Thread: Heat Molding the Tecnica Cochise/Bodacicuous Shells - great results

I tried heat molding the new Tecnica plastic. It actually works incredibly well, i was able to achieve pretty good shell movement both snugging in a few places and pushing out in a few others.

read about the details etc over at blister:
http://blistergearreview.com/gear-re...odacious-boots

i am very happy with the results.

The Cochise shell is plenty wide enough for my foot, so I won't need to do this. But I'm curious: if you were doing this with a new pair of unmolded Intuitions, would you try to do the liner first and the shell afterwards? That makes the most sense to me.

Also: I hate to be jerk, but you might want to fix your spelling of "Bodacious" in the title so people can find this thread with a search.

Nice report. Sounds pretty promising.

I had enough trouble heat molding my liners, though, so I'm not sure i'd be brave enough to try it with these boots if I ever get my hands on a pair.

Very brave my friend. Kudos

We had used a similar method on brand new tele boots to loosen/break in the bellows several years ago.

I use that on lots of race boots, or any boot that people need some more room in. Works well.

Originally Posted by auvgeek

Also: I hate to be jerk, but you might want to fix your spelling of "Bodacious" in the title so people can find this thread with a search.

not jerky at all! good catch, and updated. thanks.

also, i would FOR SURE mold liners first and ski in the boots at least 10 days before looking to modify any shell.

What if you tried to replicate the fischer pressure bags in a ghetto way, and put wrapped an air splint around the warm boot? The pressure might not be enough, but maybe it could help in a small way.

Marshal,

The Cochise plastic is different from the Bodacious plastic.

That said, I will be heating mine latter today. Will report back when I get a chance.

Marshal Olson for the motherfucking win, AGAIN.

Originally Posted by XavierD

Marshal,

The Cochise plastic is different from the Bodacious plastic.

That said, I will be heating mine latter today. Will report back when I get a chance.

Bodacious plastic is thicker and is a different color but it's the same type of plastic, TRIAX, as the Cochise and the Bushwacker.

I am pretty sure it is different (what I was told by tecnica).

Originally Posted by XavierD

I am pretty sure it is different (what I was told by tecnica).

Tecnica's new Triax plastic is used in both models.

The person from Tecnica who told you otherwise is mistaking.

It is the same plastic

Good to know, Molded my Cochises today, toe caps, no padding. Good results.

I heard this can warp the sole? Is that BS?

Originally Posted by TheDon

I heard this can warp the sole? Is that BS?

depends on the boot. i did not warp the bodacious lower. i tested it compared to a cochise and a titan. straight as an arrow. YMMV.

i also tried this on a titan with minimal effect, but no warping there either.

Originally Posted by TheDon

I heard this can warp the sole? Is that BS?

I cooked mine in a (salomon?) oven, with no problems. Keep the boot on a flat surface, with weight balanced , and don't walk on it.

I've been doing this since about 2006 when I fit all my shells and liners. I started doing it when I got my first ZipFit liners. Back then Sven was not yet evangelizing the steaming method for heating the boot shells. In fact the first time I had it done it was in the Superior shop at Snowbird and Steve Bagley used the typical boot convection oven to heat my shells and liners. This was for a pair of the first year Kryptons and I noticed that the plastic actually adjusted to the shape of my foot and liner (and without jumping in ice cold water directly afterwards).

Since then I've done all my ZipFit and Intuition liner fittings along with heating the shells for 5 minutes at 250* in a conventional oven. This has been done mostly on Flexon/Full Tilt shells and Head Raptors. In fact, I got even more aggressive on a Head Raptor B3 RD (95mm last) and did 10 minutes at 250* and got great results.

I would be surprised if most boot plastics were unable to handle this. I've always used caution on buckle tension and stood on a flat wood floor to avoid sole warping. I see that someone already provided a warning about the buckles in the comments on the article. Depending on how soft the plastic gets it may be possible to yank out a buckle (it's never happened to me though).

This thread is TGR Tech Talk Awesomeness. Thanks marshalolson for the great info.

Originally Posted by Wild4umlauts

r 5 minutes at 250* in a conventional oven. This has been done mostly on Flexon/Full Tilt shells and Head Raptors. In fact, I got even more aggressive on a Head Raptor B3 RD (95mm last) and did 10 minutes at 250* and got great results.

this is the rub with convection ovens. you do not want to get the plastic itself much above 212 degrees. you have control over the air temperature, but unless you used a digital laser thermometer, it is very hard to control the temperature of the plastic itself.

it should also be noted that the tecnica triax plastic is less dense than a normal PU shell material (full tilt). a plug boot is both much thicker and generally denser. so you need less heat than PU shell, and triax will be more prone to twisting at very high heat (250F) IMO... ie. if you actually got the triax plastic itself to 250F, i would wager you would burn/melt the material, and defiantly deform it... just based on my experience at 212F.

finally, the other problem with convection ovens is that you are heating the external plastic inwards. steaming a shell heats from the inside outwards, which means you need less heat and temperature to get the side of the shell that contacts your foot to move.

I cooked mine for 6 1/2min in a standard boot convection oven. I would cook them for 7-8 min next time, again keeping an eye on plastic temp (lazier thermometer).

For those of you keeping the stock liner, I cooked mine for 6 minutes with good results. If you do any shell modifications, I would hit the liners with some heat, if your cooking the shells. I would use a heat gun on problem areas of the liner (for me this was ankle/Achilles, and instep).

Cooking the liners really helped open the ankle for me and allowed my foot back into the boot.

Edit*. By cooking I mean putting in a convection oven.

nice feedback man.

way interested to hear other experiances with different methods.

Bumping this thread. After spending some time in the shop today trying to get my bro fit for some alpine boots, I'm starting to suspect that I should have gone with the 26.5 Cochise. The fit is decent now, but I suspect as the intuition liners pack out, I'll have some undesirable extra space. Any idea if I could potentially get a tighter fit using this method?

Definitely looking to upgrade to the Cochise Pro next season...

tighter in length? where do you need the shell tighter? how big of a gap do you have in the shell-fit behind your heel?

how many days on them so far?

Nah, tighter in width. I know the boot won't get shorter (be nice though, haha). And I'll definitely need to ski them more before I try anything. (Recovering from a hamstring issue, so use has been really light.)

But rethinking this, I'm probably going to sell them at the end of the season, it might not be the best idea to mold the shell. Any idea when the Cochise Pro will be available to the public, btw?

But the real reason for posting...I spent the day in the shop, haven't been able to ski in a while, and the snow is looking pretty slim to boot. It's a serious case of cabin fever - been rethinking every piece of gear I bought this season. I I love thinking and talking about gear, but now I'm even starting to get on my own nerves. Thanks for the reply though.