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.
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.
For those quality skis on your feet, you want quality tools!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.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!!!!
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.
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.
Heh. It's Nov. 5 - I was somewhat expecting you to have a week of prep waxing under your belt
Don't do it. You live in Utah.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
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
You'll break even with the quality of your everyday ski experience! And for your family's if they are like mine!Come on, you know you want to.....
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.
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
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.