Board cracking 6" back from nose ---what to do?

[Kesserendrel]

So I have a lovely day riding today, and when I get back to the car and brush the snow off the board, I notice a lovely crack in my topsheet about 6" back from the nose. Fiddling with it, I find that it's noticeable all the way through the board, aka not just the top sheet. I have NO idea why this would happen. I've ridden the board (Sierra Crew 160W) twice, and since I'm a noob I've stuck to groomers and a few runs on chopped pow. 40+ inch base, so no rocks. No park. No run-ins with dudes in the lift line. The only pressure I can recall putting on the nose of the board is when I got stuck on a cat track back to the base area (a run I had only seen skiers take, now I know why), and started doing the skooch.

My obvious choice is to send it back, but I'm worried first about turnaround time and second about how likely it is they're going to say, so sorry, we don't know what you did, but you did it. The House is now doing Sierra's warranty stuff (found this out by calling the warranty number), which would obviously extend turnaround time, and the type of crack doesn't look like it would be common, so they might say I did something.

This is the only board I have, and if it's going to take a month to get a replacement or worse yet the same board, it'll put a hole in my season. Is there any way of fixing this enough that the crack won't get worse until late winter, when I was planning on buying something longer anyway? FYI, I paid $150 for the board during the spring sale, so I don't have THAT much money in it. Still, it sucks that this decided to happen.

Pics follow. The second and last show the edge and the "ridge" in the base.

[Halborr]

Yeouch, you might try to epoxy that together really good, but you're going to need clamps and what-have-you, and even then I'd say it has a small chance of being permanently repaired.

I'm as much a DIY'er as the next guy (probably more! ), but I would warranty that sucker.

[Nivek]

You can try to warranty it, but I doubt you'll get anything. It looks like impact damage or you landed to tip heavy. That's also what they'll tell you and say its your fault whether it was or not. Really similar thing happened to my buddies SubZero. He gave up on it and is ordering a Kink soon.

[Kesserendrel]

Neither of those is what I wanted to hear. Probably should have just spent the $$$ on a Turbo Dream or whatever in the first place. Do you think it's still safe to ride at least until Xmas? I have NO idea when that happened. Didn't see it until I leaned the board against my car.

It's especially annoying because the only impacts I've had are me hitting the snow and if I did happen to land on the nose, I'd go head over heels before anything too bad happened to the board. Rode a rental four days late last season and was all fired up to start saving $$$ and using my own gear. At least it was cheap.

[john doe]

My friend had something very simular happen to his Forum Young blood and got it warrentied with out a problem. Since your board is a Burton made piece like Forum it might be worth the 15-20 to ship it off. If you have to warrenty it through Sierra then I have no clue what will happen since they don't really exist anymore.

[Leo]

Can't tell you how often I hear about the shoddy quality of Sierra's boards. And I always get bashed for calling Sierra out on that "This is a Burton Custom" BS.

Best thing to do is ask TruSnow about your options. If they offer you an exchange, I would put down some extra cash for a real board.

[Milo303]

Don't mean to echo everyone but that board is smoked...

[Kesserendrel]

Leo:

Part of the issue is that Trusnow isn't handling their own returns anymore. The House is. So I have to send the board to the house, then wait for them to decide if it's warranty-able, then wait for them to decide to offer me, which will probably NOT be a credit but a new board, which will then have to ship from Trusnow. So I'm basically SOL unless I buy a new board in the meantime. GAH!

So is it dangerous for me to keep riding that in the short term? I must say I bought it essentially at random on my last run, and it seemed like my toeside to heelside transition (normally the easy one for me) was a little funky for a couple runs before that --I wonder if it had something to do with the crack.

[DC5R]

So, as everyone has stated, that board is pretty much toast. You can ride it, but if you land nose heavy in any situation, that may give out and you'll be going head first into the snow.

Contact TruSnow (aka Sierra) and see if they can give you an idea if they'll warranty the board via pics. This will save you the shipping costs and down time. If they say no, flip the board so the nose is now your tail to minimize any "catching" that may happen and ride it until your new board arrives.

[Leo]

Originally Posted by DC5R

If they say no, flip the board so the nose is now your tail to minimize any "catching" that may happen and ride it until your new board arrives.

Bad idea because most people probably use heelside stops much more frequently than toesides. This means he'll be constantly putting pressure on the cracked area. Also, unless the board is a true twin, which that one isn't, it is going to ride differently. It'll feel like he's riding switch even though he isn't.

The crack is unfortunately in a location that is in contact with the snow. If it were higher, you could have gotten away with general cruising. As it is now, I personally wouldn't risk it. Not worth a potential bad crash.