Ski Builders Forum

Just an interesting side note. As I was cleaning up today I found some sidewall scraps that had been cut away with some wood still attached. They were about 3 mm thick and maybe 4-5 inches long. Just for fun and because I keep all my wood scraps for kindling, I tried peeling the UHMWPE from the wood. In most of the pieces 6-8 in all the wood failed before the epoxy bond did.

We pressed another pair this weekend. The layup went great, nearly perfect. We loaded the press and began to inflate the air bladder. Just as the pressure reached 60psi the seal on the air couple failed and we lost pressure, not good at all. We quickly removed the bladder, took it apart and reseated the coupler. After a quick pressure test we reinstalled the bladder and resumed pressing at 40 psi. The skis came out great nearly perfect. Luckily we had not turned the heat on before getting up to pressure or things would have really gotten ugly. Tense moments for sure.







180 cm
35 cm rocker tip, 30 cm rocker tail
4mm positive camber underfoot
128-138-112-126-110
19oz glass with carbon tow top and bottom
2.2-11.7-2.2 core profile

Wow, turned out nice, especially w/ the bladder blowing up. Real lucky.

Yeah, lucky for sure, I was pretty sure we were hosed so to speak.

It was actually a dumb mistake on my part. The coupler was touching the mold and I did not see it. It basically pryed itself loose with all the pressure on it.

Anyway it was mostly air tight at 40 psi. We did have to babysit the pressure but it went fine.

I'll need to pull it apart again and really make sure things are air tight before the next build.

Tried out some dyed Paua shell veneer for inlays with good results. Ski Logik does a lot of this.

Very pretty!

Did you cut the inlays by hand or CNC?

Hand drawn pattern and hand cut the material.

I love your use of veneer top sheet.

Thanks, I'm really happy with how these top sheets are turning out.

Vinman- I like the in-lay. I'm going to do the same,.. some day with pearl in-lay

Check out www.hawaiilure.com

Look in the shell veneer section

Thanks. This is another place I found for mother of pearl. One worry I have working with this stuff is the dust particles are highly toxic for some reason. And I don't know if it's working with it constantly day in and day out of any particles. Not sure if it's the mother of pearl or Abalone. Work with caution I guess.

I bought the ThinLam product. It is only .15mm thick and can be cut with an exacto knife, no particles... Easy to work with.

Another top sheet completed.



If I could just get the people that are building skis with me to be available...ONly 2.5 months until ski season and I still have 7 pair left to press. Crunch time. I have 3 pair fully ready to press and another set 1/2 done and starting the 7th pair from from raw lumber tomorrow.

That is lovely! I need to get me some veneer.