Donek Incline - toe/heel drag?

I was thinking maybe an Incline would be a bit quicker edge to edge than
my
Wide, but from what Mike T says, I probably wouldn't notice the
difference.

Other people might notice the difference more than me.... Edge changes are
"what I do". But we both have the same boots and bindings, add that to any
of the Donek freeride boards and you;ve got a seriously responsive setup.

Robert Stevahn wrote:

My current setup: 160 Incline, 27.5cm Salomon F24 boots (the Fusions
are very small -- a good 1/2" shorter than my previous boots), Palmer
Power Link Shock plates (13mm). I'm riding 24/-6 without any trouble.

Just for comparison, I'm also in Salomon F24s (a bit smaller -- 26.5 cm,
8.5 US), but I ride a Wide 156 (new this season). I'm currently riding
21/9, but I was at 15/6 earlier in the season. (It's only my second
season riding and I'm still playing around with angles.)

The boots (particulary the back foot at the lesser angle) "underhang"
the board edges slightly, but I haven't had any problems pressuring
the edges to turn, and I haven't had any problems with edge changes.

Will probably demo an Incline next season, though, just for comparison.

--
Mike

lonerider wrote:
Andy Sandford wrote:
Hi all

I currently ride an old Wide 161, but I'm toying with the idea of
getting an
Incline 164 as a replacement.

Boots are 10.5 (US) Salomon Malamutes.
Bindings are Catek Freeride - 21 front, 6 rear

I emailed Sean the other day, he suggested I'd probably have to
ride
30+
degrees angles if I got an Incline.

Has anyone had any experience on an Incline with similar sized
boots.
I was
hoping not to go "much" past 15 degrees on the rear binding, given
the extra
lift that I get using the 3mm spacer on my Cateks.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

Hi, I rode the Incline 155 which has the same waist width, but flairs
more because of the short sidecut radius. My boots are US 8.0
ThirtyTwo
Forecasts, but I have ridden US 8.0 Salomon Dialogues/Synapses with
the
board. The lowest angles without dragging I could get with the
standard
kingpins and cant screws was 24/18. I bought longer kingpins and cant
screws (went WAY past the 3mm spacer) and I could get down to 21/6 or
18/3 if the snow was firmer (Lake Tahoe snow tends to be nice and
soft
most of the time). Here is a link to a thread in the Catek forum
where
I posted photos
(http://www.catek.com/forum/read.php?f=1&i=1176&t=1176).

In summary, toe/heel drag is a noticeable problem with the Incline,
even with my small feet. Of course I get drag issues on my alpine
board
as well with size 24 boots. I don't think I'm getting my board up on
edge that much... but I'm definitely getting drag.

If it was not clear... I should elaborate that I was riding a Incline
155 with Catek freeride and size 8.0 Salomon boots and later ThirtyTwo
boots. For freestyle, the bindings were fine, but when I was on the
slopes... I would get boot out at like 60 degrees. With longer kingpins
and screws (giving me over 1" of lift... about 1 cm more than the 3mm
spacer), I can get the board tipped over to 70-75 degrees... but at the
cost of some flex control for the board (I've tried 10m Palmer Link
plates with a similar effect). I'm told most people don't get their
board that high on edge.

When I say flex control, I mean I could not longer flex the board into
tighter arcs like I do with regular bindings. I suspect it's due to the
wider, circular footprint of the Catek plates and the Palmer Lift
Plates - I'm 5'8" 150 lbs - so while I could do big GS turns, it
prevented me from flexing that already pretty stiff Incline 155 into
tight 15-20 meter arcs... actually I used to be able to carve 300
degrees of a turn at around 15-20 meter radius... but with the plates I
couldn't tighten the turn very more. This could be a hole in my
technique combined with the combination of the stiff Incline being
stiffen more with the Cateks and my relatively lightweight and modest
height (giving me less leverage).

Anyways, so I sold my bindings to Mike T and got myself a pair of
Nidecker 800s which also have a built in riser, but via an EVA foam pad
much like the Bomber TD E-ring (that is a generalization, I'm sure
Bomber and Nidecker will say that they are different) compared to the
Catek plate which gives more responsiveness and feel than actually
dampening. I have high hopes for the Nideckers.