My new homemade skis : The Gapers

fuck. ok... try either a reverse camber OR a totally flat ski, but with a little "early rise" as seen on the eric pollard pro.

try some different shit out to see what works and what doesnt first... but i seriously think that there is already a LOT of interest in the reverse camber stuff right now, and if by the end of the summer you could find something that worked really well...

you could probably start up a company around that ski.
 
haha yeah i still have to solve some durablity issues before i start selling, but they have come a long way from the first pair i made. I am making a shitload of skis this summer and my senior engineering project is a cnc router, which should cut way down on production time and increase accuracy. Once i do start selling though ill probably hook you guys up with pairs for like $250 or so. The graphics situation is kind of cool though because i can laminate any thin cotton fabric you choose under a clear topsheet.
 
can you give me a little estimate as to how much it cost to make the ski makers, and how long it takes
 
about how much do they cost to make a pair like just straight up material cost??

...and they look saweet as hell nice work
 
man all you people who asked how much it costs in material to make the ski suck at reading

but fucking awesome man, you really could start your own company if you got into rockered skis and shit.
 
nice dood some kids made some skis in my town but they were def. not as nice as yours

nice work!
 
very nice...its cool to cause if someone steals em and trys to sell em on ebay or u c em at the hill u would know they are ur skis
 
well yeah, thats what i am saying. to try to get that shit resolved by the end of the summer.

but any idea on whether or not you can do a reverse camber park ski?
 
also: look into sandwich construction, and how they have those ptex sidewalls...

my PEs seem bombproof because of the sidewall construction.. but it seems like that shit would be pretty hard to do at home.
 
just the material to make skis are way more than $50....depends on the

quality of the material, how many layers of carbon or fiberglass, what

type of wood core you are using, sidewalls or not, if you are getting

real topsheets printed up, if you are buying in bulk.....

right

now, my bamboo cores are costing me over $60 a pair alone.

When I am able to buy in bulk, this should drop down to about $40

though.

Professionally printed topsheets run about $40 a

piece, 1.3mm edges ~ $10 per ski, base material is about $25-30 if you

are using the normal grade, 1.3mm thick stuff. Eventually I am trying

to get 2.2mm race base stuff, and that will be running closer to $40

per ski. Edges will also increase in cost. Then there is tipspacers

($10), binding mat ($10), epoxy (varies depending on what you use....),

fiberglass (I use three sheets per ski, which costs about $30 per pair

for good 22oz triaxial). It really adds up.

That is just the

materials too. If you have an established wook shop with all the tools

required, than this would be much cheaper. Thus far, I've had to buy:

Table saw + good Thin Kerf Blade + Roller Stand

Jig Saw

Plunge Router

Fixed Base Router

Router Table

A number of router bits

Drill press + lots of metal drilling bits

Air compressor

Power Drill

Planer

Big Tool Box

Belt Sander

Palm Sander

tons and tons of clamps

and more stuff I am probably forgetting

Then the press......

Lots and lots of steel

150+ grade 8 bolts (think this is running about $300+ right now)

MDF for molds

Aluminum Cat Track ($200) + cable

Aluminum for heat-blanket sandwhich + cassettes ($300)

Heat Blanket ($320)

PID controller ($200)

Fire Hose ($20)

CNCed templates (~$220 for 7 templates)

ummm......think that is more or less the jist of it.

Granted....I

wanted my press to be as professional as possible. While it is only a

single-ski press, is still weights in at ~ 1,500 lbs, so it is pretty

beefy. Also, I bought relatively high quality tools, so that was fairly costly.

If you do it

on a budget, you can build a nice press for probably $250-$400 using wood and a number of metal enclosures. Forget

the cat track, heating blanket + controller, aluminum cassettes,

subliminated topsheets, plus if you already had a bunch of the tools,

and it is much more affordable. I figure I've spent close to $2800 just on tools thus far, then close to $700 on heating the press. The press, with molds, cat track, etc has got to be clost to $2000 by now too. Right now I almost have enough materials for seven pairs of skis too, which has cost me about $1800....then there are templates. Basically.....I've spent a shit-ton of money getting this all going. When it is all said and done, though, I will have my own little ski factory, so I really can't complain.

Buying in bulk saves you a ton of money for sure. If you have enough money to buy at bulk, and are not using anything super expensive, $150 per pair is pretty resonable. I hope when I can buy in bulk to get my pairs down to around $215. Bamboo is fucking expensive, as is race base, fat edges, etc.

and just to note.....how ever long it seems like it is going to take you to get it done, multiple by at least 2 and you will have a more accurate idea. I've been pretty hindered by how much this has all cost, but even if I had the funds available to me at the begining it would have taken a pretty long time.

 
thats the materials for one pair of skis, but you rarely can buy the material enough for 1 pair of skis, they usually come in ridiculously large quantities.

and 50 bucks dosnt even come close to the amount it takes to build skis. you have to make a press first, which is time consuming and costs some mad bank. you gotta have all the right tools, you might be able to borrow, but still, the materials it costs to go into a press, let alone the materials for skis. i hope no one got the idea that skis can be built at home for 50 bucks, thatd be sad.
 
word, those look sick man, I'll be at PC friday, I'll look for ya. I'm rocking a black helmet blue anthems and probably a blue UTAH jersey
 
armada - what size CNC router are you planning on building? you said it is for school...will it be located at you home or at school?

I really want to make one at some point, just hard with school + research + building skis as it is. I don't think I would need a full 4'x8' one, probably something that is more like 2' x 8'. Dana (g-man on skibuiders) is currently building one, so he could probably be a help. I think he is already started it.

My problem currently is space. Right now I am in a packed oversized single garage. My lease runs up in May, so I am looking for a new house hopefully with a double garage + basement/storage space. That way I can have a room to store all the materials, and do minor things like gluing the edges to the core, attaching binding mats, cutting fiberglass, taping base/topsheets, etc, and then ideally have a two car garage, one side with a cnc-router plus maybe a few small things, to other with places to layup the skis, etc, and the press.

Who is funding your CNC? I know that you can find them used on CL.org for around $5000-7000, and I think a DIY CNC would probably run about $2000-$2500 if it was 2' x 8'. Either way, those skis look sick. Hope utah is good.

also, one more question. you sad your park skis snapped.....where on the ski did they snap? Do you think it had to do with core thickness, material, or what?
 
umm every other pair ive made besides these has had ptex sidewalls and every pair has been sandwich construction.
 
the work envelope is going to be 18 in by 8 ft. I will probably pay for half and my dad will pay for half, but im cutting some costs by making some of my own linear bearings and i should be getting some stuff from my school for free also. when i am done it will be totally ours and reside in my shed. To say my park skis snapped isnt entirely accurate. The heelpiece ripped out of the core but stayed in the comnposite layer above the core, causing a wierd fracture delamination that continued past the toe piece. It involved me casing the shit out of a barell jib on my tails though so i think a corporately manufactured ski might have snapped aswell.
 
I may or may not be using them at pc, i might use my fujas instead because im just going to be skiing park. we shall see.

oh, and the base is white
 
die cut bases are bases with 2 or more colors of different base material that are put together and i dont do that
 
die cuts without a CNC machine are a huge pain in the ass. It is essentially fitting puzzle pieces together and it is really hard to be accurate doing it by hand. Die cuts suck anyway...they are slower and easier to damage.
 
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