st_lupo

My wife had one of those but I never trusted it completely. I’ve gotten best results from a fixed guide (swix race) a swix second cut chrome file (for setting the angle or repairing) and diamond stones for deburring(200) and general maintenance (400). Usually get at least as good results as the guys that have the electric sharpeners. Base angle you can get by with taping one side of the file.

1) F2 Silberpfeil: This was my first alpine deck. Got it because it was cheap. Now it is my rock board (so I can practice early and late in the season). 2)Coiler NFC Balance: This was board #2 and my first metal board. A total game changer in my learning curve. The board didn't make me a better rider over-night but it gave me tons of confidence to really push harder on different techniques in variable conditions. As a result I learned a ton because of this board. 3)Coiler NFC Energy: This was board #3 and a little shorter and turnier than my Balance. I got this as a refinement of my NFC-B because I got to the point where I could understand/anticipate what got me happy on a board, and I wanted something a bit "racier" than the NFC-B, but equally versatile in just about all conditions. This is absolutely my go-to board: perfect-groomers, pow, runs that have been rutted up by the local alpine teams, crowds, etc. This board handles everything predictably and with poise. It really shines in less than ideal conditions. 4)Kessler 162: I got this the same time I ordered the NFC-E because it was used and cheap. I wanted in on the European "legend". This is my adrenaline rush board, . Since I'm not riding off piste anymore, I realistically could have been perfectly content with just the Silberpfeil and the NFC-E. That would cover an entire season. However, having having taken a bite of the SL apple, the Kessler just amps up the stoke level to 11 on the days when I can get it out. The NFC-B (which I still love) kinda gets relegated to being the spare. Not planning and not interested in any new boards for the foreseeable future.

From '90 to '15 was 100% soft. From '15 and onwards I'm now 100% hard.

Hey Erazz! Can I be an honorary member of the LCI? Please? Loveland was my homebase in the 90s and I still have the best memories of the shenanigans my friends and I used to get up to there. The wind though... It was AWESOME. Kept all of the riff-raff away, and it made the chairlifts redundant on occasion.

I'm usually in the minority in this but if you go with F2 I'd recommend also picking up a bag of extra T-nuts (Donek sells them) and do annual inspection of your bindings. Great bindings though. @jburk That's a helluva lotta toe lift you got there, looks like my back heel! Am I missing out on some magic by only running a teeny amount of time lift in my front foot (two stacked cant wedges)?

There is a picture of the intec internals here. Scroll down a little over half way.

Better recalibrate that can. Mine all weigh either 504g or 10g, anything else is defective.

The 162 sure has some magic going on in it. I had mine out for back to back runs along with my NFC energy 170 (with scr of 10/12/11), and even though I was turning the 162 inside of the Coiler's tracks it managed to keep a stupid amount of speed. When I swapped back out to the Coiler it comparatively felt like I was stepping on the brakes in each carve. This might be the board or it might be that the Kessler doesn't let me get away with bad habits to the degree that the Coiler will, and so I was turning a cleaner line on the Kessler. Either way, the Kessler is a hoot to ride, but the Coiler would be my first choice when riding steep and unfamiliar terrain just because of that speed management. Like everyone mentioned that 162 is a lot stiffer than any of my other boards and it is heavier than the Coiler by about 1.5lbs.

I’ve got 0-1 (bottom-side) on both Coilers and no detune. Love it, and it holds up well (but I’m not often on blue ice). I generally touch up the sides with diamond stones just before each wax, while I’ve got a clean base. I tune my daughter’s skis at 0.5-3 and they require noticeably more love.

Talk about being spoiled. Timed my vacation day from reality just perfectly.

I hate to say it but imagining Ross stoned and seeing that picture on the link for "Ross' Gold" had me giggling.

The best I've heard this year was today: "..." There was nobody in the lift line and for about the first hour today (with a cloudless sky and beaming sun) it was virtually my private mountain. Is this what retirement is like? If so, sign me the hell up!

Epilogue... Today I did play hooky, took a day off of work and had a solid day at the local hill. After taking a couple of warm up laps on the blue Coiler (and then sending the sunny morning porn shots to my colleagues who were still in the office) I got the Kessler out. The first two runs were a bit rusty. I got in some solid carves that were a lot bigger than what the board is really capable of, but whenever I tried pushing the board to what I thought it should do, I completely lost it. I learned a lot about some of my riding habits that just work fine on the Coilers but the Kessler just wont have any truck with them. My biggest idiosyncrasy is that I really press the nose in the turns, on the Kessler the nose bites in, hard, but the back (feeling neglected) just whips around and dumps me all over the place. Centered is the key, but being the ham-fisted rider that I am, I started to over compensate but shifting my weight back, too much and at the wrong time. Boy did that Kessler lock in fierce and it stayed locked in until I chickened and skidded out. The depth of those carves, and the amount of debris and shrapnel that was spewed forth was truly awe inspiring. I was a one-man death cookie creating machine and 10 hours later, those trenches were still the single most identifiable features on the most trafficated runs. Some say that those trenches and the Great Wall of China are the only two man-made creations that can be seen from space. On the magic run number three, the heavens opened, the sun warmed my face, and I was covered in that beautiful sweet-spot again. The ride from then on wasn't quite as wild as my first night on the Kessler; it wasn't launching itself on every transition, but it was like riding a bottle of slightly pent-up fury; shiny and chrome. Evisceration doesn't describe by half the edge-hold on that little 162 when angulating properly. And easing up on the turn radius revealed that hidden under that black ptex top* there was a couple of Holley four-barrels. I've definitely found a new best friend today! *Speaking of black p-tex top, that stuff is slippery. I'd gotten spoiled by the cabonium tops on my Coilers and don't bother with stomp pads anymore. That ptext though... if there is one thing that sticks less to it than snow, its boot sole, and I'm sure the lifty at the top of the hill has me pinned as a proper gaper.

Edge pressure is certainly an important factor (one of many, oh joy) that needs to be actively managed during a carved turn. I'll extend Jack's statement that a balanced cinder block can carve a turn, but given an ideal surface. One thing that a cinder block can't do, however, is ride dynamically. The snowpack is an undulating surface with maybe some chop and maybe variable hardness. When you carve over a knoll or through a compression with your legs locked in place, you can feel the edge pressure increase or diminish quickly, just before you think SH**. Things go ass over tea kettle because the balance of forces changes faster than you can reangulate your center of mass. Extending and retracting your legs gives you a very quick but short duration mechanism to maintain that force balance, buying you the time you need to re-angulate your body. When I start getting tired during a day of riding the first thing that goes is my ability to ride dynamically over the bumps/chop/etc. Without that ability to actively manage edge pressure, things start getting ugly.

Still take the backpack full of beer next time you head up to F’lia... You know, just in case.

Correct, about an hour SW of Oslo. The ski area is called Funklia. After three or so years of warm and dry winters, we finally have something like a normal winter.

Too bad the article only focused on snurfing and didn't talk at all about snarving.

That sounds painful and probably a bit dangerous. I'm surprised that there are so many hardbooters that are cool with just skidding around. It already takes enough effort to source the right hardware. I don't get people that don't then invest in learning the techniques and close the loop? Every time I wind up skidding I just counting the time I'll have to spend to re-tune the edges. I'm getting 24 to 30 per year; any more and I'd probably have to start alimony payments. Carving every inch of every run (or at least attempting to and then learning from it).

Woe is he (me) who crosses my trenches while brushing a hand on the snow. Those f'ers will suck your fingers right in and jam them up good. :)

Actually, I'm pretty sure it can be done. However, I can recommend a strict diet of Carne Adovada, it'll get you there as well.

If it's me it's probably #2. Buuuut here's my stupid question: given equivalent snow conditions and identical tracks, how do you choose? I always thought depth was a function of turn radius, snow condition and speed.

Like you are picking up from the replies here, it is different strokes for different folks. For my, case I aim at riding full-C shaped turns, and focus on getting the board as high on edge as I can, every single turn. When you start getting proficient, you'll start looking for steeper and steeper slopes to keep up your speed. Then the mountain becomes you oyster. Your turns do look nice and clean, but Beckmann was perhaps a bit ungenerous. You could probably fit a bantha or a rancor in those turns, but definitely not any self-respecting kaiju that I know of.

I feel like I've been playing hooky. Conditions haven't been what I've been hoping for (mixed powder and rain (wtf!?)) so I've been tentative with the Kessler. I rode it a few runs on Sunday but we had races that were monopolizing all of the prime real-estate, and everything else was mixed pow/ice and crowded so I didn't push it. I do see what Jack was talking about with the versatility of the clothoid sidecut as larger/faster carves were easy to setup and go, but then I wasn't getting that pitbull terrier feeling that I was getting at the end of that first night. I wound up trading out for my Nirvana Energy though and had a blast. One thing was really apparent (maybe it is me maybe it is something with the boards), when I swapped over to the Nirvana I was turning about the same radius turn as I was on the the Kessler, but the Coiler felt like it was decelerating more in the turn. I'm bummed I'm not making it to the hill this week, but looking at the forecast, next week should be excellent. I'll be really tempted to take a vacation day to just focus on the Kessler all gosh darned day.

My understanding of most plates is that one end has a pivot constraint while the other end is free to slide, allowing the board to freely flex underneath. Each pedestal on the whip has 6 (apparently) pinned connections to the board so the sections under the pedestals are likely very stiff, whereas that lateral line between the two pedestals is likely much softer. Bend it like a letter V.

You can’t afford health insurance after buying this board. It’s ~ $2000+. A great quote from a review: >>>If Cheetah is to be believed, the F-117 will do everything short of take off and do an Immelman Turn, thanks to a huge honkin' hole that runs down the center of the board. Says Cheetah, "the main purpose of the opening is to reduce the amount of surface which comes in contact with snow. Smaller surface means less drag, which translates into more gliding speed."<<< I don’t know about the reviewer (a tech gizmo magazine), but the only part of my board that never needs waxing is anything more than 2 inches inboard of the edges.? The more you look at the board the more you scratch your head. Try to imagine the flex pattern with those pedestals sitting on top of the board.