Another thread on XT130 Freetours got me to thinking about running them in ISO 5355 (alpine) bindings. For me, that would be for ski demos, and doing this could result in a big hit on my bank account by further enabling my gear whore propensities
I was surprised at how close the toe height is between the two standards. Only .106" separates the two.
To measure this, I pulled the sole blocks off of my 2016/2017 XT 130 Freetours (last season's boots) and measured the sole clearance in my Pivot 14 WTR bindings - in both WTR and 5355 (alpine) mode. I stacked business cards to create a feeler gauge and measured the results.
So, if you absolutely must run your Freetours with alpine binders, you could grind off .106" and be good to go. I wouldn't do this with my only pair of sole blocks, however - for obvious reasons
I don't have a copy of the ISO 5355 standard (does anyone know how get one without paying?), so one caveat is the fore/aft location of the flat, AFD section on the boot - whether it lines up with the AFD on a 5355 binding.
... Thom
Bookmarks