When should I consider stripping my kick wax and starting fresh again?

[lowangle al]

More than once I've skied on last seasons wax and it was great. I always thought it was because my garage is dark and cool and my summers are short.

BTW I got 14.9 miles including 3000 feet of turns out of 3 thin coats of corked in polar today and yesterday. That was on my hyper vectors and it was thin on the tips and mostly gone on the tails. These skis are kickin butt right now with K&G.

[lilcliffy]

Is a solvent, even citrus-based like goo gone, bad for the base? I would think it might either dry it out or somehow degrade the material, no? I am very new to waxing but with a month on Nansens I had to go higher than blue extra once then temps dropped. I scraped then skiied briefly around the property then scraped again and it was all set to add green for the day and worked fine.

In recent years (since completely abandoning glide wax on my touring skis)- I rarely need to strip my grip-waxed bases (and use a wet cloth to wipe-clean dirt from them)-

But when I do, I use goo-gone, and have also used the more toxic-seeming and amazingly expensive base-cleaner solvent(s) sold by ski wax companies.

Also, being a newbie I have a related question, specifically for @lilcliffy but if anyone else can chime in, great. Ironing in polar over the whole ski--how often does this need to be done? Just one layer? And what should be done with the kick zone before doing this? Thanks.

I have gone weeks of daily touring without having to refresh Polar wax on a ski base- when the snow is "perfect" and constantly refeshed in mid-winter (i.e. not abrasive).
I have had to refresh the Polar after a single extended tur (e.g. ~20k) in very abrasive "snow".

I am afraid that there is no rule/standard.

I scrape off any softer wax from the kick zone before prepping the entire base.

[lilcliffy]

At the end of the ski season- I do not strip and apply storage wax to my touring skis.
(I do strip and storage wax our dowhill skis- as per Smitty's description).

At the beginning of the ski season- I wipe down a ski with a wet cloth- to remove dirt/dust- before considering scaping/stripping the base of a touring ski. That is usually enough in my experience.

[mca80]

Thanks, good info to make sure my skis stay good. My first experience hot waxing yesterday was a mess, haha. I think I put way too much on, had to scrape and brush then re-iron and scrape and brush again. But they look good now and feel good. Do you ever iron in the kick wax, if you know, for example, that you will be using green for the next week, or just cork? P.S. the new skis are Finnmarks. Gonna be a bigger learning curve than the Nansens but they will be a different kind of fun. Pretty excited about them.