New extremely portable slalom course

[r_maniak]

Follow up to yesterdays post:

My ski partner and I ski without a spotter and never realized how UN-level the boat is until we tried to calibrate OffCourse yesterday. Today, we leveled the boat (weight under observer seat) and off we went. It took 9 balls (shot in groups of 3 when calibrating) on one side and the other side of the boat we somehow calibrated in one try (3 calibration balls were fired).

From there, we skied! I took the first few passes and even though I'm an awesome free skier at 35off (34mph), put some balls in front of me and it all goes to shit (LOL)! I was humbled (as I always am any opportunity I have to get on a course). I started at 28 off. Struggled a bit, so had my driver/OffCourse operator give me 6 at level B. Skied a clean 6-pack (woo-hoo!). "WTF is level B?", you might ask. The genius product developer gave us 3 options for course length. A is standard (134' down-course turn buoy to turn buoy). B is 1.25x Level A, and C is 1.5x. This will give the skier a feel for course width, but allow for just a bit more time to get there (IMO - add to the fun factor). I bounced back into Level A and skied a better set. My ski partner had a very similar experience working his way through 22off.

The bottom line: We both have been free skiing with very little access to course skiing for a LONG time. OffCourse reminded us IMMEDIATELY that we simply are not getting enough width while free skiing. There will be some timing elements to work out (like nailing the "zero" ball) and some other minor tweaks, but overall, the learning curve is short. We both had fun today and we both agreed - free skiing is like getting stuck in a bit of a rut... this will refine our skiing like free skiing would never have done (and add to the fun factor)!

[xraydoc]

Got mine and used it for the first time yesterday.

 

I am a novice just trying to get down the course 15 off at 28.6mph but so far am loving being able to practice without having a real course nearby. Mine is mounted on a 2019 Malibu Response Txi with no issues.

 

I do wonder if you could use a hopper to increase the ball capacity like this:

https://paintball-online.com/hopper-loaders/proto/

 

Also wondering if a larger CO2 tank could be used with a hose going to the guns - something like this:

https://paintball-online.com/gi-sportz-co2-tank-24oz/

[skennedy]

Hello all! Our Lake Association recently decided they did not want us to use our Insta-Slalom anymore because they need to check with the insurance policy regarding liability... so decided they would ban the course until they could vote on it at the next meeting... in August. We really wanted an option at our own lake (we are members of a ski club and can pay per set at the course, but it's about 40 mins away) and after reading all the comments about the Off Course, we decided to buy one! We are so excited for it to arrive!!!!

 

Had a couple of questions, so had to register to get some advice from all of you...

1. Any advice for how to handle the zero ball for timing the rest of the course?

2. Any paintball brand that people are really liking? I saw @ErikBerghiller mentioned Empire Heat, but I couldn't find those on Amazon. Other suggestions?

3. Any preferred CO2 brand?

4. Any other advice for getting it set up and calibrated?

 

Thank you all!

[Wish]

Your lake has an insurance policy?? They can vote to ban things? Can they ban boats?? Is it a man made lake or something? I’ve heard of state or city but a homeowners association ?

[skennedy]

Yeah... unfortunately they can. We live in Michigan and the DNR permit for a ski course requires a letter of approval from the lake association board. I don't believe they can ban boats... they mostly don't have that much power, but because of the DNR permit process, they can refuse to give the letter of approval. The lake association has liability insurance and all sorts of rules that a lot of people don't actually follow.

 

It is a bit of a cross between a man-made lake and a natural lake. It was originally two natural lakes that were connected and then additional channels were added. But there is one section that is almost always protected from wind and more than long enough for a course, which is where we used to set up. But now we will just fire up our Off Course!

[Mastercrafter]

@skennedy Curious what Michigan lake, if you don’t mind me asking.

[Wish]

With regards to triggering the “zero ball” or one ball shot, I suggested early on that if there was a way for the shot to be triggered by the skiers move out to the glide position for the gate would be nice. Or when the skier passes centerline when simulating going through gates or whatever the timing my be and one ball shot would be fired. Perhaps by the rope passing some type of optical or mechanical trigger.

[skennedy]

@Mastercrafter I think I sent you a message... I'm not very experienced with this forum :)

[BraceMaker]

@Wish be a good use of a jump switch. Trigger when the skier comes off after generating atleast enough load to trigger it.

 

Then you could require a trigger per shot so it wouldn't fire if the skier stopped cutting

[xraydoc]

A little feedback after some more use.

 

1. I had a chance to test it at the local slalom course and just like the video from Erik it darn near hit every ball. The accuracy is amazing.

 

2. The ball hopper in the photo works great and allows you to load a couple hundred balls in each side making repetitive runs way easier.

 

3. As a beginner I LOVE the ability to use the "B" and "C" settings to lengthen the distance between balls which lets me practice the basics and work my way up to running the real course.

 

 

 

 

[r_maniak]

@skennedy

 

1. Any advice for how to handle the zero ball for timing the rest of the course?

I ride the left foam and as soon as I see my OffCourse operator reach up to start the system, I immediately initiate my pull-out. That seems to work pretty well.

2. Any paintball brand that people are really liking? I saw @ErikBerghiller mentioned Empire Heat, but I couldn't find those on Amazon. Other suggestions?

I strongly recommend Nelson Paintball CLEAR/CLEAR. This is a clear shell ball with clear filling. Minimal mess if they accidentally break.

3. Any preferred CO2 brand?

No. Just don't buy the threaded cartridges. They don't work.

4. Any other advice for getting it set up and calibrated?

Start with a level boat. Velcro a 24" bubble level to the dash and go from there.

[UWSkier]

Does anyone use this with a trailered boat? Do you remove before you hit the road?

[r_maniak]

Does anyone use this with a trailered boat? Do you remove before you hit the road?

 

It would be no different than using it with a boat on a lift. It comes in a REALLY nice carry case. Ours lives in the case up in the garage unless we are using it. It literally takes about 5 minutes to pull it out of the case and install it/feed it. Another 5 minutes to pack it up at the end of your set. I would never leave it on the boat while trailering.

[LLLCCC]

Can a regular reusable paintball style air bottle be used, or does anyone else know of an adapter being made? Could I stick a small garage style air compressor w tank or larger reusable tank under my passenger seat and run a hose and splitter up to this?

[dvskier]

@LLLCCC The inventor spent thousands of hours designing this device and went through many iterations to get it on the market. I would say that it shouldn’t be modified at the risk of voiding the warranty. From my understanding the consumables are very cheap.

[ErikBerghiller]

@xraydoc I’m stoked to see that you are enjoying your OffCourse™ and that you find the B and C settings useful. And since you have these hoppers, I assume that you also use the INFINITY mode quite a bit! ? FYI: We have tried most hoppers on the market and discovered that since they are designed to be shaken when running around in the woods they tend to jam on occasion once used on the OffCourse™. I hope the ones you bought will work well but if you are having issues down the line you should check out our Z-magazines.

 

@skennedy The Nelson Paint Company in Michigan is now carrying the convenient “OffCourse™ Projectile Package” on their website! After a thorough examination, we have concluded that the Nelsons Clear/Clear ball is by far the best ones for the OffCourse™, not only from an environmental standpoint but they also work great with our markers. Therefore, we highly recommendthat you use these balls with your OffCourse™ from here on out. You'll find them here.

 

@LLLCCC We do not recommend any modifications of the OffCourse™.

However, larger gas canisters are on our wishlist so we might look into that down the line.

[swc5150]

Wow that's cool! Charlie Nelson lived up the lake from me when I was a kid.

[ErikBerghiller]

Hi Ballers,

Since our old videos were shot mostly on glass I get a lot of questions about the visibility of the splash in other conditions. We just released a new video that was shot when it wasn't dead calm, maybe it answers some questions. Enjoy!

[Horton]

[Siouxcitysmitty]

Apologize if this question has already been answered (have read most, but not all 13 pages of posts :)...what boat speeds does the device accommodate? ie obviously the timing of launching the balls needs to be different at 30 vs 34 mph.

[UWSkier]

believe this was answered in the podcast with @Luzz but I believe it's measuring distance between firings, not speed, so it will work at any speed as long as your path is straight.

[ErikBerghiller]

@Siouxcitysmitty Yes, @UWSkier is right! As long you are within the speed range of 22-38 mph the OffCourse™ adjusts the distance between markings no matter what speed you're at.

[ErikBerghiller]

We have one OffCourse™ that has been used during a photoshoot.

It looks good and all moving parts have been inspected and/or refurbished.

 

Will ship the same day to a Baller at a 20% discount, send a PM for discount coupon.

[Mastercrafter]

^^ For what its worth, I got a "gently used" unit and it looks brand new, and of course worked flawlessly. I haven't yet dialed it in and skied with it due to injury, but soon!

[r_maniak]

OffCourse - Thoughts and Financials from a Seasoned Uer:

 

I thought some of you might find it interesting that my ski buddy and I have consumed 3500 paintballs since we received our OffCourse on June 2. That may seem like a lot, but let's put things into perspective.

We each ski 8 course passes in one set. 13 balls per pass = 104 balls per skier (208 balls per day total).

 

3500 / 208 would suggest we've run OffCourse 16.8 ski days since it was delivered in early June (which seems about right).

 

If you factor in the math on the consumables:

When I order Nelson Paint Clear/Clear, with shipping, it's about $95 for 2000 balls. That works out to $.0475 per ball (US). That's $9.88 per day in balls.

 

We exhaust (4) 12g cartridges of CO2 at an average cost of about $.70/ea (total daily spend on CO2 = $2.80).

 

Total cost for two guys to exhaust themselves and ski until they pretty much can't anymore each morning: $12.68 (or $6.34 per guy). Untinkable fun and VALUE.

 

Compared to the closest slalom lake where the club gets $50 per "set". Drive an hour to the slalom lake. Pay $50 per guy. Ski like crap. Your set consists of 6 passes rather than 8 and falls count. Get frustrated and go home pissed.

 

I'll take OffCourse! It's so EASILY justifiable (although I think I'm ready to test my skiing on a fixed course again soon).

 

Oh - and I should mention - the device really has not missed a beat! 5min to mount it up and load it when we hit the water and 5min to put it away. Great Product!

 

 

[Andre]

I must be dumb (please don't respond to that!) but why 13 balls per pass? Shouldn't it be 7 including zero ball?

 

[wtrskr]

Question I may have missed on this. Can you start/stop the paintball shooting at any time? What if a person falls or misses a ball?

 

If the costs are reasonable, to me this type of solution is pretty great for a lot of early morning open water skiers. The review from Horton was that this isn't for the '35 off and better type of skier. This could, however, be great for those that could get the that level if they had more course time. I've personally made it into '32 off, but only get access to a course probably 3 or 4 days a year, on average. If I could even fairly closely replicate the width and timing that is needed, that could be huge for my performance for the times that I actually see the true course. To me, the splashes wouldn't even need to be dead accurate, just pretty close.

 

For us open water skiers, skiing "well" means that we are skiing in a manner that mimics what would work on a course. That can be hard to do if you don't have any sort of target for accountability. If I had little splashes to chase when I open water skied, I am pretty sure my course performance would improve by a significant degree.

 

 

[r_maniak]

@Andre

Holy cow. I have no idea. Thanks for the catch. You are absolutely correct. 112 balls total. That brings our daily total (including CO2) to $4.06 per skier per day.

Wow - I'm embarassed. We fire the unit 2x per trip down the lake, so I wonder if my logic was askew based on that... but it still would have been wrong. Who knows, but either way, thanks for being on your toes and calling me out on that error.

 

[igkya]

@r_maniak U need to also factor in the original cost of OffCourse to get a better cost per set.

[r_maniak]

@igkya

Good Point. I went into GEEK-mode on this and deciphered Total Cost of Ownership and compared it to the $50/set Slalom club. This time I factored in GAS (total guess on the $4 figure, but thought 8 passes would suck up about a gallon). The slalom club charges $50/set. That is all-in, so no GAS in those figures. From there, I calculated a justification point (which for me, turns out to be 18 days of skiing due to the fact that I only paid for half the OffCourse). If I'd have kicked down the $2600 solo, justification wuold be at 34 days of skiing.

 

[Mastercrafter]

@r_maniak nice spreadsheet, I can always appreciate geek-mode. Thanks for breaking this down, it's interesting. Seems pretty cost-effective. Now I don't feel too bad about buying one, I just need to set the darn thing up and use it before winter.

[Rw3]

Are there opportunities to try one out before buying ?

I live in Utah.

Thanks

[r_maniak]

@wtrskr

Question I may have missed on this. Can you start/stop the paintball shooting at any time? What if a person falls or misses a ball?

Yes. User controls are intuitive and right at drivers forehead. If my skier stands up mid-pass, I stop and re-start him when he's ready. Also, it will automatically shut off on a fall when the boat speed is less than 22mph.

The remainder of your sentiments are dead on.

[Garn]

The above comment has raised a question for me. If it automatically shuts off at 22 mph, does that mean you cannot use below that speed? Because I pull my little girls at 19 mph through the course.

[r_maniak]

You are correct. You would need to bump them up to min 22. Perhaps the alternative would be to ask the developer for a custom firmware modification??

[Wish]

@Garn you can also make the course more narrow until they have success at 22mph. Then as they get better, widen the course accordingly.

[UWSkier]

What @Wish said. Also, the OffCourse can space the balls out at 1.5x or 2x normal course pace, so you can have a 6 ball course in the length of a 9 or 12 ball.

[Garn]

@UWSkier I like that idea! That would solve the problem! I like the idea of stretching the course rather then narrowing it. That way the skier gets used to getting wide right from the start.

[ErikBerghiller]

@r_maniak I love the GEEK-mode! Also glad to see that you are using your OffCourse™ as intended, to ski till you drop!

 

@Rw3 We don't have an official demo program but shoot me an email at erik@rodicsinnovation.com and I will arrange something.

 

 

[ErikBerghiller]

We have one OffCourse™ that has been slightly used during a firmware tests, it looks good and all moving parts have been inspected and/or refurbished.

 

Will ship to a Baller at a 20% discount, send an email to erik@rodicsinnovation.com for the discount coupon.

 

Probably the last one this season.

[KRoundy]

Does anyone in the Pacific NW own one of these and would be willing to demo it for a few of us? If so, PM me.

[DHski]

@ErikBerghiller if I understand the technology correctly, the OffCourse uses GPS to set the correct length of the course regardless of boat speed. So, am I correct in concluding that if I used the OffCourse on a river with a 3 mph current, the course would be either too long or too short depending on if I'm heading up river vs down river? Is there a way to get the correct course length on a river with a current? Thanks!

[Mastercrafter]

@DHski perhaps I’m thinking about this incorrectly, but since it’s GPS controlled, river current shouldn’t matter. It’s still going to fire the projectiles in the right spot, per the units position and actual GPS speed, not the speed over the water which will change with current and direction.

[BraceMaker]

@DHski since it uses gps to fire the balls in the right spot regardless of river speed the balls all be hitting correct.

 

If you have zero off or gps based speed control your boat speed will be the dame up or down river. If you hand drive or habe old rpm based speed you need to adjust your boat speed between directions. Water will be fast one way and slow the other. But it will not know.

 

3MPH is pretty brisk current.

[Sethro]

I’ve been wondering about this myself. One of the main reasons I’ve talked myself out of a couple of newer boat opportunities is because I spend so much time skiing a river with variable current speed. Adjusting for a variable current with zero off/stargazer is an absolute pain. It’s bad enough to calculate what speed we need up vs down river, but when you factor in slower in the wider spots, faster around the bend, faster in that narrow chute, etc, etc it is quite annoying.

[DHski]

@Mastercrafter @BraceMaker Unless I'm misunderstanding the technology I think we might be using a different definition of "right spot."

 

My understanding of how the OffCourse works is it uses GPS speed to calculate the correct time interval to shoot out the balls. Thus if it shoots 1 ball every 6 seconds at 15mph, then when you go up to 30mph it will shoot 1 ball every 3 seconds.

 

If I'm heading up river, and my GPS speed (speed relative to the shore) is 30mph, then my speed relative to the water (which is what matters to the skier) is 33mph. The OffCourse will shoot out balls at a time interval which would make an accurately measured course if you were going 30mph relative to the WATER. Except I am actually going 33mph relative to the water, so the splashes will end up further apart than they should be (by about 3/30 or 10%). And vice versa coming down river the splashes will be closer together than they should be by about 10%.

[BraceMaker]

@DHski In slalom we do not care about speed over water. I mean obviously you care it feels very different up vs. down stream. And for freeskiing you would ask your driver to adjust the boat speed so you dont feel like sinking or flying.

 

But if it were a permanant course the distance point to point is the same and regardless of currents you have a time tolerence ball to ball which doesnt change up or down stream. So if you held a tournament the boat would go upstream and downstream going the exact same speed according to gps or to an observer on shore. The skier feels like they are flying going one way and dragging going the other. But that is the nature of the beast. That is why slalom isnt commonly held om rivers with current, Moomba of course being an exception but skiers have to plan their passes for up and down river and the current there shifts based on tidal activity so one skier could have way faster current than another but the boat is always one speed according to timing between balls and a satellite.

 

 

 

 

 

[BraceMaker]

Consider you are asking for the equivalent of a ski course that grows or shrinks depending on direction.

[DHski]

@BraceMaker That is super interesting that you just have to deal with currents at Moomba. I wonder what speed the currents can reach at that site? I guess the athletes sign up knowing there is going to be some amount of chaos and chance involved.

 

So essentially yes I agree with you, I am asking if the OffCourse has capability to grow or shrink the course to account for river currents and make the pass as if you were skiing on a still lake instead of a river.

 

If I recall correctly the OffCourse has a mode where you can make the course 1.5x longer than usual, so I'm just curious if tuning the course to account for river currents was something Erik thought about or considered. Or maybe the river slalom skier use case is just a tiny fraction of the market so it doesn't make sense to complicate the product for this feature - which is totally understandable.

 

 

[UWSkier]

Offcourse doesn't fire the balls based on time interval or speed. It functions purely on distance traveled. It'd be no different than your fixed course in a river.