Anyone have some advice......?

Tony_H wrote:The internet is a great place to gather information. Have you ever heard of google?

It's a very confusing topic because so many in the ski industry don't understand it. Kind of like searching for info on parabolic skis ten years ago; you would have found a lot of nay sayers and conflicting ideas.

tspill wrote: Can someone explain what these skis are (tip rocker or early rise) and why they help? Thanks.

This video explains the basics:

What an interesting thread!
Firstly I sound like many of the others on here. Bad knees, happy on blues, more cautious on reds, terrified on blacks, but LOVE being on the piste and in the sun and lov e the snow.

Secondly I thought for a sec I was in the wrong forum.... something men keep in their pants throbbing and talk about men being able to rise in the morning!!! *Looks shocked*

It's such a complicated subject. Even that video is confusing. That ski is not rockered, it has regular camber with tip and tail rocker.

In addition to the attributes talked about in the video, this particular design is also used for racing and high performance carving. The difficult part is that in order for this camber rocker profile to work best, other aspects of design like sidecut and flex must work in unison. So far some skis have failed in this regard. However this is where performance ski design is heading. As has been the case with all high performance skis, quality construction is as important as shape design.

At the other end of the scale, Skis like the Rossi Alias 74 which have tip rocker, are not intended as performance skis at all. In this case the tip rocker moves the point at which a ski turn is initiated further back from the tip. This means the ski requires less forward pressure and effort to turn. Rossi call it "auto turn" and there are many other names for it.

So why have camber at all? Fully rockered skis work well is powder, and are popular for terrain park use. On piste however they do not perform well. Camber is needed to resist the bending of the skis, and put power into turns.

Adding to the confusion, most of these skis have something called a low rise tip (not to be confused with an early rise tip). The low rise tip doesn't need to turn up as much as tips on camber skis because the tip rocker is already lifting the whole front of the ski. When the skis is tipped to high angles and bent in a turn, the low rise tip blends with the curve of the ski to increase the effective edge.

One thing you will notice when using these skis is that when the ski runs flat, the tips will flap. This flapping stops as soon as the ski is tipped a few degrees, but will disconcert some skiers who associate flapping with noodle skis.

Another matter of great confusion is the sidecut radius quoted by the manufacturers. This number no longer gives an accurate idea of how the ski will turn. The curve on the side of ski may now be made up of varying and very different radiuses. The manufacturers give the average in the specs, but when these multi radius sidecuts are combined with the new rocker/camber profiles, the actually effective turn radius may be much smaller. Hopefully in the future ski manufacturers will not treat us as stupid and give the details of a ski's sidcut design, Until then the only way to know is to ski it. Again for these sidecuts to work well, the flex (stiffness) and camber/rocker have to compliment each other.

Hopefully, this gives an idea of what is happening to ski design and how complicated it can be.

Of course lacking any authoritative writings on recent ski design, this is just my interpretation. Hopefully Swingbeep can correct any errors.

now we're talking stiffness, too! *looks even more shocked!*

Trencher knows his stuff!

Right on !

Just a personal note on topic, just finished testing the Blizzard Black Pearl model 2012-2013 ! A hit with all women and some men! Very easy ski as a first "rocker" with high level of stability and ease of "carve" !

There is a 1-2 hour learning curve for many new skiers to rockers!

I now have a waiting line of 10 skiers who want to try it and a signed blank cheque for a women who insists in have that ski !

The "wise" skier must learn, not where to get information butto determine the quality of that information ! Skiing company sites is one of the worst places to be informed!

Put Trencher on your "sources" list!

Discodee wrote:What an interesting thread!

something men keep in their pants throbbing and talk about men being able to rise in the morning!!! *Looks shocked*

But you came back .........
:mrgreen:

Modern skis do seem to be making a real difference to the easyness of skiing, or effortlessness or whatever which I think can have benfits across a wide range of skiers.

I am an absolutely firm believer that there is enough room on the slopes for all sorts of skiers from those mad keen obsessives (whistles), those who want to seriously progress, those only happy getting down the steepest, hardest runs right through to those who just simply enjoy sliding around on the mountains - at whatever speed and gradient of run.

But .......
Having someone on hand who actually knows what this or that particular ski will actually mean when being skied on by a particular skier is going to be so important.
As the technology gets more advanced and new bits and bobs come in the shear choice is going to make things very confusing.

Of course! LOL