Bent a ski. You too?

[tuco]

Heat that bitch up real good next session and let it cool under pressure

[Self Jupiter]

My fully cambered park skis developed early rise tail rocker from running grass / rocks, see pics:



Pic #3 is the tail

Other pics to show what it used to look like

[gregorys]

Heat that bitch up real good next session and let it cool under pressure

Suggestions on how to do that?
I don't have a hot-box, and building one of those seems beyond the scope of this project! Alternatively, I was thinking of ironing them a while at somewhat higher temp. Does that sound like a reasonable plan? [However, one would have to move pretty fast, to get it in, clamped and bent, before it cooled quite a lot.]

I suppose, if I'm brave enough, I could iron it while clamped/bent. I'm not sure how I feel about that - there's just a hell of a lot of force there and I'm not super hip on being even closer to the action when something might go sideways!

Thanks for the ideas!

[swissiphic]

Suggestions on how to do that?

Haven't tried but a buddy of mine left his snowboard in a hot sauna for a a while to heat it up real good and bent a different rocker profile into it.

[Doremite]

And building a sauna for this project offers long term benefits.

[billyk]

Maybe use a heavy duty heat gun. Kind of like a blow dryer, but they get a lot hotter.

[billyk]

Maybe use a heavy duty heat gun. Kind of like a blow dryer, but they get a lot hotter.

And if you are concerned that your homemade king size rat trap might go off while you are applying the heat, maybe you use a sheet of plywood as a shield, with holes drilled with a hole saw at strategic points to stick the heat gun through, and other holes that you can look through.

[gregorys]

So, while building a sauna as a side project has a small amount of appeal, I opted for easier, less costly and quicker measures.
I'm rather amazed at the results. [I probably shouldn't be, as I've got substantial experience doing this with carbon/fiberglass skate boots - cooking them to mold them to your foot.]

Anyway - regular clothes iron that I use for waxing. Set a bit cooler than I'd generally use for a universal wax. [If I get a chance, I'll try to get more exact temperatures with an IR temp gun.]

Applied the iron pretty slowly on the bases and then topsheets, alternating every 30 seconds or so. Did this for probably 5m until the ski felt quite warm in the area I wanted to bend. This was a short section, less than 20 cm/10 inches.

Quickly clamped the ski down and applied the hydraulic bottle jack. I put quite a lot of pressure on it, but not as much as I've applied previously.

Results.


Now, it certainly isn't optimal - I need to clamp the ski down more rigidly - and uniformly. There's a section in that bend that has "super-camber." [essentially the ski bends up, behind the edge I'm bending down against, creating that tight arc.] That wasn't a problem in the past, but obviously the expoy softened enough to hold a much more aggressive arc.

But I think with a little more time I can fix that over-bend and return the ski to a place that's really close to the "good" ski.

This is obviously only an intermediate step to the final product - I am just surprised and encouraged at what one might be able to accomplish using this technique. While I'd probably be more wary trying this on a "good" pair of skis to make a shissiphic-worthy mod - it's something that's not beyond the realm of consideration now.

Very cool.

[swissiphic]

Nice work!!!

[gregorys]

So an update on the de-bent Bonafides.

I got a chance to ski them again today. [First day back at MHM.]

The short version is - the de-bend worked, it stays de-bent, and they ski really nicely - easily very equivalent to the pre-bend feel.

I'm obviously not as conditioned as I might be, being it's my first day; But I skied them pretty hard, through some pretty substantial bumps, airs etc. [Took a 6+ foot air to what I thought would be soft, but alas was very hard. I didn't get enough speed, so kind stalled and well - crashed and burned.] But even that wasn't enough to bend the ski. [Bend the de-bend again.]

As noted up-thread, the de-bent ski has a deeper rocker line [early tip rise] - probably a few cm, and a few mm of extra splay. But I wasn't really able to tell a difference. [It wasn't *super* firm most places - so on really firm stuff it might be more noticeable. But trading skis between feet, I wasn't ever feeling like the "fixed" ski was unreliable. For me at least, the ski is really more than good enough for, what's generally, softer NW conditions.

While I obviously wouldn't recommend this procedure as routine ski maintenance - I do think it was successful in salvaging this ski.

Honestly, I'm rather shocked at how nicely it skis now. Can't complain a bit. If you'd asked me to bet money on some outcome, I wouldn't have bet on a positive one. But that's how it turned out.

Sweet!