
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11-28-2014, 12:31 AM #1115
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12-01-2014, 08:26 AM #1116Plum Guide exploder
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I looked closer at the broken heel and can't tell exactly what happened, but if I were to have to guess, It looks like it started near the pin side of the heel post and then spread down and back from there.
I haven't gotten any sort of response from Plum yet. I'll keep this thread updated when/if I do hear anything.
Now I'm contemplating on the kingpin or the beast. Seems excessive, especially since I'm not a huge guy or ski all that extreme, but I really don't want this to happen to me way back on some mountain and have to post hole miles back to base camp.
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12-01-2014, 12:09 PM #1117not awesome
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The parallel marks at the upper left near the heel pin, maybe also those at top center and at lower right near the RV screw, look like fatigue "beach marks," indicating where a crack started and then propagated under load cycles. The irregular marks at the top rear may have come from the final failure - that may have been the last region to let go during the catastrophic failure. These are are guesses on my part as I'm not a metallurgist, or plasticalurgist.
I would guess that it had already started to crack at least at the upper part near the pin, but it might have been difficult to find that by visual inspection.
For more info on beach marks see for example:
http://pardo.net/bike/pic/fail-009/000.html
http://www.sv.vt.edu/classes/MSE2094...y/fatigue.html
and google "fatigue failure beach mark" and "fatigue failure ratchet mark."
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12-01-2014, 06:31 PM #1118Plum Guide exploder
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More failure pictures
I put the broken bit under a microscope and snagged some pictures with my cell phone. Apologies for the microscope through cell phone pics... Let me know if anyone would like some more shots. I'm not an expert but it sounds like we have a few here.
Last edited by zerkman; 12-02-2014 at 06:55 PM.
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12-02-2014, 06:01 PM #1119
I have posted previously in this thread. I bought Plums in the group buy and have personally witnessed toe pieces disintegrate in La Grave and the middle of the Himalaya--fortunately in both cases either right before, or immediately following, terrain in which failure would most likely have resulted in death. Just learned from a friend in Colorado who had a toe piece failure with a '13 model. I woke up today and realized that this, objectively, is stupid. I bought a pair of dynafits to replace my Plums. I will not be selling the Plums in gear trade, or giving them to any friends, because I do not want to be responsible should a catastrophic failure of these bindings result in that person's death, so they are going in the trash. If you are using these bindings, and skiing them in terrain where a catastrophic failure of your equipment=death... then you obviously can figure it out on your own.
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12-02-2014, 06:20 PM #1120
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12-02-2014, 06:40 PM #1121Plum Guide exploder
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12-02-2014, 07:04 PM #1122
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12-04-2014, 10:18 AM #1123Plum Guide exploder
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After 10 days, Plum did respond to me this morning. It sounds like they're going to have me ship my heel pieces back to the same address in NH were they will then evaluate them for warranty replacement. I sent links to the same pictures I posted in this thread. I asked for their thoughts on the plastic, but it seemed like they responded with a fairly generic response.
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12-05-2014, 05:07 PM #1124
I agree this thread is spooky. I take some small amount of solace (although not much anymore) in the fact that my Plum toes have the black wings, and I know plenty of folks haven't had any issues. Mine have held up so far.
Every failure of the toes on here I've seen is with the old silver wings. Telelebowski, you mentioned you saw a failure of a 2013 model. Did they have the black toe wings?
The heels seem OK now that the screws on top were updated. Zerkman, that failure is crazy but seems one of a kind as far as I can tell reading through this post. Hell I've broken 2 radical heels (the risers - they didn't explode like that plum heel did).
That being said, I would've mounted something else if given the choice now. Radical toes have the forward most holes about 12.5 mm in front of the forward Plum holes. 12.5 mm center to center, for about 8 mm between holes. This should be enough spacing for a re-mount if I choose to go this way, huh?Last edited by whatsupdoc; 12-05-2014 at 05:18 PM.
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12-06-2014, 08:22 AM #1125
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