Kästle Announces Largest Model Line Increase Since 2007

[Philpug]

If you pay full retail, then Kästle prices are high for many models. The non-hp FXs of recent years have been priced more modestly, even at MAP. Once you start looking at used skis or NOS purchases patiently, as I'm usually doing, the supposedly outrageous coast of buying Kästle more or less disappears in my experience. Yes, this is a consumer perspective, not a vendor perspective.

There is still a contingent that feel a used or NOS Kastle is better than a new XXXX..not that there is anything wrong with that.

 

[Philpug]

I must be a painfully slow skier as I've been on a number of Stormriders in various conditions and I don't think I've ever found a speed limit. But then there have been quite a few different Stormrider models with different characteristics and I haven't been on all of them. Also length of ski matters. If criticism or complements are supposed to apply to all models of a brand or years of a model in some general way, particularly if it doesn't include more information such as conditions, length, etc., honestly, I discount it.

The bamboo SR88 is the only one I came close to thinking there was a limit....and IMHO this is why it was a one year ski.

 

[ARL67]

^^^ Phil: above, is it the 2017 SR88 you are referring too in this cage-match ?

https://www.pugski.com/threads/2017-head-monster-88-vs-2017-stöckli-stormrider-88.3183/

I have the SR97 177 of that generation ( that year had the 83, 88, 97 with similar graphics ) and I think the softer flex lends itself better in a 97 than what is expected out of an 88. That SR97 is now my sole travel- ski, but the new FX96 looks to be worth a serious sniff.

 

[ski otter 2]

I believe 17/18 SR 95, the one with silver background and black ovals up top; it just plain bottomed out on me, blasting right through the suspension, on powder/crud days. As if I were a big guy or something. I had to ski it carefully - then it was fine, with its incredible turn feel. I had to rely on that great turn and not get fancy or happy in the blizzard, so to speak. But I'm used to Katanas - used to a suspension and crud charge that is up for anything - in my own clumsy way.

The SR 88 was this year's, 19/20 - demoed at Copper, just a week ago. I have no idea where it -or that particular SR 95, fit in with all the others I never could demo. And I have almost no idea how this SR 88 really skis: the tune on this ski was a mess, a really dangerous burr tune. (The reps set it aside for fixing, after trying it themselves.) But I could tell it was very soft/flexy, relatively speaking. (Especially compared to all the amazing near race skis I'd been on most of the day that I've rarely gotten a chance at before.) And it briefly bottomed out in a way very similar to the SR 95, though with its tune I couldn't really explore it further, and didn't care to (the only ski I was on in two days - or three previous demo days this year - that I had any problem with). At the same time, for me the Stockli Laser AX (in multiple lengths) and the Laser GS (in multiple lengths), while they mostly had a mildly burr tune themselves, were stand out. (The burr tune was mild enough that it didn't get in the way of skiing except for that particular SR 88.)
And all those lasers were wonderful handling skis, just exceptional among so many really amazing skis of that sort from many brands.

To me, the Laser AX and GS would have seemed to lead to all mountain skis in the 80s and mid 90s like, say, the M5 Mantra, the Blizzard Brahma or Bonafide, not the two Stormriders I tried.

With the Kastles, on the other hand, I tried the new FX 106 HP, the ones Chris Davenport has on in the earlier pic, and to me, it is a real change, a real attempt in the direction I am describing, as if they'd heard from folks like me and responded in a good way: to me, it's a true freeride ski with a Kastle flavor. While I really like the BMX 105 HP a lot, still would love to own it - another I almost bought, the new 106 HP, for Kastle, is a big, big change. Into the freeride world.

 

[givethepigeye]

I believe 17/18 SR 95, the one with silver background and black ovals up top; it just plain bottomed out on me, blasting right through the suspension, on powder/crud days. As if I were a big guy or something. I had to ski it carefully - then it was fine, with its incredible turn feel. I had to rely on that great turn and not get fancy or happy in the blizzard, so to speak. But I'm used to Katanas - used to a suspension and crud charge that is up for anything - in my own clumsy way.

The SR 88 was this year's, 19/20 - demoed at Copper, just a week ago. I have no idea where it -or that particular SR 95, fit in with all the others I never could demo. And I have almost no idea how this SR 88 really skis: the tune on this ski was a mess, a really dangerous burr tune. (The reps set it aside for fixing, after trying it themselves.) But I could tell it was very soft/flexy, relatively speaking. (Especially compared to all the amazing near race skis I'd been on most of the day that I've rarely gotten a chance at before.) And it briefly bottomed out in a way very similar to the SR 95, though with its tune I couldn't really explore it further, and didn't care to (the only ski I was on in two days - or three previous demo days this year - that I had any problem with). At the same time, for me the Stockli Laser AX (in multiple lengths) and the Laser GS (in multiple lengths), while they mostly had a mildly burr tune themselves, were stand out. (The burr tune was mild enough that it didn't get in the way of skiing except for that particular SR 88.)
And all those lasers were wonderful handling skis, just exceptional among so many really amazing skis of that sort from many brands.

To me, the Laser AX and GS would have seemed to lead to all mountain skis in the 80s and mid 90s like, say, the M5 Mantra, the Blizzard Brahma or Bonafide, not the two Stormriders I tried.

With the Kastles, on the other hand, I tried the new FX 106 HP, the ones Chris Davenport has on in the earlier pic, and to me, it is a real change, a real attempt in the direction I am describing, as if they'd heard from folks like me and responded in a good way: to me, it's a true freeride ski with a Kastle flavor. While I really like the BMX 105 HP a lot, still would love to own it - another I almost bought, the new 106 HP, for Kastle, is a big, big change. Into the freeride world.

FWIW -You were on the 16/17 SR95, which is different than 17/18 ->18/19 plaid topsheet version. The 88 only sharesthe “SR” name with the 95, different ski, light and designed for uphill travel too.

Try the plaid topsheet ones, I think you might change your view.

 

[Swiss Toni]

It was shocking for me to learn that Kastle only sold 18,000 pairs of skis in the US against a goal of 30,000.

18,000 pairs p.a. is the worldwide sales figure, sales in the US are a third of that i.e. a paltry 6000 pairs, I think total ski sales in the US amount to 700,000 pairs p.a.

Growth, in and of itself, is not a negative in my book and does not necessarily indicate that we should expect a lesser product. Only time will tell and if quality does drop off, the market will deal with that.
HOWEVER, I do think that Kastle has a bigger problem. It's called Stockli and it's all about perception. I think that most people who spend the money on Kastles are, for the most part, informed skiing consumers. Stockli goes out of their way to make the point that it takes days to make every pair. The perception, which I think is true, is that Stoclklis are handmade. Kastles are not and, in fact, they have moved their production out of Austria to a less expensive production environment. Informed people, like yourself @Rybo, will view that as a negative. Now, if Kastles were $500 less than Stocklis, that would be one thing. But they're not. They're basically the same cost.
So, one has to ask themselves, do I want a handmade ski that takes days to produce or a product that has lost their Austrian production image and is now mass produced in the Czech Republic for the same money. Do I want a mass produced product that hopefully performs like a Porsche (we'll see) or a handmade product that skis like an MBZ? As a consumer, I know what my answer would be.

Stöckli skis don’t take days to make and are not really handmade. Stöckli have one of the most efficient and flexible manufacturing systems in the industry, the have to, on average labor in the manufacturing sector here in Switzerland costs around $56 an hour. The whole process of making any wood cored ski takes about 2 weeks, but most of that time is taken up drying the cores and the other components, you can’t glue wet wood. These days most of the work is done by machines, the only process that’s still done entirely by hand is laying up the ski in the molds. The main difference between Stöckli skis and almost all the other skis on the market including Kästle skis is the adhesive system, Stöckli uses a dry system which means that the assembly workers don’t have to wear gloves and can therefore place the components in the molds more precisely. Nearly everybody else uses either prepreg fiberglass or two component epoxy (which is really messy) to stick them together. If you want to buy a pair of ‘artisanal’ handmade skis you would have to buy them from one of the ‘Garagistas’.

Again, this is speculation, the RX & MX's will still come form Austria and priced similar to what they have been. FX's will also be comong from Austria but I am told there will be a price adjustment lower. PX, DX and junior skis will be coming from the Czech factory and will priced significanly lower.

This doesn’t tally with what the new owner Tomas Nemec has said:

“In order for Kästle’s growth targets in the premium ski sector to be met, it’s important for Kästle to have its own manufacturing facility for series production. This has been possible by bringing in an existing production facility in Nové Město na Moravě, which will operate from now on under “Kästle”. Together with the Kästle team in Hohenems, I look forward to meeting future challenges on the path towards further growth”, says Němec.

https://www.kaestle.com/fileadmin/u...mitteilungen/KAESTLE_Company_News_2019_EN.pdf

They may have to wait until the contracts with Head and Atomic come to an end, but series production will move to the Czech factory. They have to make their own skis, there have been a lot of changes since the Kästle brand was relaunched in 2007, this podcast with the CIO of the Tecnica Group and accompanying Q&A pdf https://www.ibm.com/thought-leadership/wild-ducks-podcast/episode-2-blizzard-ski-industry.html should help to explain why.

Also bear in mind that this is only the start, Tomas Nemec is a very rich man. According to Forbes he is worth around 650 million dollars, he intends to build Kästle into a major ski equipment manufacturing company. As well as Sporten and Kästle he also owns LevelSportKoncept https://www.levelsportkoncept.cz/ a major distributor of outdoor sports equipment in the Czech Republic. He also has a shareholding in the country’s largest ski resort and is still racing, he competes in the FIS Masters Cup.

 

[ski otter 2]

FWIW -You were on the 16/17 SR95, which is different than 17/18 ->18/19 plaid topsheet version. The 88 only sharesthe “SR” name with the 95, different ski, light and designed for uphill travel too.

Try the plaid topsheet ones, I think you might change your view.

Thanks, but.... Not likely to happen, except possibly at the next SIA.

And I'm guessing the problem runs deeper, and not for any lack of skills on my part, or yours.

The difference in our reactions, for me, might be partly the difference in our size, not sure. But also other, healthy differences. For example, the two versions of the Kastle FX 104 I skied were just fat race skis, to me. The kind of skis I'm talking about, the kind Kastle and Stockli both have a problem with selling, in my opinion: fat race skis, not freeride skis.

I liked that FX 104 ski charging on groomers, GS or SG style - in their own milieu - not in uneven crud or powder. (To me, too many relatively better skis for that.) If I were bigger, and younger, I might have sort of liked these wider Kastle-type skis in the broader applications you do, not sure. (But in really gnarly, 14er-like conditions, at my size, only the 94 & 95 HPs would work for me, though less for relatively tame resort slopes. I've climbed all the 14ers, but only in the summer.)

As a relative thing, I just don't like fat race skis in powder or crud, because, to me, it's a waste of powder. And I'm not alone. They've been passed by, made obsolete, by great freeride skis, mostly, in my opinion.

Such skis act like the powder and crud aren't there (and/or like it's 1985). A real waste of powder and crud, to me. If I wanted just a 2 dimensional response in a powder ski I'd be on the Rossignol Sickle 111, at any rate, a ski with some rocker and qualities dialed in for powder/crud; not a fat race ski a bit out of place, to me. (Now, an actual race ski in some powder, that's a different story: oddly enough, I often enjoy my race skis in some powder, as long as its under, say, 5 inches and smooth: the reason is all the rebound; roller coaster in a storm, so to speak.)





Thanks for what is apparently the actual 183 SR ski I bought, and then sold like a hot potato. It was a ski with a "longterm" review on this site, much acclaim. Maybe a softened, fat, race-derived ski.

"Just a nervous lawyer/doctor's ski," a friend of mine in the Industry calls it; though I don't know enough to generalize that much. But he'd tried to warn me against the SR 95, which he can ski at Vail free on his company's tab, or thanks to his girlfriend there, who works in a shop that carries Stocklis. I got the ski just to see; a real surprise: for me, a dog or guppy, not sure. A different father, maybe, than the Stockli Lasers.

By the way, the Stockli rep seemed to be saying that the SR95 was mostly unchanged for 19/20, when I asked him. The SR 88 was new.

My friend and his girlfriend have both skied one or more of the more recent plaid ones: an odd, nervous ski still, they both say, though they too love the Lasers.

I'm going to listen to them, this time. And get some different skis I've liked this season that are of similar width but, for me, more suited: I like to charge in a conservative GS way, sometimes fast (GS instead of SG, for me). And I like to play while skiing: really commit to down the hill, in the stiffest blizzard. Or on a bluebird day. In my clumsy way. (My coaches years ago liked to joke about how on earth I ever won any races. Or, some of the time, at least got close.

I'd wanted a powder/crud ski for "under-performing" powder days around here, since this past few seasons we had so many 2-4" days. And in spite of those Stocklis, I've found many. The best, to me: 177 Volkl M5 Mantras, 180 Bonafides, Volkl 178 V-Werks Mantras, as well as various Moment skis, etc.

I really recommend trying the 18/19 and unchanged 19/20 178 V-Werks Mantra, by the way.

 

[Philpug]

This doesn’t tally with what the new owner Tomas Nemec has said:

“In order for Kästle’s growth targets in the premium ski sector to be met, it’s important for Kästle to have its own manufacturing facility for series production. This has been possible by bringing in an existing production facility in Nové Město na Moravě, which will operate from now on under “Kästle”. Together with the Kästle team in Hohenems, I look forward to meeting future challenges on the path towards further growth”, says Němec.

https://www.kaestle.com/fileadmin/u...mitteilungen/KAESTLE_Company_News_2019_EN.pdf

They may have to wait until the contracts with Head and Atomic come to an end, but series production will move to the Czech factory. They have to make their own skis, there have been a lot of changes since the Kästle brand was relaunched in 2007, this podcast with the CIO of the Tecnica Group and accompanying Q&A pdf https://www.ibm.com/thought-leadership/wild-ducks-podcast/episode-2-blizzard-ski-industry.html should help to explain why.

Also bear in mind that this is only the start, Tomas Nemec is a very rich man. According to Forbes he is worth around 650 million dollars, he intends to build Kästle into a major ski equipment manufacturing company. As well as Sporten and Kästle he also owns LevelSportKoncept https://www.levelsportkoncept.cz/ a major distributor of outdoor sports equipment in the Czech Republic. He also has a shareholding in the country’s largest ski resort and is still racing, he competes in the FIS Masters Cup.

Remember too, Kastle has it's own facility to build skis in Austria where they are producing their special edition skis. What happens past this year is hard to say, very well they will pull the production from Head, I beleive they did from Elan already.

 

[Muleski]

Curious? What are the Kastle Special Edition skis? Proto 83, and others, I assume.

 

[Lorenzzo]

Curious? What are the Kastle Special Edition skis? Proto 83, and others, I assume.

Perhaps these. No longer for sale.

https://www.pugski.com/threads/2018-kastle-mx-limited-176.13556/#post-311816

 

[AltaFan]

Curious? What are the Kastle Special Edition skis? Proto 83, and others, I assume.

https://www.kaestle.com/en/products/skis/#limited-edition

 

[Philpug]

Curious? What are the Kastle Special Edition skis? Proto 83, and others, I assume.

​

 

[Scotty I.]

Stöckli skis don’t take days to make and are not really handmade. Stöckli have one of the most efficient and flexible manufacturing systems in the industry, the have to, on average labor in the manufacturing sector here in Switzerland costs around $56 an hour. The whole process of making any wood cored ski takes about 2 weeks, but most of that time is taken up drying the cores and the other components, you can’t glue wet wood. These days most of the work is done by machines, the only process that’s still done entirely by hand is laying up the ski in the molds. The main difference between Stöckli skis and almost all the other skis on the market including Kästle skis is the adhesive system, Stöckli uses a dry system which means that the assembly workers don’t have to wear gloves and can therefore place the components in the molds more precisely. Nearly everybody else uses either prepreg fiberglass or two component epoxy (which is really messy) to stick them together. If you want to buy a pair of ‘artisanal’ handmade skis you would have to buy them from one of the ‘Garagistas’.

Operative word and the point of my post: Perception

 

[AngryAnalyst]

Thanks, but.... Not likely to happen, except possibly at the next SIA.

And I'm guessing the problem runs deeper, and not for any lack of skills on my part, or yours.

The difference in our reactions, for me, might be partly the difference in our size, not sure. But also other, healthy differences. For example, the two versions of the Kastle FX 104 I skied were just fat race skis, to me. The kind of skis I'm talking about, the kind Kastle and Stockli both have a problem with selling, in my opinion: fat race skis, not freeride skis.

I liked that FX 104 ski charging on groomers, GS or SG style - in their own milieu - not in uneven crud or powder. (To me, too many relatively better skis for that.) If I were bigger, and younger, I might have sort of liked these wider Kastle-type skis in the broader applications you do, not sure. (But in really gnarly, 14er-like conditions, at my size, only the 94 & 95 HPs would work for me, though less for relatively tame resort slopes. I've climbed all the 14ers, but only in the summer.)

As a relative thing, I just don't like fat race skis in powder or crud, because, to me, it's a waste of powder. And I'm not alone. They've been passed by, made obsolete, by great freeride skis, mostly, in my opinion.

Such skis act like the powder and crud aren't there (and/or like it's 1985). A real waste of powder and crud, to me. If I wanted just a 2 dimensional response in a powder ski I'd be on the Rossignol Sickle 111, at any rate, a ski with some rocker and qualities dialed in for powder/crud; not a fat race ski a bit out of place, to me. (Now, an actual race ski in some powder, that's a different story: oddly enough, I often enjoy my race skis in some powder, as long as its under, say, 5 inches and smooth: the reason is all the rebound; roller coaster in a storm, so to speak.)





Thanks for what is apparently the actual 183 SR ski I bought, and then sold like a hot potato. It was a ski with a "longterm" review on this site, much acclaim. Maybe a softened, fat, race-derived ski.

"Just a nervous lawyer/doctor's ski," a friend of mine in the Industry calls it; though I don't know enough to generalize that much. But he'd tried to warn me against the SR 95, which he can ski at Vail free on his company's tab, or thanks to his girlfriend there, who works in a shop that carries Stocklis. I got the ski just to see; a real surprise: for me, a dog or guppy, not sure. A different father, maybe, than the Stockli Lasers.

By the way, the Stockli rep seemed to be saying that the SR95 was mostly unchanged for 19/20, when I asked him. The SR 88 was new.

My friend and his girlfriend have both skied one or more of the more recent plaid ones: an odd, nervous ski still, they both say, though they too love the Lasers.

I'm going to listen to them, this time. And get some different skis I've liked this season that are of similar width but, for me, more suited: I like to charge in a conservative GS way, sometimes fast (GS instead of SG, for me). And I like to play while skiing: really commit to down the hill, in the stiffest blizzard. Or on a bluebird day. In my clumsy way. (My coaches years ago liked to joke about how on earth I ever won any races. Or, some of the time, at least got close.

I'd wanted a powder/crud ski for "under-performing" powder days around here, since this past few seasons we had so many 2-4" days. And in spite of those Stocklis, I've found many. The best, to me: 177 Volkl M5 Mantras, 180 Bonafides, Volkl 178 V-Werks Mantras, as well as various Moment skis, etc.

I really recommend trying the 18/19 and unchanged 19/20 178 V-Werks Mantra, by the way.

Thanks for this post by the way - it’s the clearest verbalization of the issues with the wide Kastle and Stockli skis I have seen. I completely agree those parts I have experience with.

I own a pair of FX104 skis. They are tanks that are basically impossible to deflect and, arguably, the best all conditions survival ski I have ever used. If I’m in shape I can ski them hard and fast all day.

They make very little of that skiing particularly *fun* however. These days - I want mustache rocker so I can slide and slash and carve my way down the mountain. The Kastle is fun because it is fast, but I can go just as fast without beating myself up and play with turn shapes while I’m at it on a lot of “less prestigious” skis.

The Laser and MX lines are really excellent carvers but I have yet to ski (or see either company develop a shape that suggests) a good freeride ski from the Kastle/Stockli brands.

You did succeed in making me interested in the 106 but to be honest that waist width is a bit of a no mans land for me...

 

[Choucas]

There are over 8,000 views of this thread so far. That means there are more people randomly ruminating over the Kastle brand on a ski forum than Kastle skis sold in the US this year. Much ado about nothing.

 

[procos]

There are over 8,000 views of this thread so far. That means there are more people randomly ruminating over the Kastle brand on a ski forum than Kastle skis sold in the US this year. Much ado about nothing.

Agreed more than half the comments are by people who don't even buy the skis. I own 4 pairs and have owned many more. I love them and don't give a crap where they are built as long as they ski well. I would rather ski on skis than pontificate about how they will ski when production changes countries. Who really cares until you ski them. A lot of people will ski the new ones and not even give them a fair shot. You can tell a lot of people are more concerned about talking on a forum and what the darn things say on their topsheets than actual performance. Also I have no idea of how good these guys even ski. LOL

 

[ski otter 2]

What actually supports and balances, for me, hopefully, whatever time I spend on this skiing site, is a lot of days spent skiing, and that fun on skis. Not as many days as a ski patroller or instructor, or someone who lives in a ski town maybe, but, when you've had to work for it, sometimes you really do appreciate it.....

Also, though it doesn't matter in terms of this or any other ski discussion, I've owned 2 Kastles, own and ski both still, and currently own 5 (formerly 6) Stocklis. I ski 4 of those regularly still. And none of this matters one wit about whether someone might have something fun or interesting to say about Kastles being made elsewhere.

I have no idea how you ski either. Don't care. Will respect what you come up with if possible, though.

I figure some folks can't ski so often due to circumstances: age, health, finances, family, job, etc. And yet they love skiing too, and enjoy thinking about skis vicariously, if they can't hit the slopes so much or can; and like skiing as a bit of a hobby. Like postage stamps or Chevy engines, maybe. Dunno. But that's okay too.

For myself, I started skiing in 1953 or 54 at the latest. There's probably no one left alive who can tell me the exact year, actually. I've probably skied some 60+ seasons, conservatively speaking; some almost entirely back country. Since I've retired, I've generally skied close to every other day, when possible, averaging over 100 times a year pretty consistently - unless injured. Probably like you, I love to ski.

I too don't give a fig about the ramifications of where Kastles are made; but some folks obviously do. Maybe for them it's job-related, dunno. Different strokes, no problem. I only care about how the skis ski, and finding ones I'd like in easy, timely ways rather than more expensive ways. I'd love a more balanced and open discussion of the pros and cons of Kastle and Stockli skis, among others, to help me figure out what to get, within my budget.

Agreed more than half the comments are by people who don't even buy the skis. I own 4 pairs and have owned many more. I love them and don't give a crap where they are built as long as they ski well. I would rather ski on skis than pontificate about how they will ski when production changes countries. Who really cares until you ski them. A lot of people will ski the new ones and not even give them a fair shot. You can tell a lot of people are more concerned about talking on a forum and what the darn things say on their topsheets than actual performance. Also I have no idea of how good these guys even ski. LOL

 

[ARL67]

Anyone notice on Kastle's website their custom build-to-order ID4 ski ?

https://www.kaestle.com/en/products/skis/show/id4/

 

[AltaFan]

Anyone notice on Kastle's website their custom build-to-order ID4 ski ?

https://www.kaestle.com/en/products/skis/show/id4/

And it comes with “Handmade in Austria” markings for the low price of 2400 EUR.

 

[rj2]

There is still a contingent that feel a used or NOS Kastle is better than a new XXXX..not that there is anything wrong with that.

It's worked out well for me, thanks to @SkiEssentials