Telemark Talk / Telemark Tips Forum

Hi all,

first post, thanks for a forum of great knowledge and experience. I'm a long time XC skier (fluent in both skating & classic) as well as alpine skiing from Sweden.

I am really intrigued to try to converge my tiredness of crowded groomed lift slopes, love for the outdoors/hiking and XC skiing and powder alpine skiing and fear of avalanches into low angle xcD skiing.

Spent a lot of time this year reading and researching suitable skis. When I finally reached a conclusion that the Fischer Sbound 98 looks like a very nice ski, I realised that almost all BC skis are sold out, including the fischers.

I managed to find a pair of NNNBC Alpina Alaska on sale and with the hope of grabbing a pair of S98s next season, I figured I'd come up with a temporary solution this year.

I purchased a pair of ~'00 Salomon Axendo 7 at the local thrift shop. (99-63-89) L=175 cm, not way off the fischers although a bit smaller waist and ofc softer camber.

My first plan was to mill fishscales into the skis.



Although I later realized that it might be a bit too much work without knowing if the skis are worth it. So plan B, buy easy skins, draw up copy of fischers plastic skin mount and mount it to the skis.. results as below.











I'll just mount the NNNBC bindings and I'll get out an give them a try, my only trouble is they are my first run on backcountry skis so I can't really compare. I'll get back with whatever feedback I can give..

This is brilliant! Thanks for sharing and let us know how it goes.

Wow, that's just awesome! I love these kind of homemade items... looks very professional. Wwll done mate... well done.

Look forward to the testing.

Nice looking work and a great idea! When you say "draw up copy of fischers plastic skin mount", what do you mean? 3-D printer or something? Excuse my ignorance of such things. Your work looks professional.

This is excellent.

Very cool. You made one of my daydream ski mods a reality!

Nice use of some technical skills! I have fisher E99 with the easy skin port. Haven't purchased the skins yet as I thought I would wax. Curious to hear how they work for you in terms of grip.

Awesome mod and writeup, Denialson!

I hope they work as well as you imagined when you started the project.

Having cut away that much of the ski's core and shell of laminate would concern me, possibly creating a weak spot. Also, finding an adhesive to assemble the plastic insert that remains perfectly water tight through flexing while very cold would concern me. So I'd stay within a bearable walk of the car until the skis have proven durable.

I modified a pair of skis to add fishscales, not unlike you had envisioned. Mine turned out great and are now personal favorites. They compare very favorably in use to commercially made pattern base skis. Posted about it here:

http://www.telemarktalk.com/viewtopic.p ... ing#p32841

So, it can be done and done well.

My skis have both scales and (nylon) kicker skins, so I have opinions about the kickers. Sadly my experience is that they glide no better than full length skins, and not well at all compared to scales. I point this out not to discourage you, but to suggest, getting on skis with scales or kick wax is much different than using skins.

I do love how the kicker skins can literally fit in a pocket- they are always with me.

Enjoy your skis, keep making things the way you want them, and post your progress!

Thank you all for the nice feedback!

I have mounted the bindings and hope to give them a try this weekend. I hear you about the negative impact on bending strength this mightve caused, thankfully I’m not that heavy at 65kg but we’ll see how they hold up!

Connyro yes, I drew it up in CAD and 3d printed the mounts. I’m happy to share the printfile if anybody has use for it. Used epoxy glue to mount and seal, good input on the potential issue with the glue not being flexible enough, we’ll see how they hold up!

Shenanigans I thought I had found all diy scale info there was but not yours. They look beautifully made and your feedback really made me want to go back to my plan A and mill some scales into these as well since I agree with your discussion about glide etc. Would you be willing of sharinf some more in depth knowledge about them? Like angle/depth/c-c? Did u do them on a cnc or manual mill? Very impressed and inspired by them! Great work!

@Denialson i was impressed with your DYI project. However are you aware that you could use kick wax for kick and glide? If your ski is a single cambered ski, kick wax may drag a bit it would be far less than a skin.