toe wear T-x pro from NTN Freeride?

[Nairb]

Hi all,

I've just sent my Terminator-X pros to Scarpa to have the lower portion of the boot replaced as the toe had changed shape enough from just 2 seasons use with the Freeride binding that there was quite a lot of lateral side to side play. I'm wondering if any others have experienced this or if it's a common problem. It's going to cost me $180 USD/boot just for the part to have the lowers replaced so I'm looking at $400 in repairs on $800 boots after only two seasons and those weren't heavy use seasons. They didn't seem to have much sympathy even when I explained that my old 75mm T1's were still going strong after 6 seasons use. The bindings have a 2 year warranty and unfortunately there appears to be not much wrong with them as it's just expired, and the boots are only 1 year.

Attached are two videos showing the lateral movement problem of my boot in a brand new sample binding screwed to the floor of my local ski shop. I'd already sent my (presumably broken) bindings to Scarpa (Rottefella dist in US) thinking this was where the problem was and as the NTN's seem to have had so much breakage, but they couldn't reproduce it and said my binding seemed normal and in good shape, which lead me to testing the boots. One video is my boot the other is a brand new boot.

Scratch the videos, got an error saying "the extension mp4 is not allowed"

So anyway I'm just wondering if others have had to replace/repair boots after so little use with the NTN bindings and if they've had success getting discounted or free repairs because it seems to be a bit of a design flaw. I wouldn't expect such wear on a boot.

Thanks,

Brian

[Johnny]

Welcome to TT Nairb!

Wooah, that sounds pretty bad... Just post some pictures or upload your vids on youtube... 400$ of repairs is unacceptable. Gee, you can get a used pair in very good shape for that price... That's really sad...

New bindings really have a 2 year warranty? You're sure about that?

I don't have any lateral play on my old freerides yet, but my TX Comps do have a lot of wear:

I just got my toe cups back from the machine shop this year again... I'm ready now!

[Nairb]

I uploaded the photos to my flickr account. Both are mounted to a new binding screwed to the floor. The binding isn't solidly mounted to the display board so it is moving a tad in both videos.

edit: UGHHH! apparently flickr uploads don't work here. I don't have a Youtube account and don't want to set up yet another account I'll rarely use. Does anyone have any other suggestions?

Here, just go to my flickr page and watch them there:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/13818761@N07/


Here's my old boot:


And the new one:




That appears to be the best I can do in terms of embedding.

It occurred to me last night that lateral stiffness is one of NTN's weaknesses as can be seen with even the slight movement shown in the new boot new binding combo video. What I started wondering is if the heavy wide skis I'm on are producing more "swing weight" and therefore lateral forces than the boot/binding can handle. That being said though, I've certainly seen many people on some huge skis with NTN Freerides around the resort. I'm riding a pair of 186cm Line Influence 115's from 2012, so they have a metal top sheet and are a really heavy ski.

[dschane]

I'm winging it here, but there seems to be a small amount of play with the good boot, so I wonder if the binding is bent and the little amount of play is, over time, wearing down the boot until there's a lot of play? I tend to doubt it has to do with your size/weight of your skis. You could easily figure that out by testing a good boot in a new binding at a shop.

[Nairb]

Thanks for the reply. The binding in the videos is a brand new unused sample binding in the ski shop.

My binding is with Scarpa (rottefella) in Boulder where they tested it with a new boot and could find nothing wrong, and it was a good fit. So that's when I tested my old boot with the new binding at the shop here.

Since there is a small amount of play in the new boot and new binding combo, it would seem this would be true of all NTN boot/binding combos and I was thinking that over time with a big heavy ski that this play would worsen as the plastic of the boot gets worn or pressed out of shape from the leverage of the ski. That's why I'm wondering if anyone else has seen this kind of wear to the boot toe piece over time with NTN. When the guy at scarpa couldn't find anything wrong with my binding, he wondered if the boot was worn down, which is why I went to test it against a new one at the ski shop before I sent it all the way to Boulder to be repaired. So since he thought of it perhaps they've seen this regularly or he was just throwing out ideas.

[TomH]

That is a fair bit of play. How worn down are your boot soles, as it looks like a vertical height issue and reduced friction between the binding and boot. My evos have nowhere near that much play after 3 years on freerides and running 100-waist skis.

I wonder if there's anyway to buildup your sole or take up some space in there to tighten things up rather than shelling out for new lowers.

Did you try tightening the power-tubes a turn to see if that snugged things up. I think I upped mine a half a turn or so after the first season of use if I recall correctly. After you start wearing items (toes/duck-butt/binding), it's pretty common to need to snug things up a bit (the same holds true for 75mm with duckbill and sole wear). It's not like alpine where there's very little movement at the boot/binding interface.

[Nairb]

I was pretty surprised to see that there was play when I tried a brand new binding as, apart from superficial abrasions, the shape of the boot sole and toe look the same as a new boot. Even the little half dimple at the tip of the rubber that I believe is on all tech boots to clear the tech binding in climbing mode was still looking as good as a new boot.

I'm still leaning toward it being the beefiness of the skis. Like I said they are massively heavy, with metal top sheet, sandwich construction.

I've already sent the boots to Scarpa for repair. I guess I'm looking for evidence that this might be a common problem to see if I can convince them that $400 in repairs after two seasons is unacceptable and perhaps get a discount on the cost.

I haven't tried tightening the power tubes. However I doubt it would help as the amount of movement is the same even when the boot is flexed, at which point it's under considerable tension.

[Nairb]

Thanks for the feedback everyone. Following the advice of one of the earlier posters, I started a similar thread here:

http://www.backcountrytalk.earnyourturn ... -heavy-ski

and have got a bit more feedback from NTN users who have been experiencing the same lateral slop after not much use with the NTN's. So it seems it might not be strickly due to the mass of my skis, though that may be a contributing factor.

Any other thoughts are much appreciated.

Brian