Zude, thanks for sharing. I agree that removing material from the spar is probably a good idea. That thing is carbon yes? I would want to leave only the part of the spar which functions to provide the “highback” support, to allow the boot to flex well laterally and medially.
Let us know how it flexes when you get a binding to clip into.

By spar I meant spar varnish to seal things and make the strap slide freely. May have to cut down the cuff? May not? I also have eliminator tongues that I may use not sure I want them.

Over hang doesn’t appear to be an issue, these are 29.5s and my board has a 26.5cm waist. I think my angles are 15 back and 25 front.

Not sure if i can do the same vertabrae arm hack on the buckle side? Buckle might run into the lock mech housing if i bolt it further back.

Yeh I may try to rush deliver some voile plate bindings just to get these on snow. These boot are the same length as my insanos (11.5).
The vertabrae as sportiva calls it is made from hard plastic, not Carbon fiber. I’m going to match the front boot with mods made on the rear boot and then try and go get some of the last turns around in az. I would also like to find some one with a sowing machine to attach more Velcro on my strap. I really look forward to touring with this setup on some dynas and a legit binding, (plates will have to do for now). I think this could be a game changer for me.

Barrows do you think flexing to the outside of the foot is as important as medial (inside flex)? The buckle side looks harder but not impossible to mod and this would leave the high back (spine) intact while freeing up more flex. I could experiment with nuts and bolts to attach the buckle further back on the arm but would have to remove the rivets to do so. This could be done without cutting the arm to beggin with but the ultimate goal would be more flex and freedom from the spine.

Matched the left boot fairly well, and painted the first coat of Spar Varnesh. Not worried about to much medial flex at this point, but i’ll wait to ride and tour with them before further cutting..

Toured and camped with the Siderals north of the Kachina Peaks, AZ. Loved the walk mode even though I’m touring on top on Voile plates great natural range of motion. Once it got to camp taking the liners out and stashing them in my sleeping bag was easy (much easier than my Insanos, which are shitty to even attempt at removing the liners).

The down was fun as always yet clearly these are not my Insanos or Drivers (Drivers are basically mush now). I felt confidant and smooth the whole way down though, even when I got to the tight and rocky trial/skateboard esc section of lower Abineu trail. These boots are stiffer and the rear lean is a bit of a hard stop.

I am going to continue to modify these by lengthening the upper strap and cutting away more of the Vertebral arms on the buckle side. I also placed a small piece of urethane from an old Thud buster seat post 😆 at the top of the lean slot to give the lean back a softer feel. The thud buster mode seems to do the trick. I also am going to experiment with the rear spoilers provided and see if this changes the rear lean feel for the better.

Over all I am happy with these boots so far but need a full season on new bindings and tech toes to really make an honest assessment. It seems from the posts i’ve read that Tlts are the way to go if you have the cash as they seem easier to modify… But Siderals are a good option if you don’t mind doing a few (kind of scary) modifications that take some time.

Yeah voile plates were really just a stopgap for me at the end of this season (only got two days on them). Voiles plates only cost $55 and they work fine for now.

Phantom is definitely the pinnacle of hard boot split systems. I like the Spark dyno option for swapping out to my old Fuses/soft boots for inbounds riding and side country. I’m also waiting to see the price difference.

I may be on phantoms or sparks next year but definitely i’m getting dynafit toe pieces.

@barrows wrote:

Yeah, Spark is certainly going to be more affordable than Phantom, and perhaps a good option for those folks who do not take their riding too seriously…
But, they will not come close to the ride performance which Phantom offers; the precision of the Phantom interface is in another league from anything which relies on the Voile Pucks.

I think that comment has the potential to piss off about 99.9 % of the people on this forum :headbang:
Met Keffler during the Canuck splitfest, great guy and glad he came up with a product that eliminated one of the reasons people trash talked hardboots.
But now its time for an objective test so to speak.Anybody who owns a set of phantoms and is abit handy I’d love to see how much deflection there is in the bindings by placing a bending moment on the board halves. Clamp one side of the board solid and load two ten pound weights one foot from the center of the board, located at each binding measure the distance the interface flex one foot away from the center of the board with a dial indicater.
Time to man up barrows with all this trash talk of other systems, I want to see numbers.

@vapor wrote:

@barrows wrote:

Yeah, Spark is certainly going to be more affordable than Phantom, and perhaps a good option for those folks who do not take their riding too seriously…
But, they will not come close to the ride performance which Phantom offers; the precision of the Phantom interface is in another league from anything which relies on the Voile Pucks.

I think that comment has the potential to piss off about 99.9 % of the people on this forum :headbang:
Met Keffler during the Canuck splitfest, great guy and glad he came up with a product that eliminated one of the reasons people trash talked hardboots.
But now its time for an objective test so to speak.Anybody who owns a set of phantoms and is abit handy I’d love to see how much deflection there is in the bindings by placing a bending moment on the board halves. Clamp one side of the board solid and load two ten pound weights one foot from the center of the board, located at each binding measure the distance the interface flex one foot away from the center of the board with a dial indicater.
Time to man up barrows with all this trash talk of other systems, I want to see numbers.

Well if the truth pisses people off, what can I say about it? We all need to face the truth sometimes.
There is good reason why Karakoram, Phantom, Ranger, and now Plum have all gone to great efforts to design and produce new splitboard interface systems: because the Voile puck system, while adequate in its day, is antiquated and has its limitations. Voile pucks flex quite a bit, not only that, occasionally they break in half, it has happened to me. Now I have no experience with Prowder, I have my own reservations about them, but without any experience that is only speculative, so I will not suggest that they have the same issues as Voile pucks.
I have participated in the kind of testing you are talking about, and the results were clear. What is even more clear is the precision of the ride with Phantom Bindings.
What some may fail to realize is how much thought and engineering has gone into Phantom bindings. They are designed specifically to have precise stiff control across the board from toe to heel (edge to edge), and to allow for a degree of controlled flex towards the tip and tail, and to precisely transfer rider forces from the boot to the board with no slop (but with a small amount of controlled flex). The transfer of dynamic riding forces, in three dimensions, is what this is all about-bench testing can tell one some things, but the true test is in the riding. I am not aware of a single rider who after trying Phantom bindings went back to a Voile puck based system-I could never go back, as it would be a step backwards.

The correct way to objectively test and measure this system is with a boot clipped in the binding (as the boot itself is part of the system which provides the support) and a lever in the shaft of the boot to apply the force. And then of course, subjective riding response tests should also be done as how it rides is really what matters, and their is no way to truly measure all the dynamic forces at play on a test bench (OK, maybe there is a way, but it would be well beyond what anyone here is going to have the budget for).

I am not trashing the Voile puck system, I rode with them for quite a few years, and certainly they did work (except when they broke in half). But, advancements in gear come as time goes on, this is normal, and really should not piss off an intelligent human.

@vapor wrote:

Who said i rode voile???. I have no problem with saying that Phantoms are a good system. what I have a problem with is you trash talking other peoples gear and doing exactly what previous people did to hardbooters, your seriously saying that the people like Liz dee, Kyle Miller, BG Knight and such aren’t “serious” about splitboarding?
If you can can design and build and interface you should be able to do some objective testing as well.So in the binding section I’ll walk you through it and do it on the cheap so anybody willing to put in a bit of effort can do it and we can compare results.
What can I say, I’m bored, cranky and looking for a fight and calling you out but mostly love to see objectively how interfaces compare.

All of my comments pertained to the Voile Puck system. There is a good reason riders like Liz Daily and Brooks Goodnight ride the Karakoram Interface. I never “trashed” the Karakoram system, my criticism was that Voile Pucks flex, and occasionally break, and that they do not provide as a precise a ride as the Phantom interface does. Please do not put words in my mouth which I did not utter. I do find it instructive that the new Karakoram Prime system has a re-designed interface plate which is very, very similar in design to Phantom: good for them, they now offer better stance adjustability because of this change, hopefully ride performance is improved as well (the original system did not overlap the board halves on both sides, and the interface plates were a little more flex than I would prefer. Hopefully the have switched to using more 7075 aluminum as well…
DIY style pucks, custom drilled for your stance, with overlaps of both board halves, as it appears yours are, are miles better than the Voile System, right? Otherwise I doubt that you would have gone to the effort to create them. The is not something one can easily purchase and set up for their board though, without custom drilling and such. For me, a good interface provides both ease of set up, ability to adjust stance width.setback in fine increments, and independent adjustment of stance angle and width/setback.

@vapor wrote:

Sorry for the thread drift.
This got me thinking that I will take one of my old boards and do an experiment between to calculate flex on a diy,Voile and Phantom like interface and graft the results with different loads.Using the same board and setup should provide for less variables in the test and then post it up in the binding section.

Vapor. I would be interested in seeing a side by side test. I don’t know of any other phantom like interface though. I have extensive experience with the Karakoram, Spark and Phantom bindings and in my opinion, the Phantom interface is much better at holding the two halves together, creating torsional rigidness. I hate the sheer effect of split boarding and have gone way out of my way in the past trying to firm up my set ups. I have added extra K clips in the center and the best was the bar between the tour brackets. Now that i am on Phantom, i don’t consider it an issue at all ( the high quality of my Venture board helps too). I am not one to care what others ride, I am not trying to preach or say that Phantom’s are the best or anything like that. To each his own. But i would place a friendly bet that the Phantom interface holds the spit together better than the other systems. If i get time, i will take pics and see if i can prove it. If a test shows otherwise, then oh well, but i really think you will see the difference if you get the chance to test Phantoms.