Ski Waxing

[WillowKat]

Stupid question: what does waxing do for the skis?

 

[SayvilleSteve]

Stupid question: what does waxing do for the skis?

Longer lifespan (the bases don't dry out and potentially crack or shrink) and the wax makes them glide better. It's like putting lotion on dry skin.

 

[Mike]

I wish I lived closer to Titus so I could learn your waxing ways. Are those Stocklis?

Yes, Laser SC's. I was at my boot-fitter's getting some work done and they came home with me. Pretty amazing ski. I have been skiing on the AR for the last few seasons, also a great ski..

and WilloKat, if you haven't had your skis tuned and waxed for a while, take them to a good shop, and have them give the skis the deluxe treatment, whatever that is. It should be pretty clear.

 

[Harvey]

Stupid question: what does waxing do for the skis?

Prevents injury.

 

[sig]

Stupid question: what does waxing do for the skis?

make you go in the spring

 

[Milo Maltbie]

I like to wax every days if I can, if the edges are ok I'll skip them for a day or two, but I like to get the burrs off and have a smooth edge at the very least. I've used my mom's old iron for close to 60 years now, the temperature adjustment is good

I sharpen every day or two with a Swix electric edge grinder. I usually hot wax only once a year in the spring because I only work outdoors, and that makes hot waxing too hard. I use my mom's best iron for but Nana's travel iron works better. Mom's iron was too big and powerful and always developed hot spots that smoked the wax. The travel iron is smaller and it has a 230 volt setting that reduces the power by 75%, which mitigates the hot spots. I only use unversal wax, but if I used high melting point waxes I would get a proper PID controlled iron.
Last week Milo Jr gave me an infrared wax heater, which works way better outdoors in cold weather. It's big and awkward to use but it works well. I'm gonna try to wax every 5 or 6 days now.

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[Milo Maltbie]

I use my work bench in garage. Put garbage can at end of skis and scrape most of the shavings into can. What falls on floor gets cleaned up when spring cleaning comes around. Waxing in a cold area will help to keep the wax sticking to everything.

Every bench, table or other horizontal surface in my house is covered with some combination of ice skates, soldering irons, tackle boxes, laundry, beer bottles or power tools. Saw horses work better for me. YMMV.

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[Milo Maltbie]

Longer lifespan (the bases don't dry out and potentially crack or shrink) and the wax makes them glide better. It's like putting lotion on dry skin.

IME HDPE doesn't dry out, crack or shrink. The chaulky white surface you sometimes see on unwaxed skis is abrasion, which waxing prevents.
An unwaxed ski will glide fine in most conditions, and better than the wrong wax in cold snow. Liquid wax twice a day in warm spring snow works well enough for me. YMMV

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[Scrundy]

Every bench, table or other horizontal surface in my house is covered with some combination of ice skates, soldering irons, tackle boxes, laundry, beer bottles or power tools. Saw horses work better for me. YMMV.

mm

My tuning bench is also full of tools and such. It serves many purposes depending on what I’m messing with.

 

[Tjf1967]

Somewhere in here I saw roto brush on a battery operated drill. They don't produce enough rpm. A 15 dollar electric drill works much better. The swix electric sharpener is the shazizzel. The metal brush for the roto is a necessary to. I was so all about easy. If they only had automated scraper.