SunSurfer

There are lots of ways to apply heat to a moldable liner. Some of them are more controlled than others. Having ruined a Deeluxe liner in the past by using too much heat I am now more cautious and opt for as controlled a technique as possible.

Just finished 11 days of riding at Revelstoke. First, a shoutout and thanks to @crackaddictJames Cherry for carving company, a guide to some of Revelstokes best carving runs, some really useful tips to work on in my own riding, and he and his partner Martina's hospitality during my stay. If you don't know James he's a Revelstoke local, an incredibly skilful and experienced rider, has instructed at Montucky CC, and just an all round nice guy. Revelstoke has great trails for carving for all levels of rider, from beginners through to steeps to challenge the most skilled. Some of the groomed slopes on Pitch Black were the steepest I have ever attempted. The Blue rated trails off the upper gondola are ideal for intermediates trying to up their game. There is a shuttle bus between the hotels in town and the resort. Most of the hotels provide free tickets for the shuttle which is otherwise C$4 exact change per ride. There are some pretty reasonably priced hotels, and a good range of places and cuisines to eat at the end of the day. I had a great time and some of the best carving days I've ever had in the groomed days after 20cm fresh. My biggest day was approx. 15.5Km vertical descent (approx. 50k feet). Beware powder days! Every man, his dog, and the dog's fleas arrive to ski it and the gondola queue at the bottom can be incredibly long if you are not in the queue seriously early.

@LateApexTThe EVA foam in heat moldable liners is exquisitely sensitive to temperature, and the foam degasses and collapses at sustained temperatures above 80-90 Celsius, much lower than the temps you are proposing using. Set your oven to approx. 65-70 deg C, or equivalent F, and wait for it to come up to heat. Then put your liner in the oven and wait 15-20 minutes for it to come up to heat. Then complete the rest of the molding process. Liners treated this way will allow you more remoldings before needing replacement. If you are in doubt do some online research about the technical specifications (data sheets) for EVA foams.

@Kurt Swanson& @lafcadio Try driving the knee on the outside of the turn "into the turn". Heelside = rear knee Toeside = front knee In my experience this seems to give better edge hold on steeper slopes and I'm assuming this is because is because it minimises twist in the section of the board between the bindings. See post above for my riding style. YMMV if you ride more heel & toe than I do.

Task for the day. Use the phrase "egregious onesie" in a conversation.

Rider style: + stance, regular, with 67Front and 63Rear and riding with not much initial nose loading transitioning to tail loading in the turn i.e. centred. Learned that stance length can be too LONG as well as too SHORT. 56cm is my Goldilocks spot, 54 too short, 58 too long Longer is good up to a point because it increases my base of support and makes soaking up bumps while carving without being thrown off balance easier. Too long makes it harder for me to effectively put weight/emphasis on the lateral side of my front foot during heelside turns on steeper hardpack. So while the toeside (R) turn bites reliably, the heelside (L) grip is less solid. Get my weight a little more onto that lateral front foot and the heelside edge grip is more solid. 2023 Contra 173 MCC demo board construction damps vibration from lumpy, hard snow. My Thirst Superconductor (built in 2019 or 2020) superconducted much of that same vibration to me. Back to back riding at MCC Day 4. The difference made the lower Main run at Turner stop start on the Thirst and pretty smoothly carve able on the Contra. Postscript after riding with CrackAddict at Revelstoke - Don't let my toeside/outside arm trail when going into a heelside turn. Keep it in front of me a little. Helps with the body angulation and knee drive, giving better grip. Compress more as the slope gets steeper/icier. Work on bending my board more as I enter the new turn. Postscript after August 2023 snowboard trip. Crucial skill for newbie carvers to gain is to maintain their balance on their edge, to tilt the board a little on edge with their knees, ankles, and feet, while keeping the upper body as still as possible. To do so by just putting pressure on that edge with both feet, while feeling their edge through all those nerve endings in the soles of their feet. That way you neither sit on the toilet (heelside), nor pat the dog (toeside). When riding my Kessler 162 slalom board turn @pow4ever "leap of faith" into a fall of faith i.e. tip myself down the fall line and carve the traversing board back underneath my COM to catch myself before I hit the snow. Forward facing pelvis, outside of turn knee drive, and ankle tilt to tip the board even further on edge makes for great grip on firm snow. I will daily commute a long way (376km round trip, 4 and a half to 5 hour drive) for a combination of good grooming, good gradients, and little traffic!

T nut has been provided. The original F2 screw was pretty lightweight metal. No surprise that Shaka managed to bend it. Probably should replace all his screws.

@CoreyII have some spare used T nuts after I replaced mine recently. No screws though. Can bring them to the skating.

Were you carving through lumpy snow or just negotiating your way through on the way to carve able snow? Carving setups are optimised for carving. Tired muscles feel the burn sooner after starting a run than fresh muscles.

@barryjh That is great news.

Sportubes make it hard for even Sydney Australia baggage handlers to trash your stuff. 3 models, I have an orange Series 2.

The torsional resistance of his freeride skis may also be less, and the effective edge considerably shorter due to the rocker at tip and tail. That extreme rocker will also make for a lot of ski "flap" when trying to carve.

Principle: To stay balanced at any time the force vector of gravity, and any other accelerative force, applied to your COM must be over your base of support. When we carve our base of support is the effective edge plus however many centimetres of base are pushing against the sidewall of the groove the board is carving in the snow. That is why I suggested feeling like you are pressuring, or tilting the board with the soles of your feet. That frees up your COM to retain balance over your base of support. With both feet tilting the board torsion or twisting of the board is minimised, and the edge angle is consistent enough along the groove for the board to track well.

Current thread on forward lean and spring adjustment may help you.

Do you have a spring system in your boots? Your rear leg needs to move through quite an arc as you move your Centre of Mass COM up and down. A spring system will allow you to preset the boot to forward lean and then move through that arc. Turn initiation on toe side is pretty easy, You can just kind of lean on your rear foot toes and the board will dig in and whip round. For heelside try feeling like you are leaning on your front heel while keeping your COM between the bindings. Alternatively, make sure your body is rotated to face toward the nose of the board, then try turning left by feeling like you are leaning on the left side of both feet. Turn right by leaning on the right side of both feet.

Sportube rigid plastic board box. 3 models for different amounts of equipment. Much better protection when travelling by air. Design will accommodate lengths up to around 200cm. I will get a link and post it. Mine is orange to really stand out in baggage collection areas. Also has wheels to trundle along rather than carry full weight. https://www.sportube.com/category-s/1923.htm PS: Have now properly read OPs list of desired features. My bad! Thanks @Neil Gendzwill

@philw I ride UPZ RC10s with the original spring system. I do notice the difference between the spring tension I've setup between front and rear. I ride 65F and 60 R with a front facing stance, so quite different from your more cross board stance. My rear boot is setup at 3 or 4th step of propositioned forward lean i.e. lots. My rear springs have minimal compression allowing me maximum movement forwards from the preset position. My rear lower leg moves through quite an arc as I move my COM up and down while riding. My front boot is setup in the most vertical preset position. The springs are set to mid to high compression as I need much less forward movement in actual riding, want to be able to accurately load the front half of the edge, and have a little bit of give to help me soak up bumps.

I have a 17cm waist Skwal USA powder Skwal I accidentally won in the Aspen Trenching Convention 2017 raffle. I've not ridden it in powder, just on firm manmade snow at an indoor venue. But the more forward angled stance around 80 degrees with outward can't that I was using also gave full rein to my knees to act as shock absorbers while initiating and holding turns with lateral foot sole pressure. Skwal stance really helps soak up the bumps and carve through crud. Stances higher than 60 degrees often benefit from outward cant, and the closer you get to 90 degrees more degrees of cant are likely to be needed to restore the natural alignment of the knee joint. I've posted the link to the YouTube video (RiotSuperCarver channel) that explains how this works so many times on ASB. Message me for the link if you can't find it.

I ride boards with waists between 17cm and 25cm. And happiest around 19 to 21cm. Riding boards with different characteristics is all part of the fun, but it can involve setup adjustments [binding angles and/or biasing binding toes or heels towards the appropriate edge) and of course technique adjustment. @EastsiiiideThe F2 bindings noted in your profile have the nice feature of being able to freely rotate the discs that attach the binding to the board. I have some F2 Intecs that I rotate the binding discs 90 degrees and use that to achieve toe/heel binding bias (also called Gilmore/Gilmour bias on the ASB Forums) to get my front foot heel close to the edge and my rear toes close to the edge on my 25cm waist RadAir board, and still ride my preferred angles (65F, 60R) with mininmal technique adjustment. The F2s allow fine adjustment laterally of a little over 1cm in either direction from centre. Video below shows the results. Like @Carvin' Marvinsaid, you can spend thousands searching and discarding till you find the perfect board, or you can make the most of what you already have, or you can gradually gather a quiver and have fun riding them all.

In the stance that you ride your snowboard, what do you want your knees and ankles to be able to do? Try standing in bare feet on a flat floor in your snowboard stance and observe how your legs move as you make snowboarding movements. If there was no ankle movement in a boot then all the movements of your leg for shock absorption, moving your centre of mass up and down for edge weighting and unweighting, and turn initiation would have to come from your knees and hips. If you feel you ride more across the board, certainly 45 degrees or less, then your ankles and knees move differently than if you ride higher angles and aligned more along the board. Aligned along the board, as you move your COM up and down to absorb shocks and to weight/unweight the board while ideally remaining roughly centered over the edge, your front lower leg moves through a much smaller angle than your rear, and will start in the at rest, uncompressed, position relatively close to vertical. Your rear leg starts off angled forward and moves through a considerable range further forward. From that it follows that your starting position should have the front cuff near vertical when mounted in the binding, while the rear should be angled further forward. Use a spring system to adjust how much resistance there is to movement away from that starting position. Alternatively softer/harder shells and tongues can be used to produce the same effect but perhaps with less easy adjustability. I ride at 65F, 60R and don't ride with an across board style. Others here who ride across the board may be able to give insight as to how both their legs move as they ride and turn, and what starting position and range of movement is useful/desirable.

@mtraczlake sure you check out the rest of his Quick Tip videos.

I woke this morning to the harsh cry of a karearea, NZs native falcon. It was perched on a railing on the hilltop water tank across the road from my house, maybe 75 metres away. There are a pair nesting amongst the pine trees on the steep slope just beyond the tank.

Just keep working on your lumbar spine flexibility. Older, stiffer backs love step-ins!

@Carvin' Marvin Was your rutting a problem before you became a Banana Bender with that yellow topped board of yours? You may have to sell it

Before you do anything else check that your boot cuff canting is optimised. 1/ Stance distance: Your stance distance should be in proportion to your leg length, NOT i) the reference stance for the board II) your shoulder width, your tibia length, your shoe size, the length of your erect p***s, or any other body part! The whole of your leg joins your pelvis (where your centre of mass is roughly) to your feet. To get you in the right area, I used to use 50cm, when I made the video above 54cm, and I'm now out at 56cm, on an inside leg length of 90 cm, and a top of greater trochanter to floor distance of 95cm. With greater distance has come better balance when absorbing bumps and better edge control. You will need toe lift under your front boot and heel lift under your rear boot for stance distances in that sort of proportion to feel relatively comfortable. Assuming your board will accommodate YOUR stance distance, place your bindings so that they are equally away from the centre of the front and rear binding insert packs. This will give the weight distribution the designer of your board intended and is a reasonable starting point. 2/ Binding angles: Now using the method from the first video, work out what binding angles will not result in boot overhang. Assuming your feet point relatively straight forward (not pointing inwards or outwards) the the front bonding being 5 degrees more angled towards the nose of the board than the rear binding is common. Softbooting with your toes and heels hanging over the edge of the board in duckfoot or even mildly directional stances is very different to alpine snowboard carving. One fundamental difference is that in a carved turn you DON'T turn the board, THE BOARD TURNS YOU! The video below describes skiing but the principles of edge engagement are fundamentally the same.