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Beckmann AG

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Posts posted by Beckmann AG

  1. If that's an issue, it will probably feel like the bindings are mounted a little too far forward.

    Depending, of course, on whether or not your legs are of equal length.

    If not, it may feel better, (or a lot worse) than 'normal'.

    E.g., if I remove the compensating shim from my front binding, I can still ride well enough to fool the jury, but my timing will be 'off'.

  2. Please use crayon. Preferably a discontinued color so I know you mean it.

     And maybe some of that grainy construction paper from the art room.

     

    You're on a project, so my observation is just something for the back of the helmet. 

    In the event you get to scheming about 12 degrees to tasty bacon...

    • LOL 1
  3. That thing you're doing?

     

    Stop doing it.

     

     

    If the goal is to smooth off the rough spots, consider that every input needs to both increase at a certain rate, and then decrease at a similar rate, in order to produce a consistent turn. This suggests that the tilt of the board should be progressive, rather than abrupt. Also that if you notice an increase in pressure under your front foot near the start of  a turn, that pressure should gradually fade somewhat toward the rear foot as the turn develops.

    Similarly, a change in edge angle should roughly coincide with a change (and redistribution of) pressure underfeet.

    ->Watch your footage (in slow motion if necessary), and look for the places where inputs either come on rapidly, or halt.

    Also, aim to ride off the soles of your feet, not the cuffs of the boots.

    With that in mind, even things out, and the 'chatter' should subside. 

    • Like 1
  4. 12 hours ago, Shred Gruumer said:

    But mainly its a comfort thing and I have a wide stance so its a bit easier at that angle..

    Thought that might be the case. When's the first round of testing?

     

    12 hours ago, Shred Gruumer said:

    and it does help you get forward on the really steep stuff

    Not to throw a wooden shoe into your cogs, but one of the primary causes of being late into a turn, especially on the steeps, is too much lift at the rearmost  attachment point; that being true of both ski boots and hardboots/bindings.

    Difficulty ending one turn usually leads to difficulty starting the next. Usually more noticeable the further across the fall line one aims to go.

    8 hours ago, SunSurfer said:

    9 degree cant disc, offset to binding baseplate, is a solution for appropriate lift and outward cant combo for skwal riders.

     Perhaps. Is the disco stack Skwal bound?

  5. On 3/18/2019 at 12:10 PM, shawndoggy said:

    I'm getting what I would call "chatter" on the heel turns... my carve looks a little wavy when looking at it on the lift ride back up.

    Also appears to be present on your soft serve configuration.

    Reminds me of the early Acqua & Sapone team colors.

    Problem most likely stems from you riding the board 'into a corner', whereby you maintain (excessive) front foot pressure at a constant or increasing edge angle, at an area of the turn where the loads are peaking.

    And something has to give.

     If this was on hard snow, you'd most likely spin out, or skip off on a tangent.

    • Like 2
  6. On 3/11/2019 at 8:23 PM, David Kirk said:

    Now to snowboarding. When the rider enters a turn the board sees a very high load against the snow and the vibration it encounters is very high frequency and very low amplitude (buzz or chatter). And since the system has no suspension most all of the buzz and chatter are transferred to the rider's feet. The rider then becomes the suspension. The problem is that we can not deal with the high frequency movements very well. The vibration is way over 1 hz (one cycle per second) and our bodies simply can't absorb a small bump, push the board back down and do it again and again many times per second. So what we tend to do is go rigid. We tense our muscles in an effort to resist the movement....but of course going rigid is the worst thing we can do to try to keep it in control. Our muscles tighten and resist any movement and our suspension "packs up" just like it did on the poorly set up bike. We loose the ability to keep the edge firmly and consistently engaged with the snow and the board chatters and our smile goes away. Not good.

    So...like the bike we need suspension to deal with the motions the board is trying to transfer to our feet....we need a filter of sorts to take up the small stuff so that we can just focus on the big stuff. This is where flexi bindings like the F2.

    The binding alone can go a good bit. It will effectively filter out the buzz so that our muscles can stay relaxed and supple and deal with the task at hand. Fully rigid bindings to not do this well at all.

    A few years back, I linked a lab grade recording device to my board; a Donek FC with radial sidecut and  ‘conventional’ camber.

    I.e.,  absence of nose rocker/early rise.

    On typical eastern machine-made hardpack, the ‘noise’ was consistent from turn to turn, and while it was annoying (in real time) by way of the ears, it was of no consequence through the feet.

    Or the legs.

    Nor did it have any perceivable effect on muscle tension elsewhere.

    Riding fully rigid bindings.

     

    A board in an of itself will do a marvelous job of attenuating vibration, particularly if the rider is providing guiding inputs to the board in such a way as to limit dissonant interaction between the board and snow.

    If, however, the inputs are either ‘inappropriate’, or outsized in magnitude, the interaction between board and snow will become progressively unstable, and this may lead to the rider adopting a ‘bracing posture’ which, by it’s nature, will be somewhat tense.

    The long and short of this scenario, is that if a rider tends to provide overlarge inputs to the board, those inputs will lead to erratic and uncomfortable board behavior. The easiest way to deal with this problem is to allow ’spillage’ of those inputs, such that what the board sees is somewhat less than what the rider provides, the end product being a ‘smoother’ experience.

    The easiest way to do that, given

    1) the obvious difficulty almost everyone has in finding a decent boot mechanic, and

    2) the all too common indifference toward understanding/implementing the subtleties of effective boot/binding configuration,

    ->is to buy flexible bindings.

    Conversely, if you prefer/want to ride flexible bindings, (for whatever reason) you will, by default, move toward larger movements of the knees and hips as a means of controlling the board; in part because the give in the bindings will dissipate the smaller, more accurate, and more intuitive controlling movements of the feet. If the feet are lost as a means of finer input, the required inputs are drawn from further up the kinetic chain (from progressively larger body parts), and that usually involves holding various limb segments in tensioned relation to one another.

    E.g., if you want to rock your knees sideways to alter the tilt of the board, you’ll need to hold the knees in flexion to allow medial/lateral movement by way of the hip joints, meanwhile driving the legs by way of the hips will ‘bind’ the legs to the torso.

    All of which will make a rough ride rougher.

    So it’s a bit of a self-affirming loop. ‘Less refined’ movements dictate flexible bindings, and flexible bindings spawn ‘less refined’ movements. Meanwhile, the flex in the system provides enough ‘give’ to make the experience palatable.

    One of the challenges of design work is to figure out “what is the problem(s) to be solved”, and then to figure out, “what is the origin of said problem(s)”.

    Within the confines of alpine snowboarding, (especially given it’s short history) it’s all too easy to look at the dominant modes of riding, and assume that such modes have followed a particular evolution toward refinement. And from there, it’s easy to assume that common problems within those modes are related to materials and hardware, rather than to technique and software.

    Technique in alpine sport is directly related to the equipment available, and how that equipment enhances, hinders, or otherwise colors the abilities of the athlete. It’s not surprising then, that most riders on a given boot/binding platform will bear resemblance to one another, or that riders within a particular genre will tend to use similar equipment. It follows they will demonstrate similar movements, experience similar difficulties through their skill development, and voice similar complaints with regard to outcome/performance.

    Get enough athletes doing the ‘same’ thing, and after a while you’ll see very little ‘technical’ innovation from within, other than platform construction/geometry, and those changes will most likely reflect established athlete preferences. Meanwhile, athlete preference for products extant will drive market viability, and that tends to hamper the development of 'better' gear. 

     

     

  7. 34 minutes ago, Bobby Buggs said:

    It said theres nothing in the front ankle pocket. Im thinking thats exactly where my problem is. I believe I have a tube of the magic cork, but Im leaving the snow for the next week. When I get back I will remove the liners and with them on I will locate the hot spot and see if its that empty area.  I hope thats the area and a partial tube will put it to rest.

    If you have a contour mismatch between boot shell and medial ankle, and you pump a bunch of goo into that area, you may wind up cocking your foot to the outside. 

    You may also have a problem with your footbed.

    As to the Surefoot liners; last I knew they were a variation on the proven but finicky Sidas/Conform'able. The Surefoot/Amfit footbed, on the other hand, is nothing to write home about.

     

  8. 18 hours ago, Bobby Buggs said:

    As I mentioned in a previous post I struggled for the better part of 20 years in hard boots trying to get a liner that didnt have me crushing my feet after lunch or later in the season.

    And also the part where you finally moved from a Raichle/DeeLuxe shell to the UPZ.

     

    Liners and shells work together as a system. Both can be in conflict with the foot, so try to avoid using one to mask the ill effects of the other.

     

     

  9. 6 hours ago, daveo said:

    I think there may be a misinterpretation of their mindset here. To them, 'everyone else' is only Japanese people. They don't care about what the rest of the world or what non Japanese are doing, they just want to improve their own skills. With snowboarding, one of those skills is carving.

    Within the context of this topic, 'everyone else' is everyone content to recreate in the higher exertion, lower dynamic world of drifting. Which is to say, learning to shape a turn by way of energy dispersal, rather than energy capture.

    The cultural desire to learn the components of a given activity, whether or not they have immediate application, makes sense. 

    25 minutes ago, daveo said:

    Depends if that subject is a mathematician or a snowboarder. 

    10001.2-3-8.1.gif

    As seen by the interactive surface, those wheels are objectively true.

    Quality riding involves (among other things) 'reading' the surface and responding to irregularity through a variance in input, rather than repeatedly providing the same input to a variable surface and expecting smooth passage.

     

    9 hours ago, st_lupo said:

    Snow falls, Winter’s gift.

    Show thanks by perfect turn art.

    Slarv is man’s weakness.

    Good example.

    + one.

    • Thanks 1
  10. On 3/8/2019 at 10:05 PM, daveo said:

    I reckon good quality riding is subjective, though.

    About as subjective as truing a bicycle wheel.

    Rote repetition of proscribed movements without regard for how the board is interacting with the snow is hardly quality.

     

    On a different note, do you have any insight into why the Japanese value 'the carve'? As in, if most everyone else is content with a truck tube, why are they intent on floating a kayak?

  11. That being the case, swap the front elastomer for the rear elastomer. If the problem follows the elastomer, then the 'loose' one has been pounded to death, or the e-ring has shrunk, or it's been cut.

    If the problem remains at the front, the inserts may have pulled, in which case, move the bindings to another set of inserts to verify.

    If the inserts are solid, and you want a quick fix, cut a shim identical to the elastomer footprint (or two) out of a milk jug to 'thicken' the loose e-ring.

  12. On 3/3/2019 at 9:15 PM, pauleleven said:

    I'm a strong advocate for minus heel, it is immensely powerful and stable,

    Is not the same thing as versatile/nimble.

    On 3/3/2019 at 9:15 PM, pauleleven said:

    My next obstacle will be the steeps......

    Depending on interpretation, 'minus heel' might be your obstacle to riding the steeps, rather than the incline itself.

    On 3/4/2019 at 2:16 AM, slapos said:

    finding your own style isnt easy. For now I enjoy mostly race style - where i ride most we usually have man made bulletproof snow. For now it seems to work best and most effective. 

    Did not so much mean finding your own style, as that will take care of itself in time. Was referring to how you work within your chosen style of riding. Subtle changes to the magnitude and timing of your movements with respect to terrain and turn dynamics can lead to interesting outcomes. Further, 'race style' may work best for your prevailing conditions simply because you haven't yet found your own, better solution.

    As a cautionary note on emulation: You probably realize by now that Nevin is out for the season, possibly much longer. Extreme postures can, and quite often do, lead to injury.  See also: Ted Ligety.

     

    • Like 2
  13. 11 hours ago, Jack M said:

    but why doesn't she engage the edge more?

    Because she can't.

    Her performance clearly reflects a desire to express an accepted visual norm, rather than quality riding.

    7 hours ago, lonbordin said:

    That said if we, as a group, could decide on a couple of videos we'd like to see on the front page of results we can probably accomplish that just by watching the videos and liking the videos. 

     If the goal is to influence the perception of alpine snowboarding by way of visual media, it might be a good idea to run a selection of footage past an unbiased focus group.

    Given some of the videos posted as noteworthy to this forum, beauty is clearly in the eye of the beholden.

    Which is not to say it's all rubbish, just that what some find attractive, others find vaguely repellent; in both cases for reasons that don't have to make sense in order to inform behaviour.

     

     

    • Like 1
  14. 2 hours ago, trailertrash said:

    Back in my day we didn't have boards! We just stood in the snow and slid, and we liked it!

     

    Much of this riding looks a lot more joyful and rewarding than a lot of what passes for accomplished hardbooting on the latest gear.

     

    • Like 2
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