Anyone DIY their own thermoformable foam ski boot liners?

[swissiphic]

Perfectly content with my Intuition Luxury HV liners but wanna experiment with a different tongue and shaft shape so i'm still perfectly content but even more so.

Have a bunch of old garmont and intuition beat to shit liners to experiment on but eventually i'm thinkin it would be cool to build up a full pair from scratch. I have a few sheets of foam from way back in the day.

Has anyone done the deed? Is it a fool's errand?

My theory is use super thick foam, don't worry about precise shaping, and let a mondo heat bake shrink the volume where required. Seemed to work really good on what i initially thought was a wrecked liner due to way too much heat, but in the end blessing in disguise, shrunk foam where required and foam got denser for more high performance skiing for my right foot.

Beyond the shaping, curious if there's any ghetto method of connecting the pieces..was thinking shoe goo and hold the parts together with duct tape until dry/cured.

Anyone have any thoughts/opinions?

[mntlion]

fun project, let me know how it all goes?

IIntuition also MIGHT make you a full custom if you ask nice?

[XXX-er]

I was going to learn guitar, take singing lessons and get some recording software for my LT... Instead I just down loaded some music

[swissiphic]

I was going to learn guitar, take singing lessons and get some recording software for my LT... Instead I just down loaded some music

Thanks for the detailed tech tips regarding diying yer own ski boot liners. Might as well end the thread, all my questions have been answered.

[Toddball]

Beyond the shaping, curious if there's any ghetto method of connecting the pieces..was thinking shoe goo and hold the parts together with duct tape until dry/cured.

1. cut up an old liner to figure out how many pieces there are and how they're shaped
2. cut shapes out of new foam
3. get a thicc needle and poke holes around the perimeter of every piece where it needs to connect with another piece; maybe you'll need a nail and maybe you'll need to heat it up to get clean holes
4. loosely lace a lace through the holes between two pieces, like you're suturing someone's forehead and they were nice enough to poke holes for your thread
5. pull that lace tight and tie off

Inspiration from the OG soft-sole shoe sew-ers

Or, just use Shoe Goo, that stuff is pretty cool.

[swissiphic]

Thanx Toddball;

Tips #1 and 2; awesome, great idea. will employ.

Stitching would certainly be the more refined/bomber and 'factory' way to go about this...but...i'm still traumatized from the experience of performing an extensive ski skin mod/repair using the needle and thread over a decade ago.

Just googled glue gun spec stuff...I didn't realize it but I have a high temp unit... It sez the glue melts at 375 to 450 degrees F....soooo, considering the bake temp of the Intuition foam is around what 240-250ish degrees F, that might be an easier way to go about it and get instant results....from a starting point just eyeball it and incrementally bond sections. Give 'er a go on some test pieces and see how it holds.

[XXX-er]

Isn't the Intuition foam is proprietary, can you even get it?

If you can't here is a game changing idea for a heat moldable material

[swissiphic]

Isn't the Intuition foam is proprietary, can you even get it?

Dunno. Have a few pieces of sheets kicking around from 1995 from a previous heliski tech gig. Lost for years until found after a basement clean up during the summer.

Previous uses include;

1. little piece molded to the small of my back as part of an adjustable lower lumbar support project for my regular bike seat. Was interesting to note how much more power i had on both hills and seated power during intervals/sprints.

2. thermal buffer for hot pizza plate when eating reclined on the couch.

[XXX-er]

hot pizza might work in this app, or vary the size and variety of apple chunks to fine tune boot feel!

[swissiphic]

So, after a few days of sitting and staring at my boots and liners, finally figured out all the little design details that I wanted to incorporate into the new liner design. This after many years of a steamy, redlining brain visualizing what might work during countless ski touring sessions.

Over the years, I've learned quite a bit from ideas presented over at The Skier's Manifesto. In somewhat modified form, i'm testing out some of the principles in this project.

Presently on a road trip and was too cheap to buy new blue foam so hacked up my car camping mattress for the first rough draft "not yet a prototype' model. Gonna have to dissemble liner and tape the puzzle pieces back into the mothership to continue life on the road... Hopefully construct something that's skiable.with the good foam when I get home.

Design goals:

1. Swissiphically ski touring boot oriented liner to fit and work in perfect synergy with my modded for more progressive and damped forward flex Dynafit Vulcans.
2. Allow for maximum forefoot metatarsal spread.
3. Target a more effective instep vertical pressure fit tension than present lower tongue/foot portion of liners afford.
4. Design a 2/3rds circumference wrap of the upper liner tongue to enhance forward and lateral shin bone/lower leg driven edging and turn pressure and prevent the typical '1/4 to 1/3' circumference lower leg wrap of the tongue from micro and macro lateral shifting during both dh skiing and uphill touring.
5. Separate tongue from foot section of liner to promote free hinging ankle glide path motion while dh skiing and maximum resistance free forward ROM while touring and summer ski approach/deproach hiking/scrambling.
6. Employ a 1/3rds circumference wrap of rear cuff area pad that is freely hinged above heel to provide for maximum rearward boot ROM while in touring mode and summer approach/deproach hiking/scrambling.
7. To secure the tongue and rear cuff foam to boot while skiing/touring/hiking, attach vecro pads to optimum contact points on shells/liners (work still in progress trynna figure that stuff out)
8. Design forefoot/instep of liner to allow for easy foot insertion with liner in shell. Based on the lateral open clamshell design, this might work...unconfirmed.
9. To promote effective ankle area lock in ankle/heel pocket, design tongue with lateral tabs that extend as 'wing's' rearward with thicker padding to fill the gap due to very skinny lower leg area. (work in progress, not optimized in first proto/rough model in pics.)
10. Ensure cold feet with numerous uninsulated areas in liner design. Based on previous experience cutting huge holes in my liners to alleviate pressure points and cutting a full length lateral slot on outside of forefoot area, I found that feet actually stay warm without a fully enclosed liner, within reason. Minus 5, no problemo, minus 20? ice blocks for feet. Not too worried about the area above ankle...never found shin/calves to get cold even when hiking in cold temps in hiking boots with minimal insulation on lower legs so, can't see it being any different with ski boots. As long as the foot proper stays warm, good to go. Work in progress; might have to redesign or have to incorporate an additional heat source.
11. Ensure easy insertion/removal of foot portion of liner by using pantyhose for friction free re and re.

Pics of the first rough model, not even in proto stage yet:










Taped the sections together to show how they should fit together when inserted into shell and shell buckled snuggly for dh skiing.

[steved]

Fwiw...I've always had good success with a tongue transplant. Toddball!....using small nails, great stuff man!
Anykind of rugged glue added to a tough sew-job ...AFAIK would work...remembering to limit the build-up of material in that base-of-the-tongue area...if your mets bring some elevation.
If there's a liner that can work I'd simply go ahead and buy another liner..if you have a favorite tongue already who cares about how good the new liner's tongue is....I've simply purchased additional liners or boots and then sold the shell.

[swissiphic]

Fwiw...I've always had good success with a tongue transplant. Toddball!....using small nails, great stuff man!
Anykind of rugged glue added to a tough sew-job ...AFAIK would work...remembering to limit the build-up of material in that base-of-the-tongue area...if your mets bring some elevation.
If there's a liner that can work I'd simply go ahead and buy another liner..if you have a favorite tongue already who cares about how good the new liner's tongue is....I've simply purchased additional liners or boots and then sold the shell.

Tongue gafting sounds fun! But I wanna try eliminating the full length tongue. Gonna try one piece of foam over instep/forefoot separated from the cuff area tongue. Wanna maximize the ankle glide path in dh skiing and uphill touring ROM.