Alpine Snowboard Plate Systems

[Seb]

Jack thanks for the thought and inquiry about my Olympic team and Plates, even if it was after someone mentioned Kildy HA!! HA !!. Looks like people think plates are cool now. That's great to see after driving the band wagon by myself for so long it's fun to have company.. Just a little up-date. We are going to be testing all our new plates in Chile this summer so will be ready by next year to build on our World Cup success from last year and the 13 years before that. Klug thinks all the interest is great for the sport and is looking forward to offering access to all our new stash.

When and where in Chile? I'm gonna be at El Colorado from mid july to maybe 7-8th of August in preparation for the Junior Worlds, in New-Zealand the 26-27 of August so if you need to test them in Gs-Sl course you are Welcome

[SunSurfer]

Hi Seb,
I'm going to be in Wanaka at the same time the FIS Junior Champs are on. I'm assuming the PGS will be at Treble Cone? Cardrona & SnowPark aren't holding it, but Treble Cone doesn't have any info on its' website yet.

SunSurfer

[Seb]

Hi Seb,
I'm going to be in Wanaka at the same time the FIS Junior Champs are on. I'm assuming the PGS will be at Treble Cone? Cardrona & SnowPark aren't holding it, but Treble Cone doesn't have any info on its' website yet.

SunSurfer

Yes it's at Treble Cone if you want all the programmation you can email me at ofy11 at hotmai dot com

[tinks]

Hey Seb thanks for the offer on gates and heads up on your dates in El Colorado .Will see how they work out. Best of luck at JW ,that's a big deal to be apart of that event. Being a KIWI myself I am sure you will have a great time with everyone in NZ.

[SunSurfer]

Hi Seb,
You may want to reformat your posted e-mail address in the style

username at hotmail dot com

Stops programmes that scan for e-mail addresses picking you up and drowning you in spam.

SunSurfer

[Seb]

ofy11 at hotmail dot com

[SunSurfer]

Hi Seb,
The idea was for you to edit post 336 where your e-mail address is still in the standard format.

SunSurfer

[pokkis]

Might be too late due Google&Co have already snapped that page

[Keyser Soze]

$1099 Canadian. Anybody getting one?

http://www.apexsnowboard.com/store.php

[Seb]

My new tools! Leaving for New-Zealand on Friday...can't wait to try them!

[big canuck]

Are these the plates he's riding?

[Donek]

My new tools! Leaving for New-Zealand on Friday...can't wait to try them!

Looks similar to Benjamin Karl's plate. Who makes/made this?

[www.oldsnowboards.com]

Cool. I expect more plates to be integral with the bindings. Mounting only the toe and heel blocks is the easiest method. Cool!! Saves weight and height , if you are riding a high end set up like these you know what your angles and cants are. No need to make them adjustable. Dampening and flex is taken care of in the plate system.

[www.oldsnowboards.com]

My new tools! Leaving for New-Zealand on Friday...can't wait to try them!

Been wondering how the season is going down south? Have fun, where are you going to be training? Mount Hutt?

[Seb]

Looks similar to Benjamin Karl's plate. Who makes/made this?

A friend of mine...we put alot of time and testing in to this. At the end of last season I was already riding/racing with a prototype made by my coach Pat Gaudet and I was actually suprise it never came out on this topic

[Seb]

Been wondering how the season is going down south? Have fun, where are you going to be training? Mount Hutt?

I really don't know how it's going sorry. Yes I'm going to train in Mount Hutt for 3 weeks and then I'm going to Wanaka for the Junior Worlds

[www.oldsnowboards.com]

http://snow.co.nz/mthutt/snowreport/

142cm base. Looks promising!! Have fun!! I love NZ!!

[Michael Pukas]

My new tools! Leaving for New-Zealand on Friday...can't wait to try them!

Feckin' sweet dude! Rock on!!!

Love to see/hear more about what you've got going on there. mpp

[Seb]

So what I like about the plate it's that it works with the 4x4 so I can still ride my favorite Boards the Sg Full race (since Apex is just working with the ''hangl'' pattern) and ride a plate that is as equal and or better in performance...better in my opinion lol. Also by having a hole between my toe and heel block I can easily mount the plate on a board with a simple allen key in about a minute! And for how it float/pivot it's a secret

[lowrider]

Seb if you take your plate to the drill press and fill it full of holes like they do with brake rotors on racing machines you can shed a pile of weight and not affect the strength reducing the mass is always good. If you made these by hand it will take a lot of work but i think you will find it worth the effort. If it's CNC well sit back and watch or do a vid and post the picture people always like to watch someone or something do the work for them.

[Seb]

Seb if you take your plate to the drill press and fill it full of holes like they do with brake rotors on racing machines you can shed a pile of weight and not affect the strength reducing the mass is always good. If you made these by hand it will take a lot of work but i think you will find it worth the effort. If it's CNC well sit back and watch or do a vid and post the picture people always like to watch someone or something do the work for them.

I understand your point but i'm not one of the people who thinks the lighter it is the better it is! If I drill tones of holes in the plate anyway they will be full of snow in them after a run. That's something you need to take in count. Like Apex it always getting full of snow under it and you need to take it off after each runs or it interact with the flex and in spring snow it get really heavy and with this plate I almost not getting any snow stick under it. That's just my thinking...I respect yours!....And I squat 400lbs I hope I can ride a 20pounds board haha just kiding

[www.oldsnowboards.com]

I understand your point but i'm not one of the people who thinks the lighter it is the better it is!

Me either, mass can be your friend. Lighter is not the answer for all things.

[lowrider]

What would you say is upper limit for weight of a plate setup?

[www.oldsnowboards.com]

What would you say is upper limit for weight of a plate setup?

Do you mean the weight of the total board, plate and bindings? In my experience this is more relevent.

Currently I am more concerned about height. I personally prefer setups that do not get too "tall".

When I had TD3s on my Kessler/Hangl or Vist setups I started to feel like it was counter productive on some plane.

This is another reason I am using TD2 bases on my Tinkler plate systems where I can. In the final analysis I seek the balance
between flex-travel-dampening and height-weight. Or, arriving at the result with the simplist, least complicated, cleanist setup.

[Seb]

What would you say is upper limit for weight of a plate setup?

I think it would be personal preference I mean i'm pretty sure alot of riders would not like my plate cause of the weight and some would like it. I'm not saying we are trying to get it as heavy as we can i'm just saying there is no big deal about the weight of a plate as long as you can handle it! You need to take in count that this is not a recreational setup it's a race setup so riders are really strong and agile...Like Benjamin Karl is plate setup, i'm pretty sure is heavier and/or about the same weight as mine and he won the Overall world cup this year. At the end I think there is advantage to be light and there is advantage to be heavy too...

[SunSurfer]

Industrial strength looking plate Seb!

The durability of the pivots/bearings in these plates is going to be an emerging issue, especially after you pay $1000+ for one. Anyone designing them had better either source a sealed lubricated bearing that works well at sub-zero temperatures OR reflect/read up on why orthopaedic surgeons don't use steel on steel, or steel on aluminium, for their unlubricated hip joint replacement joint surfaces.

Kia ora, and welcome to Aotearoa.
Watch a little top class rugby series that is on at present between the best 3 nations in the world (Australia / New Zealand / South Africa - in alphabetical order, bragging rights before next year's World Cup will be decided by the outcome). Take care on our gravel surfaced skifield access roads. Best of luck for the FIS Junior Champs at Treble Cone in Wanaka.

SunSurfer

[kieran]

Watch a little top class rugby series that is on at present between the best 3 nations in the world (Australia / New Zealand / South Africa - in alphabetical order, bragging rights before next year's World Cup will be decided by the outcome).

bwa-hahaha. even scotland can win against australia.

[Seb]

Industrial strength looking plate Seb!

The durability of the pivots/bearings in these plates is going to be an emerging issue, especially after you pay $1000+ for one. Anyone designing them had better either source a sealed lubricated bearing that works well at sub-zero temperatures OR reflect/read up on why orthopaedic surgeons don't use steel on steel, or steel on aluminium, for their unlubricated hip joint replacement joint surfaces.

SunSurfer

That's what we test last year with the prototype and we are pretty sure we found the solution cause yes we had problem with this but it is resolved...im pretty sure...And I didn't pay a $ for it my friends dad just wanted me to put sticker on it in return

[Donek]

[QUOTE=
The durability of the pivots/bearings in these plates is going to be an emerging issue, especially after you pay $1000+ for one. Anyone designing them had better either source a sealed lubricated bearing that works well at sub-zero temperatures OR reflect/read up on why orthopaedic surgeons don't use steel on steel, or steel on aluminium, for their unlubricated hip joint replacement joint surfaces.

SunSurfer[/QUOTE]

Stainbless against self lubricating plastics like UHMW and Delrin work well. So far we've seen little wear with the UHMW, but may try some delrin too.

[SunSurfer]

Joint replacement surfaces have been almost universally UHMWPE on medical grade stainless steel alloy for many years. These types of surfaces have the best track record for wear so far.
Recent advances for hip joints are steel ball femoral components onto highly polished, precision ceramic cups. It will be a number of years before it is seen how well these last. Some of the early model ceramic cups fragmented inside the patient once in use.

Increasing the bearing surface area also slows the rate of wear as point loads decrease.

SunSurfer