Katana 108 - the resurrerection

[GHILL28]

Ha,I guess I should’ve (de)tuned them before deciding they weren’t for me? Glad they are working for you now.

Ah that's right, they were yours. I think we were dealing via text and I forgot what the TGR handle was.

The binding mounting ended up with true center closer to +1 than on the rec line with the heel plate being moved, so I may think about re-mounting them again at some point if there's adequate space between the hole edges. Not sure yet. The edge tuning was the main thing so they do smear around consistently on steep bumpy stuff between the trees really well now, but then want to be going mach 10 on the open choppy stuff too. Neat skis.

[Bandit Man]

Bandit man - where do you have yours mounted. I love my 102s so much thinking about picking these up (184 as well) but would probably want to mount a cm or two forward.

I’m on the rear line for all my recent Volkls, and I’m only in a 295-mm BSL. I like driving the shovels and with that large sweet spot, it feels perfect for 184’s.

On the topic of hooky K108’s, as has been shared, it’s all about detuning. My K108’s are soooo easy to slide the tails around, especially when scrubbing speed above 50-mph and coming to a quick stop. Might be the easiest ski I have to perform this maneuver on.

Also, I’ll admit that the long-ish rocker but minimal splay might give some pause on how aggressive to get with detuning. It was a progression for me, but I feel like detuning really allows the 3D sidecut to shine, especially in heavy, dense snow.

[Beder]

Another Katana in the wild.
6 inches new on top of variable yesterday at Targhee. Leftovers today and tomorrow should be another powder day. For the second season Katana goes along on western road trips.





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[klauss]

Just mounted these up for a buddy. Quite envious. Good thing we have the same BSL.

I told him to get the 192 dynastar m-free 108s a few years ago and he went 182 instead and was under-gunned. I reckon these 184s I recommended will do the trick and open his eyes.

[swissbro]

Spent the morning skiing 14” of untracked dense two layer powder with my 184 Katanas mounted on the back line for bsl 305. No tip dive and able to make any turn shape without effort as long as you keep some forward pressure on them. Smooth as silk and nimble if you want them to be. I thought my Revolt 114s were better. They’re not.


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[Bandit Man]

Spent the morning skiing 14” of untracked dense two layer powder with my 184 Katanas mounted on the back line for bsl 305. No tip dive and able to make any turn shape without effort as long as you keep some forward pressure on them. Smooth as silk and nimble if you want them to be. I thought my Revolt 114s were better. They’re not.


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Interesting take, especially given you’ve skied the Revolt 114. K108’s are surprisingly good in pow and stellar in the leftovers.

[rod9301]

Is anyone skiing these mounted at +2? I have been obliged to mount an old pair of 184s here due to hole conflict.


Currently not enjoying them much. The skis don't feel particularly balanced and. to my mind, there is too much tail and not enough tip. I generally prefer skis mounted -11-12 cm from the true centre (Cochise 106 and MX 98 are my main skis).

I mounted mine first at +2 and they keep diving in powder. Went to back line and they ski great in powder and everywhere else.

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[Robik]

Interesting take, especially given you’ve skied the Revolt 114. K108’s are surprisingly good in pow and stellar in the leftovers.

I rediscovered K108 for myself today. Not sure what Solitude reported today but caught afternoon rope drop in Honeycomb after 3 days of snow and man these rip pow. Usually for these conditions I would grab BMT 122 or Revolt 121 but today I didn't expect any significant accumulations and K108 didn't disappoint. They definitely don't float and smear like those mentioned above but I didn't notice any tip dive as long as they had some speed (I'm on 191, mounted at +5mm from the rear line). But they get even better once stuff is tracked out. Pure stability.

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[GHILL28]

4 days at Alyeska on beat up conditions with no fresh snow since the prior week. Saddest thing ever. These things are psycho fast on the groomers, holy hell. Very composed and stable and easy to pivot going across the long narrow traverse lines much faster than I should have been.

The places where I noticed some issues were steep bumpy refrozen terrain (really hard conditions) and heavy chopped up cement. The hard bumps were taking me for a bit of a ride and more speed wasn't bringing them into more composure, and I was having a difficult time getting the tails to release in the cement stuff. This might have to do with the +1 mounting. Or the pilot. I noticed I would end up in the backseat a bit on the exit of really steep bumpy soft terrain turns (occasionally). That may be more on me.

There's one chute up there where you have to smear down through a crack for a ways. Skis were happy as can be sliding sideways down over chalky bumps.

[GHILL28]

I picked up a 2nd set of 184's to try to mount some demo bindings to (in the hope that the previous drillings will work for some demo bindings I have kicking around). Reading through here it sounds like most people with the 184's are ending up back at the line after experimenting with forward mounts. I don't think I'll have quite enough room to re-mount my current ones since they're more like +0.75.

[roQer]

Is there any noticeable difference between the 22/23 model and the 21/22? On soothski, it looks like there is, for example in the straight pull tape length measurement.

[Bandit Man]

Is there any noticeable difference between the 22/23 model and the 21/22? On soothski, it looks like there is, for example in the straight pull tape length measurement.

I have the 20-21 184 (black and yellow) and just bought a backup pair of 2023 184’s. They have the same straight pull length.

[GHILL28]

Same thing here. Have the yellow ones and new darker colored ones and they're dimensionally the same.