Camber

[photodad2001]

Camber... Huh!!! Good God!!! ...What is it good for?.... Absolutely nothing??????

How important is camber really? Will the edge hold? Is side-cut and stiffness obsolete without camber? Discuss.

[Jack M]

You need some camber to distribute pressure from under your feet out to the ends of the board. A board with no camber will work, but it would not initiate or finish a turn very well. It would feel less responsive and not as snappy. I believe a deliberately camberless board would have to be built stiffer and therefore heavier to feel as stiff as the same board with camber.

Of course, this all goes out the window if discussing powder boards.

[b0ardski]

I demoed a rockered libtech skate bannana last year.

On packed snow the magnetraction (wavy) edge held amazingly well, but 99.9% of that edge hold was inbetween my feet. If I even tried to reach out to load the nose into a turn there was nothing there to bite in and hold me up, let alone carve low. Trying to carve was futile.

In steep soft bumps (the face at Schwietzer) it turned me into a spinning machine in hard boots at 35*/47*. Now I love spinning and if that was all I ever wanted to do then rocker is the tool.

In really deep snow the rocker is good for porpoising & really tight trees, but it's a detriment on hardpack unless you ride duck with a 24in stance:barf:

[NateW]

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.

[SEJ]

I'm a little puzzled about it also. My Madd has an incredible amount, Coiler has almost none. If little camber affects the board, you wouldn't know it on the Coiler. I don't know what all the camber on the Madd is for, but I like my Coiler better, but there's a lot more going on than just the camber. Madd 170, Coiler 188PRWC. I've got a feeling that camber is just one of the many parts in the witches brew of making a good board. How much camber probably depends on stiffness, torsional ridgidty, sidecut shape, nose shape, etc, etc.

What Jack says makes perfect sense though, more camber = more pressure at the tip and the tail if stiffness remains the same.

[photodad2001]

You need some camber to distribute pressure from under your feet out to the ends of the board. A board with no camber will work, but it would not initiate or finish a turn very well. It would feel less responsive and not as snappy. I believe a deliberately camberless board would have to be built stiffer and therefore heavier to feel as stiff as the same board with camber.

Of course, this all goes out the window if discussing powder boards.

So you're saying that while locked into the turn a board without camber would feel the same? It's just the intiation and release?

[tex1230]

you should all remember that the o.p. is by his own statements riding 10yr old burtons - He may never have seen a board with camber.

[Jack M]

So you're saying that while locked into the turn a board without camber would feel the same? It's just the intiation and release?

I don't think they would feel the same. First of all, you can't very well get locked into a carve without a good initiation. And a bad finish will hurt the next initiation too. A rockered board (reverse camber) will not initiate period.

But between two boards with identical stiffness and flex pattern but one with zero camber, the one with camber should hold a better edge because it's distributing more pressure out along the whole board. That affects the whole carve. And any efforts to load the nose or tail will be more effective with camber.

[Chris Houghton]

Camber makes a significant change to the edge to edge transitions. The board has to be "lifted" more to disengage before traversing over to the other edge. Admittedly not so much for cross over, but definitely for cross under turns, so the lazy (flegmatic) among us may not notice the difference. I don't see that it makes a huge difference in edge hold, but it is one of the design features that a manufacturer may use to improve edge hold. Torsional stiffness probably has a much larger effect on edge hold than camber - think metal.

[photodad2001]

you should all remember that the o.p. is by his own statements riding 10yr old burtons - He may never have seen a board with camber.

1- 9yr. old Burton and 1- 10 year old Sims actually. The Sims still has about a centimeter of camber and the Burton about 2mm. You can't see it on thick carpet, have to look at it on a hard surface. I still have my old jib boards... well a couple. I've been snowboarding since 86, but only started euro-carving winter of 07/08. Haven't had 10-20 years to build a quiver of carve boards. Spent my money last year on the burton, a seasons pass, and driving to the hill 3 times a week. Recieved a lot of help and good advice on here though.

[b0ardski]

I've ridden 4 boards into camberlessness over the years.

Cliff drops in Alpental backcountry into a foot of fresh cascade concrete tend to stress the flex pattern of any board.

'92 nitro diablo 186 twintip, 149 eff. edge, pre-insert (titanium plate under the binders to hold the screws) carved great until the reinforcment plates under the binders bent. It still had camber between the feet but it didn't carve well after that. traded it for an '81 polaris 440 in '98.

good trade:biggthump

'92 libtec Grocer, twintip 186, 25 waist, 142 effective edge, big powder tips. Carved as well as any race board of the time when new. Cascade concrete is a camber killer. Still rides powder OK, but it don't carve so good no more:(

'93 asym alp 159. too small for me at 6ft, 180#, but it was great in tight trees and bumps at Blacktail MT.

'98 K2 edorado 159. Killer all Mt. board. Bought it for Mrs. b0ardski but she found it to stiff for her mellow style. So I carved the $hite out of it for years until an early season rock ripped the edge out. replaced it w/165 for my all mt. rock board.

The eldos were big mt. rippers:1luvu:

I haven't decambered the 159 & 164 factory primes because I get bored if I can't switch it up.

In summation, the spring (liveliness) is enhanced by camber.

If the camber is built into the core, as opposed to held in place by the laminates, its carvability will last for years.

Have you ever ridden in a car with flat springs??? It still steers, it still drives down the road, but its not a smooth ride.

[www.oldsnowboards.com]

I can't wait to post to this thread

[Steve Prokopiw]

is on the steepest runs riding at the slowest vertical decent rate while cranking the tightest,most aggro turns on the longest boards using the most precise timing of movements.There.

[Sinecure]

/\/\ Camber is nice when doing jump turns down steeps. The extra pop off the edge can really help set you up for the next edge set.

I've ridden a 171 Donek FC1 to where it has almost no camber. It still rides well, but I have to agree with Jack that it does not initiate, nor finish turns as well as my newer boards. It is very smooth and somewhat forgiving when I loan it to people. Its also now my rock board so I take it BC riding in the spring if we're booting up all the way. Its not bad for that.

I haven't ridden reverse camber boards, other than big swallowtails like the Nitro Pow Gun 196 and O-Sin 4807 178. Those are great in powder, although I've broken both on rocks/cliffs.

I have ridden powder with some reverse-camber, reverse-sidecut skis. They are absolutely amazing in deep snow. You can "butter" turns and sort of skid your way into a carve without having to worry about the tips or tails getting hung up in the snow. If you end up on firm groomed, you have to ride them gingerly, but that rarely happens on a powder day. It feels so much like cheating, that its now almost my preferred powder weapon. If the proposed terrain requires any traversing or worse, skinning, then the fat skis are the best tool for the job. They are in part responsible for my revived interest in skiing in addition to riding.

[BlueB]

I haven't ridden reverse camber boards, other than big swallowtails like the Nitro Pow Gun 196 and O-Sin 4807 178.

4807s are not reverse camber. They should have somewhere betwen 5 and 8mm of camber when new. They carve really well too (for what they are).

One of my worst skiing experiencs was borowing some old compleately decambered skis from rentals to teach on them on a rock day. They didn't initiate, nor hold the line.

Snowboards feel dead and tired when ridden into no-camber state.

[Dave ESPI]

you should all remember that the o.p. is by his own statements riding 10yr old burtons - He may never have seen a board with camber.

Funniest ZING! Ive read in a while.. LMAO.

I have a few older boards, and can say that 2 of them are near "flat". they both ride nicely, but the older board that I rarely ride that still has a ton of "pop" left in it is like night and day as to responsiveness over the flat one that ive got well over 12,000 miles on.

Do you need it ? no.

DO you want it? IMHO YES.

[Jack M]

Do you need it ?

Isn't that kind of like asking "do you need to snowboard?"

[Jon Dahl]

I can't wait to post to this thread

Yeah, but I've seen what you ride!! My 160 lb. backside wouldnt even flex some of your stuff!! Camber is part of the pop/turn initiation equation, but only part. And you can see how Donek and Coiler uses it differently. Rocker is another animal entirely different in its use in board tech.

[softbootsurfer]

Uh, take your board and put it on the floor

Step on it...no Camber now is there.

You need flex to load not camber

I have old boards with no camber that ride just as good

as the new ones with camber...

[b0ardski]

"I have old boards with no camber that ride just as good

as the new ones with camber...:eek:"

I call bull sheite

I've had 8-9 boards new, after a season or less of use they start loosing camber & response, i.e. spring/feedback. They no longer carve like new.

If you start with a stiffer flex, the carvability of the board will last longer under all circumstances.

[colintkemp]

We're all such nice kids in the sandbox when we disagree.

I think camber makes a difference, and here's why I think that:

1. Kildly 169 = no camber, dead. It rides but has no snap at all; it feels heavy and dead.

2. Volant 173 = no camber, dead, bent. It rides; no snap; super soft.

3. Donek FC 185 = .25 inch of camber. Snap; not as lively as it used to be, but a heck of a lot more lively than the Volant; still a board that can snap out of very quick turns on very steep groomers.

4. Virus titinal Berseker 183. 3.5 inches of camber (truly). Unbelievable snap; it launches me out of turns (you know, the kind where you actually air out of the turn); insanely lively; fast edge to edge; slight lack of stability at mach 3. Sickeningly responsive.

5. Kessler 185. 0.25 inch of camber (but that is with OS2s and Hangl - super heavy set up). Not quite as lively as the Virus, but fast in and out of turns at mach speeds; a launch pad. Very responsive

6. Burner 197. 1.5 inches of camber. Very lively for its size.

Now, I don't know if you can give camber 100% credit for boards being "lively" or "snappy," but the responsiveness of my boards seem to suggest that camber has a role.

[softbootsurfer]

...All my turns are initiated by applying my body weight to the front

of my stick, where the sidecut then takes over for the finish and the flex kicks

in to allow the transition to the next turn...loading and unloading is done

with flex and sidecut...maybe camber helps but it is not necessary...

[b0ardski]

a board can be built to carve like a demon with no camber but stiffness, sidecut & flex will have to be enhanced to make it happen.

[b0ardski]

I'll go back to the car analogy. No such thing as a flat leaf spring, at least when its new.

[csquared]

After an accident with my Coiler Racecarve 180, I ended up with zero camber (that's not zero lying on the floor - I mean zero standing upright - flat as a table). It still had nice flex though likley a somewhat higher flex number under the Coiler system so I took it out one day to see if it would still rail.

In a nutshell, the biggest issue was that the board would not ride flat and was difficult to keep pointed until well into a carve. The lack of camber seemed to mean that the tip and tail were inclined to flutter instead of tracking the snow when the board was running flat or nearly flat.

As with any structure, camber is a means of applying stress to a member such that when it is in its "zero" position, the member is delivering its design strength and resisting bending. Without camber, the member must flex somewhat beyond its "zero" position before it begins to act appreciably. This momentary weakness before a member offers significant resistance means there is less than full strength to resist encountered forces and movement is possible - that is it is free to flutter within a small range. We need camber so that our boards are at full strength when running flat and have resistance against flexure from the moment of turn initiation (rather than from 5% bending onwards).