Splitboard.com Forums

trim them

sure, i'm going to trim them, but does the reduced surface area impact climbing ability?

yeah but your spliti is 140-160 wide which they are made for so you be fine. Their is still plenty of skin left after you trim them.

Yes. You need to trim them. Center the strip and use the tool they give you. Plenty of videos online too.

Dude I used them today and they are the truth. I took them out to Donner this morning and they worked awesome climbing, scrambling over bolders , hoping trees the works and they hauled ass. Not to mention that they are super light. I'm Stoked. I just looped shock cord around the tail strap and wrapped them around the rear clip. I can't wait to check them out in some January Pow!!!! Check My TR at Donner 11/12. It was a November to remember for sure.

P.S. the trimming didn't affect how they climbed. I was worried too, but they are sick.

I have to say-

the lightness is great. The asym tips loops are key. The tail clips hold firm..

But the skinless strip in the middle definitely compromises grip in the conditions I've been using these. (steep ascents in trackless blower pow).

Perhaps in a packed skin track they'd be great, but for me the limit was just about the difference between the normal and the higher risers...

normal (old style) risers they would hold. On a slope that I'd be using the new higher riser with I was literally skiing backwards at times. sketchy!

I think the deeper sidecut of the board means you cut away more fur than BD intended.

I've used the BD Ascension Nylon Split STS Skins for touring 10 days or so now. In case you missed it, these are skins that are unique, in that they do not have mohair across the full width of the skin. They look like this:
http://www.blackdiamondequipment.com/en ... -split-sts
The "split" in the name refers not to splitboarding, but rather to the way the skins are split in 3 sections. The nylon strip in the middle results in a much lighter skin (about 4 oz lighter per skin than my regular skins).

They've been in a couple of steep, gnar skinning conditions, both pow and packed, and comparing them to my partners' skinning performance, I think they are ALMOST as grippy as regular skins, but not quite, I'd call it like 95% as grippy. To me it's barely noticeable. I however have not taken them on any super icey skintracks - people are reporting they are noticeably poorer in those conditions. Which makes sense, if a rounded, icy track forces your splitski to "high-center" on the non-sticky nylon center strip.

I find that they do not glide as well on the flats as other skins. I'd say they glide about 75% as well. Which is not a big deal to me.

Also, because each skin is made of 3 strips of sewn-together material, they are consequently a bit warped out of true plane, don't lay perfectly flat when stuck to the base of your splitski, and hence "snow-up" on the gluey side a bit quicker than traditional skins that lie perfectly flat. Not a huge deal either.

The nose clips are highly adjustable and work well for splitski tips. The tail clips do not work well but I don't want them anyway so chop chop.

I wish BD sized the stuff sack longer, so that the skins would fit when folded in quarters, like all my other skin stuff sacks.

Are they worth the slightly degraded performance for the weight savings? Let's argue about it! I'm going to keep using them.

On my new Venture I am using the BD Ascension Nylon STS Skins. They are actually wider than the Voile skins. The adjustable tip attachment is killer. I got a great fit on my board with it. And for the STS tail clip? I chopped it off. In the end they are the same price as tractor skins. But you get more adjustment due to the tip attachment and the wider material to trim to you board. I am also using cheat sheets with them. They make it really easy to pull the skin apart. And they are not nearly as much of a pain in the ass as I thought they would be.

Compared to my old purple skins, the new orange ones seem to glide a bit better. Maybe that is just a new skin trait?

I don't know why- but these skins really don't glide well for me at all.

And, I'm increasingly frustrated by their inability to hold...

Perhaps my memory of my old skins isn't right (the old black burton ones), but I feel like they glided and held better...

With asym tip loos and tail clips, they never come off, though. and that stripe of sail fabric down the middle sure looks cool.

I've been running a pair of these on a 170 Khyber this year and love them. The Kyber is a pretty wide board so I think I end up with enough material to be grippy enough for me. I'm using the stock front attachments and the G3 strap attachments on the rear. Here is my pro/con breakdown for anyone trying to decide:

Pro - Much lighter on a really fat board. I could instantly tell the difference.
Pro - Glide much better. Once again, very noticeable to me over tractor skins.
Pro - Pick up less snow. I really hated the 15lbs of snow constantly caked to the bottom of my tractor skins. The wider the board, the more snow I collect.
Pro - Soak up less water. Tractor skins get so heavy when wet.
Pro - Go full length on my board. I like to ride longer boards and tractor skins are too short.

Con - Not as grippy. If your board waist is below 26, I wouldn't recommend these.
Con - Require some work to get them set up, took me about 3 hours to get them going. I drilled out the tail attachements and then reconnected them at the proper angle. I'm sure I could do it faster now but took me some time to figure out what I wanted to do.

Conclusion - I love these on my powder board but don't run them on my hard snow/spring conditions board. The lack of grip would be too painful in icy spring conditions. If you only have one board that you use for everything, I probably woudn't recommend these. If you have multiple boards and one of them is a fat powder board, I highly recommend them. The lighter grip isn't a big deal to me at all in soft snow.