F*ckin Newb

There seems to be very few here who care about ski maintenance. I have posted some videos etc. and not a lot of response. Not like none, just very little, then the threads get buried as this is a media pit.
It's nice thing to try to help the youngers. Take care.

Here is an example.

https://www.newschoolers.com/forum/thread/818909/Scraping---Brushing-Skis-For-Maximum-Speed-

Nice man. Look forward to reading your responses. I love tuning/tech and what not. Worked as a tech in HS.

Always looking for new advice tips, etc.

Well I don't just tune, I fix the broken stuff too. I see a lot of threads about janky busted bindings, or how to take them off, stuff like that.

Welcome! And while I have the master tuners in here...what is the best process for base welding? I put a nice zippered core shot into my new skis. Should I "clean up" the wound so it's relatively uniform? Should I epoxy the exposed fiberglass? What is the best way to remove excess before stone grinding?

doitbigWelcome! And while I have the master tuners in here...what is the best process for base welding? I put a nice zippered core shot into my new skis. Should I "clean up" the wound so it's relatively uniform? Should I epoxy the exposed fiberglass? What is the best way to remove excess before stone grinding?

Are you doing it yourself? Do you have access to a stone grinder? With Zippers I generally will have to cut the whole damaged area out, mainly when you can see that the damaged area is raised up between the zipper gouges. Raised base material indicates that it has delamed underneath. I usually cut out the whole zippered area.

Make sure that you are cutting the sides of the core shot to where there is full base material thickness if possible, that way when you do your weld it will be more like an inlay and the edges of the weld won't be thinner and more prone to ripping out.

If it is on the edge and there is a bunch of metal exposed, go ahead and sand the metal a bit and score it up so the weld will have some texture to stick to. In these circumstances I generally use a hot air welder and heat activated "metal grip".

If it is in the center of the base material you can use a poly welder or the like. Zippers generally are only base material deep so you usually don't have to epoxy the core. If the core hasn't been gouged, then no worries, it has already been epoxied and reasonably well sealed when the ski was originally built. If the core is damaged and you can see little strands of fiberglass sticking up loose out of the core, then epoxy might be in order.

!!! DON'T use drip in P-tex on your core shots, you are waisting your time. P-tex is more brittle than welding material and will crack and allow water to get to the core continuously. P-tex is really designed to fix shallower scratches that don't go all the way through the base material to the core.

phew... that was a long explanation. Hope it helps.

Extremely helpful, thank you!

I have found that I typically do a better job then most with the right information, so I would like to try. I do have access to free stone grinds at a local shop and was planning to take advantage of that once I had it patched.

The damage is nowhere near the edge, but I did manage to get scrape the fiberglass layer.

I have read that many people use metal grip ilo polywelder for deep core shots. What do you think?

doitbigWelcome! And while I have the master tuners in here...what is the best process for base welding? I put a nice zippered core shot into my new skis. Should I "clean up" the wound so it's relatively uniform? Should I epoxy the exposed fiberglass? What is the best way to remove excess before stone grinding?

I gave up on ptex candles and welds a long, long time ago for anything except tiny damage... patching is by far the best method IMO, especially for zippers and gnarly gouges, especially close to the edge.

Method is:
-Grab a sheet of base material (helps to have a couple of thicknesses too)
-Cut a piece out of your sheet that will cover the entire damaged area plus a few millimetres of margin
-Place your cut-out piece over the damaged bit, then trace around it (cutting lightly into your base) with a scalpel
-Take away your cut-out then cut the rest of the way through the base.
-Get a small, sharp chisel and pop the section of damaged base out
-Now is a good time to check the fitment of your patch into the hole you've cut, make any adjustments you need to by shaving the edges with a sharp knife, you want the closest fit possible
-Mix your epoxy, apply to both surfaces, place the patch into the hole, put a metal plate over it then clamp the hell out of that sucker.
-Chuck it under a heat lamp to help the epoxy flow
-Remove clamps and stuff. Chances are some of the epoxy will have squeezed out the bottom and it will be a giant mess.
-Hit it with a coarse file if the patch is proud of the surrounding base area
-Stone-grind
-Wax
-Brush
-Ski

I prefer this method because essentially it's exactly the same as the die-cut bases a lot of skis have on them these days. It's as robust as a new base if done properly, and you don't have issues with bits popping out of the base due to different temperatures and such.

What are your thought on detuning powder skis with a good amount of early taper and rocker? I was thinking of gummy stoning anything past the tapered sections of the tip and tail.

rozboonI gave up on ptex candles and welds a long, long time ago for anything except tiny damage... patching is by far the best method IMO, especially for zippers and gnarly gouges, especially close to the edge.

Method is:
-Grab a sheet of base material (helps to have a couple of thicknesses too)
-Cut a piece out of your sheet that will cover the entire damaged area plus a few millimetres of margin
-Place your cut-out piece over the damaged bit, then trace around it (cutting lightly into your base) with a scalpel
-Take away your cut-out then cut the rest of the way through the base.
-Get a small, sharp chisel and pop the section of damaged base out
-Now is a good time to check the fitment of your patch into the hole you've cut, make any adjustments you need to by shaving the edges with a sharp knife, you want the closest fit possible
-Mix your epoxy, apply to both surfaces, place the patch into the hole, put a metal plate over it then clamp the hell out of that sucker.
-Chuck it under a heat lamp to help the epoxy flow
-Remove clamps and stuff. Chances are some of the epoxy will have squeezed out the bottom and it will be a giant mess.
-Hit it with a coarse file if the patch is proud of the surrounding base area
-Stone-grind
-Wax
-Brush
-Ski

I prefer this method because essentially it's exactly the same as the die-cut bases a lot of skis have on them these days. It's as robust as a new base if done properly, and you don't have issues with bits popping out of the base due to different temperatures and such.

Where are you working at? What part of the country. How many do you do a day? I fix about 20 or more coreshots a day here on the Wasatch front. Not much time for what you are describing, ever do that process over night for people? Simply not realistic in my opinion. I do put base patches in, but only for extreme damage, or very wide core shots, and I require multiple days for that job to be done properly. I have the punches in all different shapes and do use them from time to time. But I haven't had much trouble with welds pulling out. maybe 2 a season, and thats usually on a ski that someone skied for weeks or months before deciding to get it fixed.

soupcanWhat are your thought on detuning powder skis with a good amount of early taper and rocker? I was thinking of gummy stoning anything past the tapered sections of the tip and tail.

FOR A "POWDER" SKI:
Detune the tips and tails. If the edge material goes all the way around the tip and/or tail, then take a file and go ahead and round those edges off upfront. You don't ever need your tips or tails to be sharp right on the ends.
As far as detuning the edge, I usually round the edges down to about 4" from the contact point on the rocketed section of the ski. I then use a softer gummy stone to "fade" the detune back towards the center of the ski. The main thing is that the transition from dull to sharp on the part of the edge that is off the snow smoothly transitions to the part of the ski that is constantly on the snow. :)

Jack_the_tunerWhere are you working at? What part of the country. How many do you do a day? I fix about 20 or more coreshots a day here on the Wasatch front. Not much time for what you are describing, ever do that process over night for people? Simply not realistic in my opinion. I do put base patches in, but only for extreme damage, or very wide core shots, and I require multiple days for that job to be done properly. I have the punches in all different shapes and do use them from time to time. But I haven't had much trouble with welds pulling out. maybe 2 a season, and thats usually on a ski that someone skied for weeks or months before deciding to get it fixed.

You're quite right about it not being a mass-market job, and it's not something I would do on a piece of crap rental fleet ski.

But if you have the time and effort to do it, it is, in my opinion, the best way to repair a base.

Takes about 2 hours absolute minimum.... you can knock one out overnight easy peasy, but that's if there aren't 100 other jobs on. You have to remember that 99.99% of people on here aren't techs, they're people with a workbench in their basement and 3 pairs of skis, if it takes them 2 days to do a base patch (and then take their skis into a shop for a stone grind) then that's no big deal, especially if it saves them $70 or whatever a base patch goes for these days.

On a side note, I've found that the "trace the piece with a scalpel" method ends up with a cleaner end result than punches, but again, it's a time vs. result trade-off.

Jack_the_tuner"rocketed section of the ski".

I typed in rockered.... oh, auto correct you are such a gaper!

rozboonYou're quite right about it not being a mass-market job, and it's not something I would do on a piece of crap rental fleet ski.

But if you have the time and effort to do it, it is, in my opinion, the best way to repair a base.

Takes about 2 hours absolute minimum.... you can knock one out overnight easy peasy, but that's if there aren't 100 other jobs on. You have to remember that 99.99% of people on here aren't techs, they're people with a workbench in their basement and 3 pairs of skis, if it takes them 2 days to do a base patch (and then take their skis into a shop for a stone grind) then that's no big deal, especially if it saves them $70 or whatever a base patch goes for these days.

On a side note, I've found that the "trace the piece with a scalpel" method ends up with a cleaner end result than punches, but again, it's a time vs. result trade-off.

I do agree with what you say about the quality of a base patch... if it is isolated damage. But what you have to realize is that the skis I generally tune have 20-30 fills, a combination of ptex scratches and core shot welds. There are always rocks here at Alta, and Sendy-Bros definitely hit them on a regular basis. I work in a shop at the base of the mountain. I tune demos (Atomic, Line, DPS, Head, K2, Dynastar, Fischer, Black Diamond, H20/Praxis... blah, blah, blah) we have basic rentals too. The bread and butter is customer's personal skis.

Have you ever tried a Wintersteiger Poly-Man base repair gun? That is essentially a base material extruding gun. As long as you cut out the area to be welded, as if it was going to be an "inlay", the weld will come out the same as regular base material. The exception is that it will be extruded. Not as porous as a sintered base, but just as tough if not more so. On a regular basis I retune skis and I see new core shots that cut through base material and old welds as if it were all one single base material.

Jack_the_tunerHave you ever tried a Wintersteiger Poly-Man base repair gun?

I have access to one of these. Going to try it out. Worst case I got with the base patch if it pulls out.

Jack_the_tunerHave you ever tried a Wintersteiger Poly-Man base repair gun? That is essentially a base material extruding gun. As long as you cut out the area to be welded, as if it was going to be an "inlay", the weld will come out the same as regular base material. The exception is that it will be extruded. Not as porous as a sintered base, but just as tough if not more so. On a regular basis I retune skis and I see new core shots that cut through base material and old welds as if it were all one single base material.

I've always been a bit sceptical of the sorta ptex-iron type doofers but I just watched a youtube video of a snowboard repair with one of those Wintersteigers and it looks like the adhesion/merging is a lot better than the usual glorified soldering iron models. I wonder if it melts more deeply into the existing base material, achieving a genuine plastic welded bond, rather than just some shitty surface to surface adhesion?
Interesting, thanks for the pointer.

Oh yeah man, the Wintersteiger poly-man is miles ahead of the standard "doofers" as you say. Its all about the material. The Wintersteiger uses polyethylene on a reel that is fed through the gun and distributed through two points at the tip. Polyethylene is basically the main ingredient in almost all ski bases, so the cohesion is really good and strong if the weld area has been dried thoroughly and prepared properly. The only other that I have seen that is even close in quality is a gun made by Montana. You will pay for it. The Wintersteiger poly-man sells for around $1,900 to a ski shop that is a dealer and has a professional tune shop.... worth every penny if you were to ask a guy who repairs core shots every day.

IDK. I just use metal grip when needed to prime and regular wire to finish. I use a wood burner with a regulator to reduce the temp. to about 400F and I have NEVER had a repair fall out.
This way the repair area is as small as the damaged area so no major loss in wax absorption.
One need not melt the UHMWPE base to get it to bond. Just hot enough to excite the molecules and they will bond.
Yes 400F will melt a base, but the heat is only to melt the wire into the base and smooth out the repair a bit.
I finish with a sharp steel scraper and that's it. Done.