NateW

I had the option of getting that Nitro setup many years ago and I still kinda regret not taking it. Nice simple design, and it looks really robust. I'd be pleased to see the rumoured Bomber heels put the moving parts into the binding itself as well. But frankly it doesn't much matter. The heelpiece is now the weakest link in my setup, so I'm almost certain to run out and buy whatever heels Bomber provides. I look forward to the unveiling. :) Ace, I had all kinds of problems with regular bindings failing. I could never get things dialed in to where they wouldn't pop upon if I pushed them really hard (read: falling, or hard landings from jumps) but I've had very little trouble with Intecs releasing - just a couple incidents of not being properly clicked in to begin with, or heel screws loosening up, both of which are totally avoidable. IMO there's no question about Intecs being safer. My only worry is that the plastic frame of the heelpiece may break. That's almost unheard-of though. Hasn't happened to me and I've punished the **** out of mine. And I'm sure Bomber can build something that I won't worry about in the slightest.

I sure hope that little bird is correct.

+1 for moving bindings back on pow days. Even better, have two boards and set the bindings back on one. :) IMO this makes more difference width (well, to a point...) or stiffness. I've got a custom Axxess (172 x 19) that I'm very happy with... I ride mine with the bindings centered and I have a 2nd board with aft bindings that I ride when there's lots of new snow. I think a similar board (Donek AX, Coiler AM, etc) with the regular 21cm waist would be a good complement for your Madd. Set the bindings back a bit for better pow float.

Aw schucks. I thought Pierre was special.

"Pierre de Fermat" This account has only made one post (and a short one, at that) therefore it is in excellent condition. Someone just tried to log in 5 times (enough to get it locked out) so it clearly has value to at least one of you. We'll do this auction-style. Bidding starts at one dollar. Proceeds will go to the Bomber Legal Defense Fund.

To me, the right width is the one that matches the stance that I find most comfortable. I came down slowly, riding 25, 23, 21 cm boards, and settled on 19 as the sweet spot. Had a 17, but had mixed feelings about it. (Speaking of which - Bruce, did you get my email about paying full price for a second one? I came to terms with the fact that I just plain broke the first one all by myself. :) ) Narrower boards feel lighter under my feet. I doubt they really are much lighter, but it takes noticeably less effort to tip a skinny board on edge compared to a wider board. But stance comfort is still the thing that dictates width for me.

Twin Tail Technology You beat me to it. :(

UPZs also fit my feet better than Raichles do (less volume around the ankle and over the tops of my feet) so I understand that fitting work isn't always the best answer. But... Which part of your heel hurts? My heels have knobs on them right below my achilles, and having a boot fitter grind out some material (a lot of material) in that area really helped. If there's a particular spot that is giving you trouble, consider working on it that way. It's always nice to have a second set of boots in case something goes wrong with the first set, or if someone wants to try hardbooting. :)

I'm trying to picture in my head how this would work... You come to the end of a carve (toeside, for the sake of discussion) and you wrench the nose of the board to the other edge. So you're leaning on your front heel, while still maintaining pressure on your rear toe. Does anyone here actually go bow-legged like that as they change edges? And conversely, you'd have to drive your knees toward the center of the board (if not beyond it) when switching from your heel edge to your toe edge. That sounds incredibly awkward. And then let's consider the fact that to maintain a carve the board has to actually be turning. What happens in the middle of the board when the tail is carving right and the nose is carving left? Until I see someone riding a board with a hinge in the middle I'm thinking this isn't possible.

I've ridden two boards until they were camberless (almost three now) and it doesn't make a huge difference. I guess that by the time I'm really into a carved turn, the board is flexed back far enough that a centimeter or two of camber isn't going to make a night-and-day difference.

I missed that thread. Will search now. Makes me wonder how many other AX customs were built last year. :)

Jack, that's awesome. :lol: I'd take the Donek AX 172 that I picked up last year. 19cm waist, 13m radius, does everything nicely. Probably going to get a second on this year just in case.

Injuries (or deaths) per 1000 is an interesting metric. Totals, however, are not interesting. I bet cars kill more people per year than skiing, snowboarding, and ice fishing combined.

Those are the bindings I was (no longer) riding when I had my simultaneous double ejection and leash breakage incident. Yay Burton! (OK, to be fair, I don't remember if it was a Burton leash that failed.)

There's been a bit of activity in the register of actions which suggests that a settlement is happening, and the case is being dismissed, at least between Joel and Bomber. There isn't much information there, and I'm no lawyer but that's how I read it. I'm hoping that this works out well for Bomber. Click for a little more. I don't see anything about the cross-complaint from Boards And More though.

For the record, I'm very happy with my TD2s and would gladly ride them until I run out of heel receivers. But there are a couple things that might motivate me to upgrade: 1) Something to keep the board-to-binding mounting screws tight. Perhaps screws with bigger heads, drilled for safety wire. Or maybe old-school hexagonal-head bolts, with a metal plate under them, with tabs that can be bent upward to stop the bolt from rotating. If this problem is solved I will upgrade for sure. The coating on the Intec heel receivers does a fantastic job of holding the screws in place. Those have never come loose for me. Perhaps the same coating would be helpful on the mounting disc. I don't know if it would really work as well though, due to the relatively squishy nature of wood (as compared bolting metal directly to metal). 2) Improved vibration damping. The TD2 system is clever and effective, but an even more clever fully-floating system might be even more effective. This might be achieved by revising only the center disc, though I'm not sure if there's enough room under there. I might upgrade for this alone. Would probably buy one set to try it and then decide if I wanted another set. 3) Longer lugs on the ends of the bails, and longer threads on the bails. I just want a couple more turns of usable adjustment range. If wouldn't personally upgrade just for this, but if my boot soles were 1-2mm longer then I might think differently. Somebody mentioned Teflon coatings. That might be neat. However since I started coating my contact areas with a very thin layer of Bomber Butter, I have had very little trouble with snow interference. I just touch a fingertip to the grease, and then smear that around. The angled ramps that meet the pins get a little more.

What makes you think we don't? As others have noted, it's tedious. The top plate screws are usually tight, but the screws that go into the board are another matter. If performing this chore brings you pleasure, then don't worry about the TD3, I'm sure you'll still be able to do this as often as you like.

I forgot to mention that last season the "push-pull" think that the extreme-carve guys have been talking about finally clicked for me. I've tried it before and thought it made no difference at all, but I guess I was doing it wrong. This year I tried it again and... well, it put a huge smile on my face. I don't have an opinion as to whether or not it helps or hurts technically but it feels really cool. It just feels right in a way that's hard to explain. I get it now, and I'll be doing a lot more of it.

Stay out of the hospital. Get 30 days of ~6 hours each (counting time on lift, but not time in lodge) No equipment failures. Finally truly fix an intermittent foot pain issue that I've had forever. Enjoy my new (used) 190 a few times. Get my left shoulder closer to the snow in heelsides. Keep my hands off the snow in toesides. Get more consistent with 360s and backside 180s. Convert an intrigued softbooter I met last season. ECES or SES.

Made a deal with my boss to take Wednesdays off in Feb, March, and April. Probably got about 30 days in. Switched from Snoqualmie pass, where I've had a season pass since 1994/1995 to Sevens Pass, where I scored a deal on 10 discounted tickets. Snoqualmie's terrain park has been steadily declining (unless you like jibs (I don't)) but Stevens was awesome this year. I don't think I broke even on my Snoqualmie pass, for the first time ever. It was an expensive year, but worth it. Got much more comfortable with 360 airs - grabbed a 360, though only once; did ~12 360 airs off the same jump in an equal number of runs. Got much more comfortable doing backside 180 airs too. Got a sweet board from Donek, based on their 172 AX mold but narrower (19cm) and with a larger sidecut (13m) and stiffer (9.0) and I love it. It carves really well and the width is just right for the angles I want to ride, and I can go switch without worrying about digging the tail in. And the metallic red topsheet.... Stevens pass had an epic (overused, but apt) year in the terrain park. One day they had 5 consecutive jumps, all sized perfectly so you could just drop in, bomb straight ahead, and get a perfectly soft landing every time. I guesstimated 4 runs/hour, x 5 jumps/run, x 6 hours = 120 nice big cushy smooth airs that day. Just glorious. And even on the worst days I could usually get 3-4 good ones with just a little work. Was looking at my tracks from the lift one day and noticed that my hand was touching snow while I was carving on the downhill edge. I was pushing myself to carve more aggressively, but I wasn't specifically trying to do that, so it was neat to see that just happen. Finally got past a mental block that's been holding me back in the halfpipe since I broke my collarbone almost 10 years ago. My airs went from barely-above-the-lip and feeling awkward, to about waist-high and feeling comfortable. Got UPZ boots one size bigger than last time, this time they fit great. They're much stiffer than I was accustomed to (coming from SB 324s) but by the end of the season I was perfectly happy in them. My feet are shaped much more like UPZs than like Raichles. Still need to tweak my footbeds a little though. I think I am going to make a convert next year - one of the lift ops said he'd noticed the way I was carving and wanted to try it. His feet are the same size as mine, and now I have two full sets of gear (board/boots/bindings) so he's going to try a setup next season (unfortunately we only had that talk right before the season ended). Got humbled by the sheer size of the jumps they're building this year. A couple years ago I was hitting their biggest jumps and they were right on the edge of my comfort zone. This year the biggest jumps were completely out of my league. It was kind of disappointing and discouraging to go around them every time, but I did. Had to admit to myself that I am getting too old for some of this stuff. I finished the season with no injuries. :)

My girlfriend's best friend's brother had a section of skull removed, about the size of a silver dollar. I've forgotten what the operation was about... but anyway, they actually gave him the bone piece to take home. GF said he looked really weird with this section missing from his head. Punch line: the doctors later put the piece of bone back in. That is just the weirdest most bizarre thing. It's not surprising to me that they let him have it, but it blows me away that they'd put it back in after letting him (any patient, really) have custody of it. Seems like a recipe for infection?!? I'm told he's doing fine though.

They could see your brain from the chairlift??? That's awesome!

You must eat a lot of Alphabet soup.

Show us your brain! Braaaaiinsss!

I think I paid $80ish. I was looking for one online for almost a year when it was out of production. Tons of shops had them in online catalogs, but none had them in stock. And then I happened across one on a shelf at a local shop earlier this year. At that point it was just old stock than hadn't sold, so I got it at a discount. Pure luck. I'm pretty sure the 06/07 model didn't have the boot carrier bits. But looking at Spyder's own web site, it seems to be back in production.