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KingGrump

Most Interesting Man In The World
Team Gathermeister
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Oh, don't forget the spring clamp. BTDT. :D
 

jzmtl

Intermidiot
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Apr 25, 2017
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323
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Montreal
One thing to keep in mind is the level of skis you are asked to sharpen. Rental class skis ideally should be machine sharpened as they have a harder Rockwell edge. They are a bitch to hand sharpen and will ruin your stones, files and other sharpening tools needlessly. Years ago K2 imported Chinese rental skis with edges that where so hard they almost couldn't be sharpened by machine let alone hand. High end and racing skis have a lower Rockwell temper (higher carbon though) so they can be hand sharpened. I know this sounds counterintuitive but its true and makes sense. Rental skis will take more abuse and a designed for machine sharpening a few times a season or as needed. Racing skis are lovingly tuned by technicians for each race. People may not believe me but I have Rockwell testing equipment at my company and verified it myself as I was skeptical. The highest Rockwell I tested was my daughters small child ski. It was designed to probably never be sharpened. Let me give you another interesting example. There is always an argument if high end Japanese or German kitchen knifes are best. Well both are equally sharp but Japanese knifes are tempered to a higher Rockwell so once sharp they last longer. But they can be brittle, chip and must be handled with greater care. German knifes are tempered to a lower Rockwell so their sharp edge do not last as long but can be more easily sharpened. They are also less likely to break or chip if dropped and can handle more abuse. So neither is better, they just are built to different ideas of what best is.

What's the ski edge test score in HRC? Curious to know.
 

Jacques

Workin' It on Skis Best I Can
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Apr 24, 2017
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Bend, OR
One thing to keep in mind is the level of skis you are asked to sharpen. Rental class skis ideally should be machine sharpened as they have a harder Rockwell edge. They are a bitch to hand sharpen and will ruin your stones, files and other sharpening tools needlessly. Years ago K2 imported Chinese rental skis with edges that where so hard they almost couldn't be sharpened by machine let alone hand. High end and racing skis have a lower Rockwell temper (higher carbon though) so they can be hand sharpened. I know this sounds counterintuitive but its true and makes sense. Rental skis will take more abuse and a designed for machine sharpening a few times a season or as needed. Racing skis are lovingly tuned by technicians for each race. People may not believe me but I have Rockwell testing equipment at my company and verified it myself as I was skeptical. The highest Rockwell I tested was my daughters small child ski. It was designed to probably never be sharpened. Let me give you another interesting example. There is always an argument if high end Japanese or German kitchen knifes are best. Well both are equally sharp but Japanese knifes are tempered to a higher Rockwell so once sharp they last longer. But they can be brittle, chip and must be handled with greater care. German knifes are tempered to a lower Rockwell so their sharp edge do not last as long but can be more easily sharpened. They are also less likely to break or chip if dropped and can handle more abuse. So neither is better, they just are built to different ideas of what best is.

IDK. I'd venture to say that any machine tuned edge will be harder.......at the surface anyway.
If one took the "machine" out of the edge, I think it would be a bit softer underneath.
So it goes to follow that the machine tuned rentals tested harder.
Most racing skis are hand tuned, so it goes to follow the surface would be softer than a heat treated by machine tuned edge.

I'd like to see you make a video of this testing to include a machined edge, then take out the machine tune and test again.
 
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TheArchitect

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It's been a very expensive week but I'm down to just diamond stones and brushes. So excited to get started! Thanks to all of you for all of your help!!!!
 

François Pugh

Skiing the powder
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It's been a very expensive week but I'm down to just diamond stones and brushes. So excited to get started! Thanks to all of you for all of your help!!!!
Brushes. You may come across and be tempted to buy a brush with steel or brass bristles on one side and nylon on the other half of the brush. Do not buy it; it is for cross country skis. Half the brush is not wide enough for alpine skis.
 

Steve

SkiMangoJazz
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Nov 13, 2015
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Good going. I don't know what your brush plans are, but after lots of years of lots of brushes I've come to prefer the larger oval sized brushes over the smaller rectangular ones.

People will suggest all kinds of combos of brush type. My current methodology is using only two brushes (although I own lots more!)

After scraping I have a nice soft Brass brush that gets a ton of the wax out without a lot of work. After that I use a horsehair brush.

I also have both soft and hard bristled nylon brushes. The Hard one is good for the first pass, but the brass one gets a lot more wax out. Some people may say that brass is only for cleaning bases, but the one I have is not that aggressive. Interested to see what others on the thread think about this.

The soft nylon is good for a final polish, makes the skis look nice, but is really not needed.
 
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TheArchitect

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Brushes. You may come across and be tempted to buy a brush with steel or brass bristles on one side and nylon on the other half of the brush. Do not buy it; it is for cross country skis. Half the brush is not wide enough for alpine skis.

Good going. I don't know what your brush plans are, but after lots of years of lots of brushes I've come to prefer the larger oval sized brushes over the smaller rectangular ones.

People will suggest all kinds of combos of brush type. My current methodology is using only two brushes (although I own lots more!)

After scraping I have a nice soft Brass brush that gets a ton of the wax out without a lot of work. After that I use a horsehair brush.

I also have both soft and hard bristled nylon brushes. The Hard one is good for the first pass, but the brass one gets a lot more wax out. Some people may say that brass is only for cleaning bases, but the one I have is not that aggressive. Interested to see what others on the thread think about this.

The soft nylon is good for a final polish, makes the skis look nice, but is really not needed.


My plans is to buy oval brushes. If Swix has a good price at the ski show I'll get those. If not I'm buying the Beast ones. I've been planning to get coarse bronze, med bronze, horsehair and nylon. I see ones that are made of steel but I didn't think I needed that one.
 
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TheArchitect

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Heh. It's Nov. 5 - I was somewhat expecting you to have a week of prep waxing under your belt :D

I wish! I had brought my skis to SkiMD before this saga started and he still has them. Plus, I'm still waiting for a bunch of stuff to arrive.

Speaking of SkiMD, I've been emailing back and forth with Mike and decided to have him do his Factory Fresh service on my FX94s. He had done that on my MX88s and I really loved how they came out. Turns out, his default base bevel is .5* and he recommended putting a 3* bevel on the side of the FXs. Sooooo, for all of those up-thread who were saying I should go to 3*, :doh: I should have listened to you! Apparently that's what he put on my MX88's and I didn't know. I'm leaving the BMXs as is for now.
 

Started at 53

Making fresh tracks
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Not Ikon, UT
I do not want to read this whole thread, I really don’t want to tune skis. But I am a cheap bastard and will likely eventually read this thread and tune our skis.










But I don’t want to do it
 

Dave Marshak

All Time World Champion
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Nov 17, 2015
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I do not want to read this whole thread, I really don’t want to tune skis. But I am a cheap bastard and will likely eventually read this thread and tune our skis.










But I don’t want to do it
Don't do it. You live in Utah.

If I still lived in Utah, I would throw my files away and use my diamond stones to round off the edges of all my new skis.

dm
 
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TheArchitect

TheArchitect

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I do not want to read this whole thread, I really don’t want to tune skis. But I am a cheap bastard and will likely eventually read this thread and tune our skis.










But I don’t want to do it

Come on, you know you want to..... ogsmile

I don't ever expect to break even on this, given how much I spent. You can certainly do it much cheaper than I have. If you plan on tuning multiple pairs of skis frequently in a season then I suspect you will end up saving money on top of having well-tuned skis all the time. I'm doing this because it's always been something I've thought I might enjoy, not to save money.
 

Marker

Making fresh tracks
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Oct 16, 2017
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2,352
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Kennett Square, PA & Killington, VT
Come on, you know you want to..... ogsmile

I don't ever expect to break even on this, given how much I spent. You can certainly do it much cheaper than I have. If you plan on tuning multiple pairs of skis frequently in a season then I suspect you will end up saving money on top of having well-tuned skis all the time. I'm doing this because it's always been something I've thought I might enjoy, not to save money.
You'll break even with the quality of your everyday ski experience! And for your family's if they are like mine!
 

Novaloafah

Should've paid attention to that lesson.
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Joined
Sep 6, 2017
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238
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Halifax NS Canada
I do not want to read this whole thread, I really don’t want to tune skis. But I am a cheap bastard and will likely eventually read this thread and tune our skis.










But I don’t want to do it

Picture an old Winnebago parked at the far end of a ski hill parking lot. Inside....a tuning bench and racks of expensive but necessary(to the addict) stones/files/waxes etc
Yes, yes you do want to read this thread.
 

Steve

SkiMangoJazz
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Nov 13, 2015
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Yes I have Mike grind my skis too and they're all .5/3. He says that the .5 fairly quickly becomes 1, so I have a 1 degree base bevel which when I (rarely) do lightly stone my base edges may increase the bevel a little.

Skiing on skis that you know are deburred and waxed is a wonderful feeling, a feeling of pride and confidence.

Having my wife brag about how I maintain her skis to others, and thanking me for how nice they feel is another huge plus.

Spending a little quality time with my beloved skis is usually a joy.

The only time I don't like tuning is when I have a few pairs that all need to be done at once! Doing my own skis is never a chore.
 

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