Plate insert patterns (UPM, Allflex)

[TimW]

Does anyone have the dimensions ( insert locations) for UPM & Allflex mount?

I intend to built a snowboard + plate, but want to use  the standard insert patterns so I could use other plate designs as well. (The board will be plate specific  so I will not include 4x4 inserts, as the board should not work without a plate anyway)

If anyone has the dimensions or would be willing to measure them for me that would great. As I understand Allflex uses standard distance between front and back inserts, UPM I am not sure.

[Corey]

Not sure how current this is, drawing from Bomber:

[Lurch]

Interesting it is not symmetrical. 

[Corey]

Oh, I think that was updated to be symmetrical. I asked Coiler to center the pattern on one board, Donek is definitely symmetrical. 

[pokkis]

Allflex ones, note there are two versions, ASL/W-GS and M-GS

Edited June 15, 2019 by pokkis

[TimW]

Perfect! Thank you guys!

[SunSurfer]

Thanks Pokkis, I've wanted to know the AllFlex pattern dimensions for a while. 784mm is a good deal more board torsionally stiffened than the standard max UPM 660mm interaxle distance.

[pokkis]

Agree, even board builders dont so much puttin inserts to thinner section, but for plate working that is best available setup

I have one board with ASL insert setup and another with GS, so i made mechanics that can be used for both with same plate. Just by changing left side mechanics to right side and vice versa You get it if you think.

[skategoat]

On 6/14/2019 at 4:48 PM, Corey said:

Not sure how current this is, drawing from Bomber:

That's actually Apex's drawing that we distributed to all snowboard manufacturers back in 2010 when our V1 was released to the general public. We called it the ASIP (Apex Standard Insert Pattern). UPM was a term invented by the third parties.

Not all ASIP compatible boards conform to those dimensions. A lot of manufacturers (I'm looking at you Kessler), drifted from them as they experimented or customised for individual racers.

Edited June 22, 2019 by skategoat

[daveo]

7 hours ago, skategoat said:

That's actually Apex's drawing that we distributed to all snowboard manufacturers back in 2010 when our V1 was released to the general public. We called it the ASIP (Apex Standard Insert Pattern). UPM was a term invented by the third parties.

I am glad you mentioned this. I would think someone with integrity would have published papers with ASIP in the description, not UPM. Now that ASIP has pretty much been deprecated, it hardly matters, but it would have given Apex much more exposure, when they were the benchmark plate, if the name of the insert pattern wasn't randomly changed somewhere along the way. It's a shame stuff like this happens in such a small industry/'community'.

[Corey]

From what I heard; the intention was not to slight one company, but rather to pick a name that was not associated with any company to make it a more universal standard. 

If you're company A, would you proudly proclaim that you now use a hole pattern from company B? Could that be seen as weakening your position? Would you have to pay a licensing fee? 

This does change when company B is the industry leader or a well established standard. See 4x4 (F2's design?), Burton 3D/Channel, AllFlex hole pattern, etc. 

[daveo]

8 hours ago, Corey said:

If you're company A, would you proudly proclaim that you now use a hole pattern from company B?

If company B had put years of research to develop it and had already named it, and I were company A, then yes, definitely. Without a doubt.

It is a shame that it was done intentionally to undermine Apex. It really sucks that a community this small doesn't offer each other support.

In the end, it seems like all "UPM" plates were inferior to the Apex design anyway. From what I understand, they all implemented design aspects which were already invalidated by the research Apex had done. 

 

[Corey]

6 hours ago, daveo said:

It is a shame that it was done intentionally to undermine Apex.

How do you figure this? 

How do you feel about using 4x4 inserts? 

[skategoat]

It's no big deal. I can understand why Bomber and Donek didn't want to use the ASIP name. The only thing that bugs me is that they could have come up with their own drawing instead of cutting and pasting their made-up name on mine. I rejected UPM because there's nothing "universal" about it!

[daveo]

19 hours ago, Corey said:

How do you figure this?

Collusion between Donek and Bomber to, as you say, not weaken their position or essentially not strengthen the opposition's (Apex) position- I think this is undermining Apex. The word undermine is open to interpretation, but I think ya get me.

I wonder if it was Donek who had been in Apex's position, if the same logic and would have applied from Bomber in an attempt to undermine (or whatever) Donek. Or vice-versa. I can only speculate on the answer.

Maybe that's just how business is done in your end of the world, but this sort of thing is generally frowned upon here. And if that's just the norm over your way, then sure thang. But ... plagiarism? Surely engineers, regardless of geographical position, hold themselves to a higher standard than that.

On 6/23/2019 at 8:56 PM, Corey said:

Would you have to pay a licensing fee?

Given the nature of Henry & Apex, do you really think this is even a remote possibility? I don't.

19 hours ago, Corey said:

How do you feel about using 4x4 inserts? 

If you mean about the naming scheme, then to be honest the naming scheme for 4x4 inserts is before my time. Were these initially called something else by a manufacturer and then adopted industry wide by means of collusion as 4x4 in an attempt to not use the manufacturer's initial designation as to not weaken the other players in the market's position?

But if you're asking how I feel about using them, then I think they work quite well. Would be nice if there was a standard hole depth (surely that has a name?) and bolt length based on the thickness of binding baseplates as sometimes I feel these can differ between between manufacturers and can lead to some issues.

Edited June 24, 2019 by daveo

[SunSurfer]

I hadn't figured you for a conspiracy theorist @daveo . Apex's reputation has always ridden on the perceived quality of their design, construction, and the results of riders on Apex plates. Their reputation does not significantly risde on the position of the mounting holes in the board. If anything, the wide uptake of their original insert layout by board makers and other isolation plate designers might be construed to make the chances of a rider purchasing an Apex plate higher because of the interchangeability between plates and boards. Plenty of other people beside Bomber and Donek using the term UPM from pretty early on in the isolation plate explosion that began immediately prior to the Vancouver Olympics inspired by Benjamin Karl's success with his plate on theWorld Cup. Donek and Bomber had competing plate designs. SG used the same 12.9cm x 3cm insert spacing.

As for your contention that Apex outdesigned everyone else at any stage of the progression of their designs, an awful lot of beer could be drunk while debating that. Isolation plate design is far from being optimised.

Edited June 25, 2019 by SunSurfer
Add detail

[daveo]

8 hours ago, SunSurfer said:

I hadn't figured you for a conspiracy theorist @daveo .

Me neither. I have merely reiterated facts, which have been stated on this forum

I think there is one (or is this two?) thing we can all agree on and that is that Apex products are of the highest quality and the designs are well researched and thought out.

And for a 10% discount use my coupon in the Apex checkout. DAVEO10.

Edited June 25, 2019 by daveo

[daveo]

@SunSurfer to avoid confusion, that last part was a joke mate 

[SunSurfer]

@daveo

Should we ever get to ride together, afterwards I'll buy the first round.

[skategoat]

On 6/25/2019 at 12:19 AM, SunSurfer said:

I hadn't figured you for a conspiracy theorist @daveo . Apex's reputation has always ridden on the perceived quality of their design, construction, and the results of riders on Apex plates. Their reputation does not significantly risde on the position of the mounting holes in the board. If anything, the wide uptake of their original insert layout by board makers and other isolation plate designers might be construed to make the chances of a rider purchasing an Apex plate higher because of the interchangeability between plates and boards. Plenty of other people beside Bomber and Donek using the term UPM from pretty early on in the isolation plate explosion that began immediately prior to the Vancouver Olympics inspired by Benjamin Karl's success with his plate on theWorld Cup. Donek and Bomber had competing plate designs. SG used the same 12.9cm x 3cm insert spacing.

As for your contention that Apex outdesigned everyone else at any stage of the progression of their designs, an awful lot of beer could be drunk while debating that. Isolation plate design is far from being optimised.

To set the record straight, the term UPM was proposed to me by Fin and Sean after we released our plate to the public. I declined since I didn't feel it was a universal at all. And, to be honest, the insert pattern was only a slight modification on the Hangl design. Since the entire plate system was literally wrapped in duct tape and secrecy prior to the Olympics, I highly doubt that the term UPM or ASIP existed prior to the 2010 Games.

Benji's plate was indeed the inspiration for the Apex project. The Canadian team wanted a plate that would deliver the benefits of Karl's isolation plate but be actually ride-able by humans and not just Austrian cyborgs.

SG used the 4x4 pattern to mount their plates. In conversations with Sigi, he was adamant in retaining the 4x4 inserts. This was clearly a mistake in our opinion since the axle positions were too far inboard. Your foot would roll forward using the axle as a fulcrum, lifting the centre of the plate. SG tried to address this with posts and bumpers under the nose of the plate and by making the plate thick and stiff. Other 4x4 mounted plates had similar issues.

All water under the bridge but I thought I would settle the facts.

[SunSurfer]

My bad. SG plate is mounted into a standard 4x4 or 4x2 cm insert pattern.

[daveo]

After Sean and Fin approached Apex to change the name of their insert pattern, and after having their proposal rejected, they still had the nerve to cut and paste their UPM designation on the Apex drawing. Absolutely despicable. What a regretful piece of history to mar our otherwise amazing community.

[rjnakata]

On 6/28/2019 at 8:02 PM, skategoat said:

SG used the 4x4 pattern to mount their plates. In conversations with Sigi, he was adamant in retaining the 4x4 inserts. This was clearly a mistake in our opinion since the axle positions were too far inboard. Your foot would roll forward using the axle as a fulcrum, lifting the centre of the plate. 

Did Apex's 4x4 mounting system solved this problem?

[lowrider]

4x4 mounting system has always been the problem . For most people who have tried and not likes the feel of the plate was most likely due to the fact that the plates didn't work as well on 4x4 as they did with (UPM). The most effective plates aside from stiffness were ones that had the longest hardware foot print but that also created problems as Sunsurfer discovered the expensive way. Thinner areas of the board were not an ideal locations for extra inserts. My suggestion to you if building a matching board and plate is to make the plate as long as you can but respect the limits when attaching the inserts to the most delicate area of the board. Perhaps experiment with hardware that can allow for positioning the hardware  well away from the extreme edges of the board.

[skategoat]

On 6/30/2019 at 6:23 PM, rjnakata said:

Did Apex's 4x4 mounting system solved this problem?

You can see that the mounts screw into the 4x4 holes but the plate axles are pushed out towards the nose and tail.

We had to be careful about insert placement. As you move out, as lowrider states, you encounter problems with not enough board thickness for a strong mount. Allflex required inserts even further out which not only created problems with board thickness but also created a handy stress riser where the board would often fold. When an Allflex compatible board fails, it folds on a straight line across the front inserts.