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Sauna as a Hot Box?
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Sauna as a Hot Box?
Hank Garretson wrote:
A friend has been using a health club sauna as a hot box for his skis. Has anyone else tried this? Does it work? Is it safe? How hot should the box be? Anything up to about 140 C is relatively easy to generate. A sauna like mine is a well-insulated, made to give relatively constant internal temperature at a given height above the floor. As long as you place something underneath your skis to avoid damaging the sauna with wax residues it should be OK. Terje -- - "almost all programming can be viewed as an exercise in caching" |
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Sauna as a Hot Box?
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Sauna as a Hot Box?
Hank Garretson wrote:
As long as you place something underneath your skis to avoid damaging the sauna with wax residues it should be OK. Ciao Terje, Spoken like a true Finn--more concerned about the sauna than the skis! Maybe I can be an honorary Finn? I have built several saunas over the years, and spent quite a bit of time in them a well. In my student days I might even have _averaged_ an hour/day or more. :-) Terje -- - "almost all programming can be viewed as an exercise in caching" |
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Sauna as a Hot Box?
Nat Brown's recent newsletter had a Q&A on this:
Hotbox temperatures Thanks for including me in your newsletter. I built a wax box for less than a $75. It works great! After reading your newsletter I have two question. I keep the box at 140 degrees when in use. However, several years ago Steve Poulin wrote a article in Master Skier stating the base material will not except wax until it reaches a temp of 220 degrees for several minutes. So why does 140 degrees work in the box? Secondly, I've read Start green and blue waxes are plastic. Does this mean putting this type of wax in the box for several hours is a moot point, or is it better to shortly adhere it to the base and scrape warm? - Douglas Diehl Thanks for the note. I'm glad to hear you were able to build a box so cheaply - now you've got money left over for gold knobs, or something. Peter Hale (Madshus) suggests I add a tanning bed to mine... I translated an article a few years ago from research done by the Norwegian Sports institute (alas, I had a computer melt-down, and lost it, or I'd send you a copy) which underlined what I've found by practical experience, and Zach Caldwell has shown as well: that wax is absorbed even at low heat, when it is not fully molten. The Norwegian research showed that wax is absorbed by time / temperature. The lower the temp, the longer the time needed. Wax continues to be absorbed into the amorphous part of the base, at astonishingly low temperatures, because even though waxes seem hard - especially the cold ones - they are plastic, and do migrate, if the word can be used. My personal experience was that even at circa 60 C (or perhaps a bit higher - I have lost the records) Rex Green was absorbed so well that after a week of skiing in very abrasive snow at -20? C, I was the only person on the team with almost no "white spots" on the base. Everyone else was re-waxing daily. I'd ironed it on, then left it over-night in the box, in a non-molten state. (Melting Rex green in the box would ruin the bases, and delaminate the skis.) I spread the wax on with the iron, never over 130 C, and usually at 120, moving the iron very fast and over a thick layer of wax (rubbed on, then dripped on), then pop them in the box. That's all. I do not think there is any reason to think that skis need to be heated higher at the start. The Toko portable heat blanket is also at a very low temp. I keep my hotbox at 155-157º C. Hank Garretson wrote: A friend has been using a health club sauna as a hot box for his skis. Has anyone else tried this? Does it work? Is it safe? Ski Exuberantly, Hank Mammoth Lakes, Calif. |
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