Donek

The boards in the pictures are 185s. We'll see what changes are required before producing a 175. I have some new BX shapes as well. That e-mail bounced back Phil. Send me an e-mail and we can discuss scheduling and shapes.

It's possible. We'll see what happens with the feedback and what adjustments become necessary.

I've been working on some new stuff over the last few weeks. While we have some testing starting next week at A-basin, I'd be very interested to get feedback from other teams training this summer. Let me know when and where you will be on snow and we can try to arrange something. There are more details on these new boards on the vendor forum. http://www.bomberonline.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=25844

Thanks Jack. I had some problems on the longer end with that Sigma 50-500mm lens. I think it's earned a permanent place at home when I shoot snowboarding. It just doesn't cut it for me. The 70-200 with a DX chip (1.5crop factor) really makes the perfect setup.

If you have the box in tact, you should be able to make a claim against the carrier, assuming it was insured. It's not something I would leave as is. I'm not sure of your location, but if you're in CO, bring it by the shop and I can throw it in the press for you. Otherwise, as stated, epoxy and clamps. If you heat the area up with a hair dryer prior to clamping the epoxy will flow a bit better. Wedging a screw driver in the gap and opening and closing the gap helps to work the epoxy all the way into the joit as well.

As always, we see a lot of custom orders. So far few people have asked for coiler shapes. I am, however, currently in the process of developing my own version of "the new shape" Bordy posted about. This is a race specific shape, but many of the properties in this design are likely to spill back over into the recreational carve boards. We'll be pressing some prototypes this week. You can probably expect to see a little something on them here.

I've posted photos in the photo forum http://www.bomberonline.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=25688

Went up to copper for the race today. I missed the qualifiers, but shot the finals. There are more here: http://donek.smugmug.com/gallery/7838454_TSfio If you made the finals and I haven't posted any of your shots, just shoot me an e-mail.

I plan to be there on Tuesday for GS and Friday for the BX. I am taking the whole week off, so I might make it up another day. Give me a call.

Both Billy and Bruce are using the new Coiler Saucy. It's got a clothoid decambered shape, anti progressive transposed sidecut with a SCR of about 25cm. Bruce is wearing a tuke with a coiler on it and Billy has a T-shirt on over his speed suite that says "Blame Canada". Bordy is claiming Bruce has developed the greatest and newest shape ever to hit this hill. Bruce agrees, "It's a real game changer." They're both at the top of the elementry school sledding hill ready to see who's going to be crowned the next...

It's a very carve oriented freeride board. It's typically not great in the park or tight trees. If you want it to be, I can modify the flex pattern to make it more park and tree friendly. Everything is adjustable as mentioned earlier.

It would depend on the generation. If Dave's is newer, it is highly probable that the insert location has moved with the evolution of the shape. This is what's being discussed on the custom yourself thread and a few others.

The prior is substantially shorter than the donek. Look at the tips. The offset on the prior appears to be about the same as the difference in length. If you look at the tails, the widest portion of the priors tail seems to be closer to the ground as well. All of this compounds to produce the illusion that the priors inserts are much closer to the tail. If you were to lay the two on a bench and center the priors contact length with that of the Donek, I would guess you'll observe about a 1in (possibly 2in) offset to the tail.

The 179 FC has a centered sweet spot. The WCRM probably incorporates some of the offset and sidecut variations that is being used by a lot of racers and some rec carvers. This will result in a dramatic shift towards the tail. Mount the FC centered on the hole pattern. I would mount the Prior centered on the hole pattern too.

We've discussed adding such a model to the line for a couple years, but have simply failed to get to it. With the new software I've written, it will take about 5 minutes to generate the cnc code for a new shape like this.

As a little heads up on what we'll be offering next year (actually as of now). Custom shaping will be coming down dramatically. We're basically eliminating the fee for a custom shape. Anyway, we can accomodate your shoe size and length without any problems. Carve specific, freeride, jib/freeride, whatever you like.

You haven't really mentioned your stance on the two setups. A soft setup is very forgiving of an innapropriate stance. Being off by an inch on width or a few degrees on your angles on hard boots can make a huge difference in your ability to perform. There are a lot of different opinions on stance choices, but the best one is yours. If you're uncomfortable, having a tough time getting low, find one leg fatigues more than another, chances are altering your stance will improve things. Your stance width should be somewhere close to the distance from your knees center of rotation to the bottom of your heel. Mine is about 1.5in narrower than that measurement. If your feet naturally turn out, your back foot should be turned out the same amount. My feet turn out about 20 degrees. I ride 60deg front and 40 deg back.

I've used both releasable and bail bindings on a monoski. My personal preference is a non releasable bail. Even with the releasable ski bindings maxed out on the din settings, I've twisted out with one foot, leaving the other in. That's a scarry feeling having something that big and heavy capable of twisting your knee. With the non release system, you're basically in the same situation as an alpine snowboard. You are capable of generating as much torque as the ski, so knee injuries don't occur. I would strongly advise against " just mounting a set of ski bindings to a snowboard". Skis and monoskis have a mounting plate in them that provides a lot of extra grip for the screws used. Just mounting directly to a snowboard without some sort of reenforcement will result in insufficient retention. A binding will come off the board, leaving the other foot locked on the board. Be sure to t-bold or helicoil the board you are mounting. Monoski waist widths are typically in the 18 to 19.5cm width. While I have not ridden wider monoskis, most do not like the performance of them.

You're likely to have difficulties finding a certified tech to mount it for you. Snowboards don't have a mounting plate, so it's necessary to t-bolt the board to ensure the bindings don't pull out of the board. There use to be an adapter plate available for this, but I don't remember who made it or what it's called. You might ask over at lateralpressure.com. Most monoskis have a lot of taper to help in the powder. If this is your wifes application, she's unlikely to enjoy the sims as a monoski. If she wants to carve on it, then that's a different story. Most of the carving monoskis I've built are very similar to an alpine snowboard. They do have mounting plates though.

Are you certain on those knee injuries. Monoskiing is considered one of the friendliest snow sports on knees. There are even one leged skiers who look like they aren't missing a leg when monoskiing. When I was release from my torn MCL, I was released to a monoski. It truly generates the most stable platform for people with knee issues.

I think there is a general misconception about this industry. Carving is supported by people who are very passionate about it, not people who make 6 figure incomes at it. Up until recently Bruce had another job. He has found a way to support himself with snowboarding, but as I understand it, it came with a lifestyle change. I am only able to maintain the large shop I have because I puchased a big piece of land with a double wide prefab in the middle of nowhere. Jeff Caron has another job. Lets face it, we're in an economic $#@!hole. If Jeff has to pay a bit more attention to that other job to continue feeding his and your passion, I'd say give him a bit of slack. We all do the best we can, but this is a true cottage industry supported by really hard work. While most of us attempt to provide customer service on par with companies much larger than ours, sometimes other aspects of our world make that difficult.

Jenifer and I are fine with you posting the video.

Fin asked Jenifer questions about my bagpiping. She was not supposed to say what it was as people were supposed to try to guess what my old hobby was. Turns out my old hobby was something completely different.

Well, I was a little further along than I thought. I put in a couple hours and got them finished. Unfortunately the lack of light makes for softer focus and poor contrast everywhere. There were a few shots that appealed to me though. Dave Winters Having way too much fun Mr. Bomber looking very intense I'd like to see more of these Mark Harris doing his impression of Popeye (too bad about the soft focus) So everything is posted from Friday now. You can view all the photos here: http://www.seanmartinphoto.com/gallery/7336937_49TSK

I have had a huge number of requests over the last week for this. I had hoped to get them up by Friday, but that has not happened. I am about half way through post processing them. I will post them as soon as I am done and make an announcement here. Those of you who have e-mailed me will also get an e-mail indicating I have posted photos. Between building boards, keeping the family happy, and taking photos for the local newspaper, I am quite busy. Your patience is appreciated.