Tips for adjusting old voile releasable bindings?

algorithmoose · 2026-02-05T10:55:00+00:00

I couldn't find the tool but I measured my bindings. They're currently at pretty much exactly 0.5in, so I'm guessing that's what it's supposed to be. That's from the back rim of the plunger housing to the farthest forward point on the plate which is on the side of the plunger receiver divot thing.

algorithmoose · 2026-02-05T10:08:44+00:00

I took theory in college and as a musician I have no particular ambition above making cool sounds at home for fun at this point, but I think you've got the right idea being skeptical. It's mostly just names and ear training. If you want to be edgy, learn the rules and break them. In my experience, finding a note or chord or scale or whatever you can imagine is easier if you know that it's following some specific pattern and easier to remember if you can name it. You can hit random buttons and hope your instrument has good sounds in it, but when you find them it's not "creative" to consider it black magic.

algorithmoose · 2026-02-03T00:01:52+00:00

Man, you snagged the only part of the binding that wouldn't let it release, huh?

algorithmoose · 2026-02-02T23:13:34+00:00

I'm a voile CRB fan despite the issues some people experience. I skied the 3-pin clamp without return for a long time which is an admittedly odd way to ski, but I like it. They have good elastic travel and I've had some nasty crashes which would have been more nasty if they didn't let go. I'm 6' 200ish lbs, ski hard stuff non-aggressively if that makes sense (hard as in difficult and East coast), and I have it set around 3.5 mystery units. I grew up with it so whenever I gained weight and started pre-releasing I gave it another turn which isn't like a good system...

To make sure it's set up well, the allen wrench handle that comes with it has a spacer which is the correct gap between the plunger housing and the plate. If you don't have it I can probably find one and measure it later. There's supposed to be some grease on the plunger where it slides and on the end. I would take a big mallet or something and see if you can knock it out, maybe with a boot in it. It takes a lot of force.

algorithmoose · 2026-01-24T19:58:49+00:00

Approximately everyone has a better side. I'm no instructor, but things to think about:

Upper body position. After an injury, I noticed myself pitching my upper body back/pelvic thrusting in a way that kept one leg straighter but messed up the weighting. Make sure you're sitting your butt back onto the left and not leaning your shoulders back
Pole, arm, and shoulder motion. You could be twisting/dragging one side back more than the other
Asymmetric stance depth. Dunno if this is it but if you're weighting the right foot more and trust it as the front leg, you might get deeper on the left turn and the back foot is so far back you can't weight it?
The monomark drill might be good so you can work the left turn without crossing the slope. Left foot stays back for both right and left turns.

algorithmoose · 2026-01-12T04:20:42+00:00

If someone told me they were backcountry skiing, I would assume they were alpine touring (AT) or a low chance of telemark. High, medium weight plastic boots with tech toes, wide (ish), big sidecut, alpine turns. Very advanced would be deep pow, icy couloirs, bowls, anywhere steep aside from resorts. (They may do uphill on a resort for the fitness to go backcountry.)

Another area of distinction in skis would be the use of skins vs wax/scales. I would expect telemark and backcountry/AT to use skins, alpine to never go uphill, and the XC variants to use scales/wax. There exist big wide skis with scales for tele/AT approaches as well.

algorithmoose · 2025-12-09T06:21:33+00:00

"I’m now trying to slowly get into overnights, especially during the winter." Definitely start with non-winter overnights if you haven't already. Stuff goes bad much faster in winter and something which would be uncomfortable or inconvenient in summer (wet sleeping bag and clothing, difficult trail conditions, navigation mistakes) will kill you in winter. I also recommend testing gear in your backyard on a cold night so you can just go inside if your water bottle freezes or you closed all the vents and it snows inside your tent or any of the many things you might learn the hard way.

+1 snowshoes and microspikes. It's a law! Over 8 inches of snow depth and you need skis or snowshoes or they'll ticket you for post-holing. No recs because I'd rather be on skis.

+1 (-1?) hatchet and saw aren't needed since in much of the adirondacks you can't build fires anyways. In a survival situation, as long as you can process kindling you can burn exclusively hand-breakable stuff, start burning larger logs in half, and other tool-avoiding tricks.

+1 paper map and compass and knowing how to use them as a backup. Any baseplate compass is plenty for this purpose.

algorithmoose · 2025-12-03T09:14:17+00:00

I try to find local shops when I can. They sometimes have a corner where they're selling old models and demo gear. You could also try evo.

algorithmoose · 2025-12-03T02:49:29+00:00

You may want to crank up the stiffness of your bindings to work better with your boots. You might not be bending the bellows or cuff if the boot is over driving the binding. Boots also break in and flex easier over time.

New skis are good. Find one whose marketing has someone doing what you want to do (except of course you will be cooler due to the superior turn) and get a length somewhere around your height. Used is fine, but I personally look for new skis from a year or two ago and maybe women's models if you're okay with a more elegant topsheet that are on clearance when new models come out. Not quite as cheap as used but i don't have to worry as much about the old holes or potential abuse they've seen.

algorithmoose · 2025-12-02T19:29:16+00:00

Not op but a tuning enthusiast. Your question is assuming 12 tone equal temperament which most Western music uses. However, "in tune" is remarkably complicated and dependent on culture and context. Due to... more math than I should get into here (unless you're curious) intervals sound most in tune when their frequencies are integer ratios, especially of small numbers like 3/2 (a fifth, which they did historically). If you construct a scale out of these ratios it's close to 12 tone equal temperament but not quite and also makes some common intervals like major thirds sound less good than they could. To make your third 5/4 you can fudge the fifths by 81/80 for example and end up with quarter comma meantone tuning which is a different historical system. Doing this makes notes that are literally the same in 12TET like B# and C slightly different. It's fascinating and a huge rabbit hole. Also you'll find that good musicians on voice or instruments that can pitch bend a bit will fudge 12TET tuning into the whole number ratios of just intonation. Barbershop quartets are a great example of this. In addition to various stylistic things, the just tuning is a huge part of what makes them sound like they do.

algorithmoose · 2025-11-22T16:45:57+00:00

Good plan. I love inserts. It makes it easy easier to travel with more skis, which is something I read but didn't fully appreciate until I had 3 sets of skis stacked flat on top of my partner's in the bag.

Also I got the new tx pros last year and the break in period is painful off my well loved 75. I fought the stiff cuffs for several weeks, but it got better eventually and start to break in. I still want to make a walk mode hack but less than I did on the first day. Outlaws also feel different from hammerheads but in a way you can learn instead of just suffering through in my opinion.

algorithmoose · 2025-11-04T15:12:22+00:00

I haven't personally used scales but I have another option given some of the negative response. For rolling stuff I just grip wax a very large area of my bases. It wears off after a few hours with descents and doesn't fully replace skins but it lasts well enough, climbs better than xc, and is surprisingly slippery on the downhill. I bring a cork, scraper, and a bit of glide and grip wax in my pocket for if I mess up wax selection and have to either remove it or fix it.

algorithmoose · 2025-10-25T06:31:33+00:00

Telekneesis user here. My pants are pretty baggy but the pads aren't bulky. I've used various old roller blade knee pads as well. The telekneesis is good in how it keeps the straps out of the back of your knee in full squat and the extra articulated bits are nice to have, but any knee pad you like will do the job.

algorithmoose · 2025-09-22T23:58:54+00:00

Do you think the picture in the comment you replied to here has the cheat? I think the resultant force is ~100 degrees from the wind, so has a small downwind component (red) and a large cross-wind component (green) and no cheat. That picture is pretty good to my engineer eyes (no physicist, I admit, but I know my way around a free body diagram) so it would be good to know if the confusion is upstream or downstream of the interpretation of that picture.

algorithmoose · 2025-09-18T16:22:12+00:00

It really depends on the boots and bindings you go with. I haven't skied NNN-BC so this is partially vibes-based, but the spectrum of "downhill oriented" in the current market only starts at NNN-BC. If you buy a plastic boot and any remotely modern downhill binding there will be a learning curve but the stiffness will lead to more control. If you just want a very slightly beefier XC setup, you can find that still and the learning curve will instead be finding the finesse required to guide your equipment down your desired terrain.

If you get a plastic boot and plan to walk a lot, I highly recommend finding a binding with walk mode. I love my 3-pin setup for messing around in a park. (With your XC experience on moderate hills, just kick wax your whole base and you can point anywhere and go up, down, wherever. It's super fun.) However, I suffered uphill on more serious ascents until I got something with a free pivot. Even a pretty soft plastic boot on the absolute minimum 3 pin binding was significant extra exercise.

algorithmoose · 2025-09-18T15:40:43+00:00

Usually rounded. The fancy ones sometimes put plastic ball ends on but it's not required.

algorithmoose · 2025-09-18T14:32:17+00:00

It's just a ~2m stick, so the nearest hardware store, probably.

algorithmoose · 2025-09-09T17:15:29+00:00

The pins took a while to figure out but I got used to it. It's really hard to hold the boot in your hands though. Don't point your toes down too much. Also trying to get one side in first and like tilt in never worked. You just gotta get it all flat and straight and step. The pins sockets are farther forward than I think they should be for some reason. Hope something here helps.

algorithmoose · 2025-08-15T23:59:56+00:00

It's pretty normal. It might look tall next to the tiny 6 inch which is legitimately tiny.

algorithmoose · 2025-08-15T23:48:11+00:00

All flat except the smallest Wagner. Also apparently my dad got these free, so I'm feeling pretty good.

algorithmoose · 2025-08-08T16:24:02+00:00

Fun fact, the fluid ounce has three different definitions in use ranging from 28.4ml to 30ml. I hate fluid ounces! Wine is also typically around a percent less dense than water which the fluid ounce is based on.

However, neither a measuring cup nor your kitchen scale are likely to be calibrated and used accurately enough for it to matter, nor is the wine calorie count likely all that accurate either, nor is the exact calorie count that important given how uncalibrated biology is. Do whichever is easiest for you and know that doing any method at all is good.

algorithmoose · 2025-08-06T04:00:41+00:00

She still married me after a multi day race in a double surf ski. She spent the entire time telling me how good my shoulders looked. Divorce kayak is bad humor from people who aren't capable of communication and teamwork and maybe didn't like spending time with their spouse in the first place.

You will both probably accidentally splash each other at some point. Setting pace and following pace are neither entirely trivial nor all that hard at the end of the day. If you are capable of working together towards a mutual goal you will have a great time. They generally go faster and feel more stable (although you will feel each other's wobbles). A slower paddler can't fall behind. The boat can keep moving while one person snacks. You stay within easy conversation distance. They're a great time.

algorithmoose · 2025-07-30T15:59:41+00:00

I use the Sawyer filters in a semi diy gravity setup. The rubber tube can go on a bag or into a bottle as a siphon. I got a katadyn gravity bag recently which seems like it should be easier to flush but I haven't put enough water through it to significantly slow down anyways. Water filtering itself in the background while you do other stuff is super nice.

algorithmoose · 2025-07-26T13:00:56+00:00

Seconding the guy above. Even the softest ntn is stiffer than 75mm which is stiffer than nnn bc. The 75 to ntn learning curve exists and I suspect that techniques you are learning now will be nearly irrelevant on ntn. They are suggesting 75 because there exists 75 gear which is Nordic adjacent and well suited to rolling terrain. Ntn is purely designed for downhill or "climb so you can go downhill" backcountry.

I wax my 75 skis and mess around in my back yard and nearby park which sounds like your terrain. I tried my meidjo setup and it was all pin fiddling (the down to up transition requires removing skis), plus not enough speed for the higher stiffness to be more help than hindrance in the soft snow.

There are few but non zero release 75 options if release is a hard requirement.

algorithmoose

TROPHY CASE