Last year, on the first trip since I'd been cleared to ski on my replacement hip, I broke my ski in the bumps. I was a bit off balance and hit the trough wrong - hard. I heard something snap. I didn't fall but blew out of the line uncontrollably. Spent some time checking out my hip but it felt OK. Tried to ski but skied like crap - especially if I got a bit back. (Note that I ski like a teenager from the 60s - always in the back seat.) Really wondered what I'd done to my hip. Until I went to spray my wife and fell in an undignified heap at her feet. "Dad, your ski is broken!" Sure enough, the top skin and core was completely severed. The ski was held together by the bottom skin and Ptex. Amazing boost to the confidence in my new hip!
I'd love to say that's my only broken ski but just a couple years ago I did exactly the same thing to some Atomics we had gotten for my wife. She didn't like them but I did! Until I hit the bump wrong. Same top skin failure. Carefully finished the day on the ptex bases holding it together.
Broke another old Goode top skin in a similar fashion. But that failure started at the binding hole and the break exploded the binding out of the ski. One foot skied down from that one.
Last winter, one of the college kids did
@slowrider 's delamination to his new skis. Good warranty service but he had to demo one of my skis for a day or two.
Like
@crgildart , I consumed skis in the old days. I loved K2 Threes but always had to have a spare handy. The thrift stores were well stocked in orphan skis (it wasn't just me) so it was easy to find a spare. Got pretty good at skiing on one ski back then.
Maybe I need to get better at skiing the bumps smoothly...
I dissect lots of broken waterskis. If my skis don't break, I remove material until they do. Then spot reinforce the broken area. I'd guess that
@KevinF needed carbon in the bottom skin instead of glass.
@slowrider needed the core to be drier (if it was wood) or stronger (if it was foam) or a more adhesive resin to bond the core. My skis needed something better than carbon in compression to hold the top sheets together under load. Note, I cured the same problem in my waterskis by replacing the carbon with boron.
Skis are often quite overbuilt. This is really good for longevity and resistance to breakage but has some significant performance tradeoffs. As the skiing population ages and more women demand performance skis, excess weight is becoming less acceptable. As weights come down, we will probably see small amount of more breakage. A reasonable tradeoff for improved performance.
Eric
