need equipment help

Dave wrote:


lal_truckee wrote:
Dave wrote:

Any suggestions?

Vtskier's insole suggestion can help; take care to avoid cutting off
circulation on the top of the foot - not too terribly expensive, and
can be reused; worth a shot, might be your complete solution.

Make your own boots - get a bunch of likely looking suspects at garage
sales and go after them with a dremel tool and boiling water +
stretchers; mix and match parts and move buckles, etc. - try it - it
works - cheap; once you've done it you'll never blow money on boots
again.

Find a top bootfitter and let him dremel and stretch the boots and
build insoles; works great - pricey.

Let Mel Dalebout build you some boots - pricey; works, guaranteed.
http://www.daleboot.com/root.html


Being a CSOB, I may try to hack up a old pair of boots I bought in the
early 90's. Only wore them a couple of times.

Old plastic get brittle.
But have a go just for practice if nothing else.

I bought a pair of great looking Technicas at a yard sale
once for the astounding sum of $4. Yes four dollars.
They looked like they had never been skied. I bought a
custom inner sole, did a little fitting at a local shop,
adjusted bindings, etc. Skied the next day.

At the end of a run I looked down to see the toe of both
boots disintegrated. They were apparently 20 years old
and age simply ruined the plastic.

I loose circulation and pinch nerves since the top of my foot is so
bony. I'll get shooting pains in my feet for days after a good day of
skiing. I have to loosen them up between runs.
It's really a top of the foot issue so I'm not sure of a insole insert
will do the trick.
Is there a good web site that gives pointers on how to do this?

Here are a few pointers from my experience.
1) your foot doesn't want to wiggle about and your heel
doesn't want to lift very much *when skiing*. That last
is important, since even in a very tight boot you can
get a little heel lift when you try real hard indoors.

2) get the heel as tight as possible without causing
pressure wounds. This may not be as tight as you might
think. See above.

3) if at all possible, get boots which have the third
(or second if a 3-buckle boot) buckle pull a strap
diagonally across the bend point of your ankle.
Dalbello Krypton's do this as do my Scarpa Tornado's
(AT boots, but quite stiff). A few other current boots
do this also. This diagonal pull will lower the
requirement for heel tightness.

4) learn to live with just a bit of looseness in the
front part of the boot unless you are an olympic
quality racer.

I use the Scarpa's mentioned above which have an
"Intuition" heat formable liner, semi-custom
inner soles (Sure-Foot). I put them on at 7:30AM
and don't touch them to adjust or anything else
until at least 4:30PM and sometimes later.

This looks pretty good:
http://www.techsupportforskiers.com/boots2.htm
The whole site looks pretty good but is clearly
pushing you toward professionals. You may want
to read with a grain or two of salt.

Now, if you haven't bought boots yet, look for
sales in professional shops that guarantee fit.
This fit guarantee holds in the shop regardless
of what you pay for the boots.

There is usually a loose table (for want of a better
word) inside the shell under the liner. To decrease
volume in a boot or raise a heel to get the ankle
bone in the correct location, put a shim on top
of this table. To increase volume or to lower the
ankle bone, grind away the bottom of this. Do all
modifications in small doses. Overdoing can ruin
a boot.

Some of the stretching a shop does uses a fairly
high pressure pneumatic press with interchangeable
pressure pads. I've tried screw type shoe stretchers
with little success. You need a good amount of
pressure to stretch even a heat softened boot.

Thanks all for the tips and suggestions.

BTW, I'm on a work assignment in Stratford, CT for the next few months,
where is the best place to go skiing for a day trip?

Mt. Snow, Gore, some of the Catskill (Plattekill comes highly
recommended) and if you want some challenge (actually Plattekill
has quite a bit, but it's small) come up to Killington. The new
management is doing good things for snow.


Dave