michael.a

Would have flipped the plane over from the engines digging into the ground. Also much cheaper to repair the plane after a gearup landing on bitumen. Phenomenal landing as with that Hudson River pilot. WOW

Bump to the top. Lowered the price a bit to help move them.

Ignoring the marketing hype, Goretex is the only stuff that works for me (never tried eVent though). I ride when it snows, rains, spring conditions, -20C and windy and I have just one jacket and pair of pants that does it all. Never got wet. Ever. It is a softshell so on very very cold and windy days it blows through me but whatever, its all about layering. Everything else I tried still got wet in the end, and its something I cannot tolerate. The other issue is that I sweat a lot, so my jacket needs to have excellent breathability, I cant use thick insulated jackets for example.

So I just want to make sure I get this: inward canting is tilting the bindings toward each other. outward canting is tilting the bindings away from each other. Im one of those people that have massive problems deciding if a guy in a photo is holding up his right or left hand, and imagining bindings set already at some angle and then tilting them in some direction is difficult. So someone with inward cant on the front binding and outward canting on the rear binding is actually shifting their legs and therefore upper body "out" from the center of the board more to the toeside edge. Do I have that right? Like I said, I can ride flat but mostly use toe/heel lift and its perfectly comfortable, but I like to tinker :)

A silly question but... canting is the lateral tilting of the binding, ie, from one edge of the board to the other. So what is "inward" canting? And outward? Im regular, so would inward canting be having my binding/boots tilt towards the toeside edge (right edge when standing normally on a board)? Im having trouble visualing why someone would want inward canting on the front and outward, so towards the heelside edge, on the rear... I dont use canting only toe and heel lift but would like to try it this year.

The amount of will power you got to have in order to not reach for the snow is colossal. I know. I'm an intermediate carver and still do it although I try hard not to. I'd also say you ruin a lot of gloves and pants VERY fast since you use your hands and hips to nudge you off the snow when you start to fall over, which inevitably happens a lot since your COM is so far off. I picked up this technique in addition to the classic grabbing the but cuff is to practice what I could call "hand sweeping" where you point your arm out in front of you and then you "sweep" it smoothly to where you wanna turn while using your ankles and knees, then when making the turn have your continue to turn and go up up up up up. I think I saw some pros practicing like this. Helps practice facing the way of travel as well as keeping the shoulders level to the slope. Have to say it looks like Im dancing like a ballerina but it works.

Too soft for me too, dropping my offer for the madd 170.

dibs on the madd 170, email sent for more info

Since most of Europe is at the same longitude as Canada, I thought Id ask how are the current temps? Here in central europe it is freezing cold, some incredible cold spell, first time I remember below 0C in early October.

second in line for the madd

I totally agree you with but... but... I started with just a side bevel tool, a file, an iron and some wax. Very quickly I found out how limited I was, suddenly the sidewall is getting in your way, you cant brush out the structure, your wax scraper is completely dull and you need a sharpener, you cant do anything with the base edge... and as we know, you want to use mill files or have base grinds done at an absolute minimum to save your edges. Ive always believed to do the job right you need the right tools. It took me 3 years to be able to afford all of the stuff I bought but I dont regret it. And as another poster mentioned, buy the good stuff from the beginning, you'll actually save money in the long run.

Tuning stuff is EXPENSIVE. I think I spent more than 300USD on the most basic but fundamental tools you need. Iron, scraper, brushes, base bevel tool, side bevel tool, files, diamonds, planewall scraper, vices, and wax... my god, the amount of wax you need for hot scrapes, base prep, summer storage, different temps is just insane. I cant even afford any fluoro stuff, just big slabs of service wax. And then figuring it all out....

It all depends on what kind of AWD you have, how many miles on the car, if you regularly rotated your tires, etc, but the general rule of thumb on most modern "AWD" systems is a) rotate the tires every 6k-8k, and if there is more than 1/4" of wear between all the tires, which is done by measuring the entire tire from tread to tread, then you have to replace them but theres many option, for example you could technically shave the tires. So being religious with tire wear plus 2x-3x the maintenance costs and the Subaru tax on everything.. meh. And since most people lag or just dont service their cars at regular intervals due to the cost, with that "oh Ill get that knocking sound checked out next month", well... Its all about the maintenance. That was why I decided against any AWD/4WD, esp if you live in the burbs and head up to the mountains only on the weekend. All you need are a good set of winter tires, thats it. I have a '99 Golf diesel thats been like a tank while getting around 40mpg. During the winter I use Bridgestone Blizzaks and have never had a problem in blizzards, ice, freezing rain, up steep hills, whatever.... And I live in Poland, home of the worst roads and winters in mainland Europe. :) In my opinion avoid SUVs because they dont handle well and get worse mileage, a FWD wagon from VW, volvo, honda with a good maintenance history and a set of winter tires is all youll need.

For me, cold feet was either caused by a crappy liner or just a far too thick ski sock. So if youve got a decent liner, its the socks. I mistakenly believed the thicker the sock the better, but all it did was impede blood flow and air circulation and if you have sweaty feet like me, it doesnt wick the moisture away, leading to even colder, soggier and smellier socks. Then when I threw those heating packets into the equation and what I had was similar to you, burning hot boots for about an hour which then died out due to foot sweat. Go with a thin to medium ski sock made from merino wool, a lot of manufacturers out there but theres smartwool, icebreaker, darn tough, wigwam... and see what works for you. I avoid any synthetic socks as they do not warm my feet at all and stink after a few hours. I only use a medium sock but heard of people wearing two thins, or starting out with thin socks and then later in the day or week move to medium socks as the liner packs out.

That toe piece is not a heel piece, mine looks like that and it does fold down . I have an almost identical set of step-ins, just in blue and made completely out of plastic (baseplate too). Good bindings in my opinion. I like to use them for freeriding or where I feel Ill need the most flex possible as they are very flexible but strong. I weigh 90kg (200pds) and "try" to ride aggressively and have never had a problem. Plus you can get them for cheap. Some cant/lift mods are possible with special shims, but surprise surprise I ride them completely flat, not unlike my TD2/3s which for some reason I always have to dial in with all sorts of tweaks.

I think its far easier to do this: 1. upload your photos to any number of online hosting sites like photobucket.com 2. it automatically rescales them 3. copy the photos address and link them directly with the tags 4. drink beer

SOLD SOLD SOLD Burton Wind boots mondo 25.0 Brand new (new old stock). Never worn. They have some tiny "blemishes" from storage. Intec comptabile (no need to drill or anything like that, plug&play). I was going to keep them for parts. Great boots, massive shame they dont make them anymore. $160 + shipping to the US ($66), shipping within the EU ($37).

Boots sold

Boots sold pending funds

Arggggh... I spent months looking for these boots for my girlfriend only to hear she prefers her Burton Ice's a ton more and doesn't want em. So up for sale, a pair of brand-new (never used, worn for like 5 minutes) Burton Fire's mondo 25.5. From what the original seller told me they were literally some of the last boots produced at Burton, got sold to some ski shop that hid them in a warehouse until they went bankrupt last year (no wonder) and then this guy picked them up. Damn fine pair of boots imho, though I prefer Burton Winds (and they're way too small for me). Cool color, heels are intec compatible, no cracks, new old stock. Boots are right now located in Europe, but will be stateside in November when I fly over for turkey day. Looking for $250 + shipping (from the US). I'm also holding in reserve a pair of Burton Wind's 25.0 (also brand new) that I also picked up but want to keep them for spare parts, but it'd be a shame to just have them lying around and not used. If anyone's interested let me know.

Jack's been hitting the nail on the head every time here, but I dont want to boost his ego too much so I'll add that he's probably bald and ugly or something. Like riding, I was in a similar spot like you, wanted to ride from the beginning on the best of the best and master EC-ing, everything. My over-ambition probably set me back a year or more skill-wise, I picked up numerous bad habits like reaching for the snow every single second. At the time I was riding on small radius boards and thought I was a pretty damn good, but the moment on I got on something bigger (13m, 18, or even 23m) I thought wow thats too big for real snowboarding, Id need a football field to carve on this thing. I was wrong, so wrong. Now that Im a bit better my favorite boards are getting longer and longer with bigger sidecuts even on the same narrow trails I ride.

Isnt this stuff far too thick? Shouldnt you use something more liquid in order to "coat" the glove?

Doesnt and wont change a damned thing.

I had a somewhat similar experience with my Donek Axxess 172 ('05 I think). When I first tried it out I found the board almost unrideable and fought with the bastards for 2 seasons... stiff as hell, esp the nose, and it wouldnt hold in anything. I think I tried every possible stance/setback/angle/cant/lift combination possible and still found it unmanageable. Of course these were my beginner days and it was disconcerting that I could ride ok on other boards but this Axxess, a supposed good beg's board and "all-mountain" was something that honestly couldnt do anything well, and on hardpack or ice, it was an f'ing disaster. Well, and there's always a "well...", one day I said f' it and just mounted the bindings using maximum setback, narrowed my stance from 53 to 49cm and wham!!! the thing could rock... it was weird as hell but I could go nuts with it on everything except the **** I ride 90% of the time on, frozen hardpack/ice. Now, hurumph hurumph, as Im a better rider I love the board as an early/late seasoner, as long as its powda or soft or mushy or off-piste or moguls, but for anything else, PASS.

wow :)