Here are some pics of my DIY swallowtail job on my 172 supermodel.
Basically I cut it with a jig saw, cut the wood core back about 5mm between the top and bottom layers and filled the gap with flexible urethane.
It has turned my old board into an insane pow stick for under $50, cant wait to test it out in japan!
The thin layer of urethane worked a treat, looks a lot better now.
ETM I was going to put my bindings back far as possible again, but had a thought that this might be pointless now. I might have too much weight now on the rear off board and loose too much float.
Having the bindings central might balance the board out better?
Have you played around with binding postions since doing the chop?
Do you still run your bindings back as far as possible?
yeah I played around with it a lot, thats one thing I like about the channel with normal disc bindings because you can get crazy with setback. Im sure this is very personal but I ended up at 100mm setback in relation to the sidecut radius.
When you try it out you will find that the closer you get your back foot to the cut out the more control you get in the powder. I can still ride it on hard pack easily with 100mm set back.
Yes speed powder and hard pack won't have any issues.
The only time I thought set back might cause an issue is when your going through flat sections off powder, where you need to maintain speed and float, so you skim across the top and you don't sink down.
We were finding flat untouched powder runs that were 100s off meters long and wide at Niseko sometimes after 1 o'clock in the afternoon!
A foam core would probably snap. Drill a small hole through the top sheet and see if wood comes out or not, if not just fill the hole with urethane and forget it.
Just got back from 7 snowboarding days in Japan , my swallow tail and my mates worked a treat, it made the powder days a lot easier. It took six 9 hours days before my rear leg started getting sore, normally I get sore on the 1st or 2nd day.
Glad I did this mod and I will do this mod again if I upgrade my board.
Good to board with you ETM and thanks for lending out your powder boards.
I have not gone through the full 9 pages of this interesting thread. But this last post might tell me something I never knew before. I have never experienced deep powder in my short snowboarding pursuit.
Does a swallow tail effectively eliminate the need to exert rear foot pressure in order to maintain good float in deep powder?
Hi all,
i started working on my old rossignol 166 board to make it swallowtail. this thread got me started.
here's where i'm at so far.
working on sanding, finishing the inside edge at the moment, a re-paint is in the plans. Iù,m not on a rush, i want it to be nicely done, if I only test it next season so be it.
few questions for those who already tested their board.:
1- do you guy' feel the tails are a lot softer/flexier than before?
2- would they benefit from some reinforcement? either added laminate or a stiffener bar between the tips?
1- do you guy' feel the tails are a lot softer/flexier than before?
2- would they benefit from some reinforcement? either added laminate or a stiffener bar between the tips?
Mine and my mates didn't feel any softer, we both followed each other to watch the rear end to see if it was flexing more and we both couldn't see any difference. I also have go-pro footage of just the board working and you can't see any extra flex.
Holy shit, those Coda boards are ridiculous. They'd have to have something to hold those two "skis" together. I think that amount of swallow tail is a bit overkill.
option one would help torsionaly in a turn, not to much in the longitudinal (tip to tail) direction.
i would be concerned with the stress concentrations where the wood stops.
If i were to do any reinforcing i would add carbon tape from the rear binding out to the swallow tips on the tail ( reverse V pattern )
I personally wouldnt be that worried about the tail flex. A normal tail of a board rolls up yours is now flat. Many boards have rocker in the tail and perform fine. My pow boards of choice is a lib snowmullet and k2 gyrator which both have rockered tails.
try it first, modify later. This board will ride different than others thats the point, adapt your riding style to fit the board.
option one would help torsionaly in a turn, not to much in the longitudinal (tip to tail) direction.
i would be concerned with the stress concentrations where the wood stops.
If i were to do any reinforcing i would add carbon tape from the rear binding out to the swallow tips on the tail ( reverse V pattern )
I personally wouldnt be that worried about the tail flex. A normal tail of a board rolls up yours is now flat. Many boards have rocker in the tail and perform fine. My pow boards of choice is a lib snowmullet and k2 gyrator which both have rockered tails.
I know i' overthinking this, but thats a fun part of it for me. Lol
try it first, modify later. This board will ride different than others thats the point, adapt your riding style to fit the board.
Torsional flex is what concerns me a little, let face it even if i plan to go on a powder day...sometimes, theres not as much snow as expected at the moutain so I would like the board to be rideable in a broad range of conditions.
thanks all for your infos,
I think i will try it like that first.
@ig88, yes i have lots of tools, i'm 43 yers old(16 in my head) passionate about mountain biking, outdoors sports in general and also a homeowner...all this requires me to be well equiped with tools. plus i just love to modify/improve things. my basement is part shop, part storage for all my outdoor toys.
Oh that's still the year of the rooster (Feb 4, 1969 till Feb 4, 1970). Maybe there are some similarities between us haha. Anyway let's go back on topic.
I wonder if any swallow tail, for example the Burton Fish will perform equally well as you guys' diy swallow tail in powder.
I have to say it did loose some stiffness though, probably because it had carbon stringers tip to tail in the exact spot where you cut out for the swallowtail.
It works fine in powder, but has lost some groomer performance without a doubt. You only notice it when on hard not so smooth surfaces.
Probably depends on the structure of board and where the stiffness comes from. For many boards this will not be an issue.
Also a proper powder board will have a smoothly rockered nose and taper, these features will make it better than a DIY swallowtail IMO. Still its a great fun way to breathe life into an old stick and get a pretty good powder deck.
Nice pictures of diy swallow tail in your thread. You've got great craftsmanship I must say. The edges look very smooth. You guys must have a helluva lots of older boards to experiment and sacrifice. Apparently all you guys' diy swallow tails also reportedly perform very well too. Good work. But for people like me with almost absolutely no diy wood work experience, buying a swallow tail seems to be the only feasible option.
Flat is the new gloss brother!
If you clear it knock it back with green scotchbrite for a satin finish, it looks nice and is easy to maintain compared to gloss
Nice work, this thread is turning our to be the epic swallowtail thread.
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