Klister?

[dhdaines]

I ordered a bunch of klister last week and I'm sad because the red was out of stock and it's going to be 9C and raining in a few days...

On the bright side, I had really great results using base klister today. Snow in the Laurentians right now is crusty and icy with a tiny bit of powder on top below 650m, but nice higher up. The grip zone on my FT62s seems to basically be the whole length of the "asnes" print on the bases, so I decided the klister zone was probably "sne". Ironed in a layer of green base klister (KX20) there, put it outside to freeze up, brought it in to put Blue Extra on it... whoa, it grabbed the wax and held on for dear life! Whole lotta wax on those skis!

It was a bit colder than expected and even on the crusty stuff around 400m, the blue was dragging so I put a bit of V20 green over top, and that worked really, really well. I was able to ski 22km and 1100m of vertical on single-cambered skis without rewaxing at all.

KX20 really seems to work better than base binder, at least in these conditions. Also it smells good.

[lowangle al]

Thanks John, I think the blue is probably what I needed, but maybe the universal failed because I had no base binder.

I will give it another try in the future because I expect crusty conditions will be common back East. My fishscale skis weren't gripping too good and I had to get by with a soft kick, but the glide was so good I still managed almost 3.5 mph. If I had a good kick I would have flew.

dhdaines, my conditions seem about the same as yours and it's fantastic that your extra blue on the klister lasted that long. I'll have to try that as well as putting green over blue when it starts to drag.

[red_pine]

Al, I had the exact same problem as you yesterday. My klister got worn off in about 10 minutes and I had absolutely no grip whatsoever. I tried re-applying it and letting it set up for 40 minutes and it still rubbed off immediately.

I think the green base klister is something to try. I wonder if I can put it on at home before driving to the trailhead, or if it will drip all over the inside of my car. Applying base klister, and then universal klister at the trailhead sounds like a long process which will eat up at least half an hour. I'm also wondering if green base klister can be used directly on ice with nothing over it.

[dhdaines]

I didn't have great luck with ironing ice klister over base klister last week, but the conditions were *really* icy at that point, like basically unskiable, -20C and 1mm of snow on top of concrete crust.

I think it would be okay to iron on base klister and leave it in the car as long as you don't turn the heat up - it's already quite thick at room temperature. Not sure how you would get it to harden up if it's above freezing though. Perhaps laying the skis on the snow, in the shade.

I skied 30km yesterday with the same base klister, topped up with a layer of V40 in the morning and twice with a bit of VR55N in the afternoon. Definitely thought I'd have no kick left after each of two long, hard-packed and crusty downhills with a lot of side-sliding and stemming, but there's plenty of wax (and a bunch of other junk) left on the skis.

[lowangle al]

I took out my skis with the universal on them in some wet corn snow the other day and they worked pretty good. I skied out about a mile and came home and switched to scaled skis to compare the two. The klister was a few tenths of a mph faster but wasn't worth the extra effort compared to the simplicity of scales in those conditions.

In hard frozen crust I will definitely try a harder klister specific to those conditions. I will also use the softer ones in the future when I want to use my narrow dbl camber skis rather than try to find a new dbl camber scaled ski that I like. I don't know why I've had such an aversion to using klister over the years.

[fisheater]

In case I need to add a layer of klister, I carry my klister and the klister scraper in a Ziplock sandwich bag with baby power in the bag. I feel safe carrying it in my pants pocket to keep it warm for easy application. The tube and the scraper never get sticky, and the baby powder (hopefully) will act as a containment medium if the tube leaks.
As far as using klister, it is a good reason to have a beer waiting at the truck. I enjoy having a beer while I scrape off klister!
In complete honesty I use and recommend only genuine Ziplock heavy duty freezer bags for carrying klister in your pants pocket. Mine are actually quart size bags. Don’t blame me if you get gooey pants being cheap using no-brand Zip locks !!!

[lowangle al]

Good tip on the plastic bag fish and the bigger take away that I may need to reapply and it has to be kept warm. Thanks.

[lowangle al]

I don't think I will put it in my pocket to keep it warm. I have an invention I call the candy bar caddy. It is made from a cargo pocket from some worn out pants that I cut off and put two gromets in and attach a string to wear around my neck under my outer layer to keep things unfrozen and handy.