rockered skis

For discussions related to ski/snowboard construction/design methods and techniques.

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Yeti
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Post by Yeti »

What do you guys think of 0 camber skis? That seems like a decent compromise between camber and rocker, though i have not skied rockered skis yet, so I have no idea.

I'm looking at making some as my first pair becuase i want something like an EHP 193 but shorter. It also simplifies the pressing process.

Also about a ski for soft snow without edges, have you though of making the base convex (i think thats right, curving down towards the middle)laterally also, its somethin my friend has wanted to try so he can just roll the skis over in soft snow. It seems complicated to set up and build but I may try it as well.
mattym
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Post by mattym »

0 camber skis I don't think would work quite as well. I think the real compromise is a little camber underfoot and a rocker in the tips and tails. I don't believe a skis with 0 camber would serve quite the same purpose... especially park wise. Something like the EHP would work great, but once again it has some camber underfoot and then an early rise in the tips and tails. After skiing the hellbent, pontoon and next years seth I think if you want a truely versatile ski I think you need to have the camber underfoot plus the rockered tips and tails, however given my current quiver I think I'd like the hellbents. I think if the seth were fatter and had a little more rocker - both aggressigve wise and length wise, it would be primo.

As for the convex base, I think that would be sick in the pow. I have been thinking about that recently, a complete surfboard shape would be sick. Fully rockered, reverse sidecut, huge dimensions and a convex base - that would be fun times in the super deep. If your riding the resot though, the trip back to the lift may be a little sketch
Svimen
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Post by Svimen »

I have been thinking about a convex base, as i think this would work really well on fat skis, making them easier to throw around and easier to slide.

I own a Bataleon snowboard which has a 1/3 convex-1/3 flat-1/3 convex base, so something like that would be my first idea. I like the board a lot, it carves really well and it is really stable at speed (this is one of the main reasons for building it like this, would be cool if the same applied to fat skis...)

The reason the Bataleon boards are made this way is quite well explained on their website

www.bataleon.com

or

http://www.bataleon.com/triple%20base%20technology/

if you want to get straight into the tech part.


Svimen
plywood
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Post by plywood »

0 camber-skis...well i don`t know what to think about them.maybe if you don`t want to use your ski in the park 0 camber can work. but i`m sure there are better things than 0 camber.

next topic: convex base.
i don`t get the point why this should be sick in pow. of course it would be easier to butter/turn on hard snow...by the way: once they produced skis with convex bases. don`t ask me which brand, but a friend of mine told my once that he had skis for freestyle (oldschool) skiing/skiacrobatics which had a convex base. so the sliding abilities are of corse great.
the same with bataleon snowboards. i didn`t had the occasion for riding one up to now, but on several tests the wrote that on higher speeds they get squirelly.
this is kind of logical. EVERY method which we mentioned reduces the stability of a ski: negative camber, rocker, convex base...they all shorten the running lenght/lenght of the edges contacting the snow - and this causes a loss of stability. with the benefit of better sliding abilities,better buttering etc. but at the moment i`d say that it is completely impossible to get stability at high speeds AND increase the agility.

and now for the pow:
i`m not sure which effect a convex base there may have. but i guess that with a convex base you may sink a slight litte bit more into the powder than with a straight base. by following reason: if we look at ships they are somehow similar to a convex base - they are created to reduce the extrusion of water.
but for skiing we don`t want such an extrusion. this extrusion would cause a deeper sinking into the powder (well, acually it would not be such a big effect, but anyway). so my thoughts are about to increase the extrusion instead of reduce it - on our subject the higher extrusion creates a better floatation.
so in other words: a convex base would throw the snow to each side of the ski which would make the ski sink deeper into the powder. we needed something to keep the snow under the ski, this would generate an uplift...and that`s what we need.
with a convex base you also lost a bit of the...bity edges. because of the effects described above you would slip through the turns. you weren`t able to ride "sharp curves".the centripetal forces which occur making a turn would push the skis out of the turn because the convex base would reduce the "grip" of them.... i hope you understand what i mean. so this are my thoughts about these themes...if i`m totally wrong feel free to correct me!
plywood freeride industries - go ply, ride wood!
Yeti
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Post by Yeti »

Well thanks for that reply Plywood, I have to think about that more now. The idea was to make it like a surfboard with the base, I don't know if it actually helps in snow, but we assumed that since powder acts more like water than hardpack does, it would make sense as a pow specific ski. The only problem is that while it would definetley make it squirrelly as you said. However to combat that, the idea was to make the base more flat in the center and then have it rise up toward the side. So maybe 1/3 of the area would be turned up , the middle 2/3 would be flat or barely curved.
\_______/ Kind of like that and then wrap the base up over the top so it doesn't peel off, though that may be significantly more difficult.
plywood
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Post by plywood »

i like the idea considering powder more like water than "solid" ground.

but the point is that powder is somewhere between water and solid. so if you ride through powder it floats a bit like water, but at the same time it is solid. if you once displaced powder (caused by skiing through it) it stays there and doesn "float back" like water would do.

somehow i guess this is the reason why on a surfboard there is no need for sharp edges like on skis...
plywood freeride industries - go ply, ride wood!
doughboyshredder
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Post by doughboyshredder »

How can Armada patent the new arg? Is there really anything significantly different other than that there is sidecut and camber underfoot and reverse sidecut and reverse camber to the fore and aft?

I have been thinking of building a board like this for a couple years. All of this patenting nonsense is getting out of control.
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endre
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Post by endre »

doughboyshredder wrote:How can Armada patent the new arg? Is there really anything significantly different other than that there is sidecut and camber underfoot and reverse sidecut and reverse camber to the fore and aft?


I have been thinking of building a board like this for a couple years. All of this patenting nonsense is getting out of control.
Is the ARG patented??!

In that case I totaly agree.
In the oslo ski museum you can find 250 year old negative cambered skis with 15cm wide waists. Ideas like this is clarely not new, anyway the ARG is just a thing between the Spatula and the Pontoon. Nothing new about it!

It must be an end to patenting ski shapes, McConkey did a great thing by reinventing the spatula, but the patenting trend must stop there, (until some other SIGNIFICANT change comes along)
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vinman
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Post by vinman »

doughboyshredder wrote:How can Armada patent the new arg? Is there really anything significantly different other than that there is sidecut and camber underfoot and reverse sidecut and reverse camber to the fore and aft?
so you cahnge the dimesnions by a mm or two and it wouldn't violate their patent.... Such a dumb idea to patent a ski shape.
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endre
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Post by endre »

Vinman wrote:
doughboyshredder wrote:How can Armada patent the new arg? Is there really anything significantly different other than that there is sidecut and camber underfoot and reverse sidecut and reverse camber to the fore and aft?
so you cahnge the dimesnions by a mm or two and it wouldn't violate their patent.... Such a dumb idea to patent a ski shape.
it would be a difficult case. There are only floating parameters, how do you differ between a "rocker" and a "long tip radius"? (like zag)
Easy
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Post by Easy »

Patents are mostly b*llsh*t anyway. Anyone can get one, which does not mean that it will ever hold up in court. Ski patents seem to be particularly useless, since ski designs are "copied" without regard for patents and without consequence.

Almost all ski innovations, re-inventions and geometry changes are or have been patented. But did manufacturers regard these patents when selling carve ski's or rockered ski's? NO

Where there any consequences for their violations of these patents? Not as far as I know of.
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endre
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Post by endre »

don't know if this has been posted, but here's Mcconkey's patent on the spatula:

http://www.wipo.int/patentscopedb/en/fe ... 2002038689

There is one big miss in the patent though, they claim a patent of a ski that is 90 or 180mm wide, they actually forgot to ad the "between" in the beginning. anyone an expert on patents here? Would that miss mean anything in a case?
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endre
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Post by endre »

not that it matters, since the patent run out in 06..
camhard
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Post by camhard »

As far as the convex base goes, i think it has some potential. It's already done quite a bit, though you could take it to a more extreme level to really achieve a shaped base as opposed to a bevel. Tonnes of racers use base bevel tools for the purposes of creating a smoother transition from edge to edge. If you buy your base material from a plastic supplier that will allow you to specify the dimensions, you could use something slightly thicker than is generally used. It would take a lot of wok, but you could then grind, plane or use a router and jig to get the exact shape you want.

A 0 camber ski could be fine too. I know my 2006 AR5s have only a little and my buddies 2007 Scratch BCs have next to none (they seem to work pretty well on groomed park terrain as well as powder). I'd have to check for sure on the Rossis though; that's just what I remember when looking at his skis in a gondola lineup or in the basement.
Svimen
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Post by Svimen »

Can´t get the image thing to work, see here for picture: http://www.tetongravity.com/forums/atta ... 1196751458

No camber? No problem. My 05/06 Legend Pros have turned into zero camber skis with rocker in the tip. They have become somewhat more slarveable, maybe a bit better in the pow. (Don´t really know though, haven´t skied them much since i noticed, think it happened during a spring day with 40 cms of heavy, tracked pow. Haven´t had any crashes to justify them bending.)
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