Thursday, May 17, 2012

Wax & Race Service

Stone Grinding & Waxing Services

Boulder Nordic Sport is a full-service ski shop offering premium stone grinding, ski and waxing services at our retail locations in Boulder, CO and Portland, Maine and now at events with our traveling race service shop, BNS Mobile. Top racers from across North America send their skis to us because we do the best quality work in the country. Have your skis prepared by the pros and see how much better they go!

BNS Mobile

The BNS wax crew hits the road in our new rig, BNS Mobile, pushing our goal of providing World Cup Service for Everyone at events across the country. BNS Mobile travels to races offering professional race waxing services and a mini-BNS store. It serves as a base for our testing and waxing operations and is a great resource wherever you are headed. Visit the BNS Mobile page for more information, including event schedules and the latest test results and wax recommendations.

Stone Grinding

Stone grinding flattens the ski base, removes burnt and damaged base material and provides important micro-structure. Bottom line, it makes your skis faster and easier to wax. We have advanced Tazzari stone grinding machines set up in our Boulder shop. Skis can be dropped off at our Boulder, CO or Portland, Maine stores. If you are shipping skis to us, please ship directly to our Boulder store. Click this link to see our Stone Grinding Menu and Service Schedule/Lead Time.

Hot Box Wax Treatments

Saturate your base with wax for durability and glide.

Basic Saturation $19: Basic Saturation involves applying a very soft paraffin wax to the ski and placing it in the heat box for 90-120 minutes at a temperature of about 55 degrees Celsius (131F). This ensures excellent saturation of the base. The skis will need to be hardened with colder wax for the appropriate conditions. This hardening can be done with 2-3 layers of ironed-in wax or hot box treatment.

Extreme Saturation $29 (Recommended): This is a two-step process with the first step being application of a very soft paraffin which is placed in the heat box at low temperature (50-55C) for a long time (6-12 hours). The skis are scraped and a harder paraffin wax is applied followed by the heat box at 60C for approximately one hour. This second step is still very safe for the skis, but the temperature but may hasten any inevitable movement of the base away from dead flat. We notice that some skis, especially older models, tend to get concave tips and tails after heat boxing, even after grinding. The same thing will happen over time and with ironing, but the heat box may accelerate the process.

This treatment will saturate the base and then harden it to a level where it can be race-waxed with high-temperature fluoros and cold waxes.

Race Ready $49: Extreme Saturation plus finish with the specified Swix race wax (LF, HF or HFBD). The skis are saturated, hardened and then two layers of LF/HF are applied, scraped and brushed, leaving the skis ready to race or for application of Swix Cera F pure fluoro. Cera F treatment can be added for $20.

Race Wax Services

BNS wax techs offer race waxing services out of the shop and on-site at several events each winter. We can prepare your skis for any race, just bring them in and we'll get them ready to go. $39 for High-Fluoro (LF & HF Layers) and $85 for pure fluoro (LF, HF + Pure Fluoro).

Weekly Nighthawks race special: $15 for a race prep LF wax. Drop your skis off any day by 3PM and pick them up the next day after 2.

Wax Recommendations

Lake Placid Loppet Wax Recommendation

Categories: Wax Reports | Author: Eric Pepper | Posted: 2/2/2011 | Views: 1124

Lake Placid Loppet

The Lake Placid Loppet is a 25k and 50k race that can be done in the classic or skate technique. All of the races will be performed on a 25km loop at Mt. Van Hoevenberg. The trails at Mt. Van Hoevenberg are generally pretty challenging with long climbs and technical descents, making wax durability a concern.

Weather: Friday Night: Partly cloudy, with a low around -1f.

Saturday: Snow likely, mainly after 1pm. Cloudy, with a high near 30. Chance of precipitation is 60%

Forecast Based Recommendation

Recommendation:

We recommend the following:

Base Layer: SkiGo LF Graphite iron, scrape brush.

Race Paraffin: SkiGo HF Blue, Holmenkol Matrix Blue, Swix HF 6

Fluoro Powder: SkiGo C105 Powder, Holmenkol Cold Powder, Swix FC7

Top Coat: Skigo C105 Block, Holmenkol Cold Block

Structure: Li2 for Classic and CV0 for Skate

Kick Recommendation:

Base Binder: Toko Green Carbon Base Binder, Ironed in, let cool, cork smooth.

Kick: SkiGo HF Violet, Rode Blue Multigrade, VR40, VR45, Rode Green Special

Discussion: For a race of this distance, wax durability is very important for both glide and kick. To ensure that you get the most out of your glide wax it is highly recommended that a layer for graphite is put down to help harden the base and make it more durable. Our favorite graphite for these conditions is SkiGo LF grapite. Other good options are Rex Graphite and Start Graphite.

For paraffin’s our favorite wax for these conditions is Skigo HF Blue, as it is very good in new snow and will cover the full range of temperatures on race day, as it is projected to be in the low teens at race time and warm up to the mid 20s during the day. Other waxes to consider would be Holmenkol Matrix Blue and Swix HF 6. For Fluoro Powders SkiGo C105 Powder would be a good choice as it also runs very well in new snow, with Holmenkol Cold Powder and Swix FC7 also being good options. Top Coats are a good idea to help with initial speed over the first 5 to10k. Again SkiGo C105 solid would be a great choice as it runs very well in new snow and has a wide range. Another good option would be Holmenkol Cold Block.

For kick it is important to put down a thin ironed in binder to ensure durability and that the kick wax will stay on the ski. For this our favorite binder is Toko Green base binder. As for kick it is going to be colder at start time than it will be later in the day, so a wax that can cover this range is very important. Our number one recommendation for this is SkiGo HF Violet kick wax which is made for new snow and covers the entire range during race time. Other options would be Rode Multigrade blue, SwixVR40 and Swix VR45. These other waxes may need to be covered earlier in the race with a colder wax to speed them up and for that we recommend waxes such as Rode Green Special and SkiGo XC Green.

note: BNS imports Holmenkol and SkiGo waxes, and also sells waxes from Swix, Toko, Rode, Solda, Rex, Guru, Innovax, Magnar and others. We search for the fastest waxes for our customers and our testing is professional, objective and transparent. We make our best effort to test what we think is the best from each brand. However, given that we are testing more options from Holmenkol and SkiGo, there is a bias toward those brands. With this full disclosure, you can assess the legitimacy of our testing yourself. Visit Swix and Toko for their official recommendations. If you have any questions please contact us.

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