eleeski

So sad. Dave was a brilliant innovator. His snow skis redefined lightweight performance. Best poles ever. A skilled racer as well. His waterskis were at the top of every podium. His skiing prowess earned his share of high stakes podiums. His vest allows me to keep skiing despite my back problems. His support of tournament waterskiing was unmatched. He was a skilled pilot taking delivery of one of the first Cessna Mustang jets. He was a good friend. The world will miss him. Our lives are richer because of him. Eric

If grease isn't getting in (the original problem of the thread) it doesn't matter what grease you use. If you grease regularly, you will still get adequate lubrication from any marine grease. So, how did you fix the problem of NO grease to the rudder? And did that change how the boat drives? This is a common problem I've had. New zerk fittings, new grease gun ends, rubber grease gun hoses and just struggling have been my unfulfilling solutions. Drop the rudder and hand grease might be easier. Too often I just run dry. Anybody done @BraceMaker 's flexible zerk extension successfully? Also, tapping the rudder box is difficult - is there a threaded pipe saddle that could go over the rudder box to add a zerk fitting? Eric

Safe and performance fit requires careful tensioning of the laces. That is a lot easier on the step. Exploding out of your binding should be rare enough that you should get on the step every time. Eric

First, the PP servo reacts well enough to give a pull similar to ZO. The call for speed adjustment determines the feel of the pull. It is not limited by mechanical lag. DBW was a severe problem for PP (in my experience). There were couple years where DBW boats were sold and ZO had not been developed. PP never interfaced well then. The ZO did interface well when it was introduced - makes sense since the ECM is made by the same company that makes ZO. The Nautique 200 engine that I put in the American Skier had it's DBW unit in the engine compartment. (I actually damaged it while fitting the engine cover and replaced it. Very easy project.) A conventional throttle cable drives the unit. And it is compatible with a PP servo for a quality ride. Eric

In an RS1 with an Intuition liner on my slalom ski for several years, I was 50/50 liner ejecting or foot only (liner stayed with the ski and boot). The liner floats well and sometimes came off my foot after ejecting from the shell. Pulse might be different. Your foot might be different. Not a big deal either way. I never could get in a binding in the water. Always a swim step for me. Eric

My Mecca site is for sale. Pass it on to him! Eric

Nice. Where did you get the heel cup? Eric

@TacoMan I have done your experiment with ski sizes. Often. I sometimes build a ski that is too long and too wide. I am willing to take a massive binding move, a sawzall or a grinder to the ski until it works well. (Yes, I have chopped over an inch off the tail of a ski and improved it!) Horrifying to watch the process but I have gotten good results. Length is just one factor in making a ski work well. Area is another. Rocker might be the most important. Edge shape a close second. Tunnel next. Binding placement, fin setup, shape and even weight - all must be balanced to make a ski work. Since everyone is different, no one ski will be perfect. Demo as many skis as you can. Eric

@Kelvin scored off of me to help with the conversion cost. But I rebuilt the American Skier with his old engine and now have the coolest boat ever! It was a fun project. While I will never get on @Horton 's good side, at least I won't get nasty memes by saying that it makes more sense to buy a Mastercraft than fix up an obsolete 200. Unless you enjoy wrenching on things. Restore a classic car? Or get a sweet modern boat! Eric

Slippery slalom gets a lot of reasonably skilled (but not elite) skiers into extremely short line. The geometry of the rope's pull around the buoy is similar to "real" skiing at short line. Slippery slalom certainly models some aspects of deep shortline well. More than a "grain of validity". Like cars have zero similarity to waterskiing, a Yugo has zero modeling validity in F1 racing (although you have the same chance to win a race in a Yugo as in a sprint car against an F1 car). How a "genius" tag is put on for a "non-sequitur" comment defies logic. Perhaps logic isn't popular when it contradicts beliefs. Sorry for going off topic but it seems to be personal, not technical. Eric

@Bruce_Butterfield Nice technical well thought out response...

As a pilot, yaw, roll and pitch are needed to turn an aircraft in 3 dimensions. Uncoordinated turns (actual pilot language) result in a slip (more actual pilot language) that happens when the roll and yaw aren't balanced. Aircraft attitude changes if the pitch and yaw aren't balanced. Handling of an aircraft is quite complex. Cars only move in a 2 dimensional world. Yaw and sliding are simple to understand and control. On firm snow, snow skis tip, carve and skid (slide) and do it almost completely on the surface. (Note, in powder, skidding or sliding is minimal). A waterski is in an unusual environment. It is constrained to a very small range of 3 d movement because of the surface of the water. So a pure aircraft model is not really valid. But it is absolutely moving in pitch, roll and yaw in 3 dimensions. So a car isn't even a close model. A slalom ski is almost always at a significant angle relative to the surface of the water. Sometimes nearly 90 degrees tipped. If that ski is going to slide in a two dimensional manner, it has to slide over the water surface. When that happens to me, the ski skips out and I fall (Kjellander's slam dunk turn might have worked for him but nobody's coaching that style nowadays). Otherwise, the ski pushes the water mass out of the way. There's lots of resistance to this displacement due to the properties and weight of the water. A lot of force is involved - so a lot of ski movement and acceleration is possible. Regardless, it's nothing like a car sliding in a turn. In snow ski terms, it resembles a carve not a sliding skid. Minimizing any downcourse movement by the slalom ski when crossing the wake will improve the buoy count. How does a ski turn? It certainly doesn't just tail slide flat to rotate (aircraft style pure yaw or a car's slide). It doesn't "bend" the ski to a pure carve (like snow ski instructors teach). There's some of an aircraft style turn - except there's no movable rudder and aileron. Instead, pressure on the tip of a ski rolled on edge will cause a rotation around the center of the ski and turn the ski. Sure, this is an oversimplification and there's a minor sliding yaw component to the turn but an elite turn depends primarily on tip pressure, ski tipping angle and the fore aft balance of the angled ski. @bishop8950 's underwater picture shows more area ahead of the feet than behind (taking into account the width of the front vs the narrow tapered tail). This is driving the rotation. Note that the front of the ski has very little "slippage" and the tail is moving deeper underwater. How much do things anchored firmly in the water slide? Alternatively, you can rear back on the ski, bury the tail until the tip is way out of the water and slam the tip sideways to generate angle (early LaPoint survival turns that ended with steep ski angles and huge turn angles). No yaw, just power and management of the fore aft balance of the ski. Switching topics, how much slippage is there through the course? This is a variation of the aircraft crosswind problem. The plane doesn't slide but its speed toward the destination is a combination of the forward speed and the crosswind. Applying that logic, skier speeds have been measured at about 60mph. The boat is going about 36mph. That is about 48mph crosscourse component with a ski angle of close to 60 degrees off the boat's course. Mathematically, plenty to work with to get out to the buoy - as long as you're not sliding too much downcourse. Note, this is an imperfect model for skiing but it does illustrate that slippage is not required for the course. Also note, my skis with the experimental super flexible fins, that feel great, lose ground in the course - do they slide? Probably but it's not helpful. While we are talking fins, I'm definitely not trolling @Horton . Nor has the Sierra Nevada Narwhal Imperial Stout that I'm sipping affected me @Bruce_Butterfield . Since the ski is at an acute angle relative to the water surface (and the direction of travel), the fin is not working as a rudder. It is more like an aircraft elevator stabilizing whether the tip raises or lowers. Due to the ski angle, the tail of the ski is working to stabilize rotation. In reality, I probably don't generate enough ski tipping angle to have the tail exclusively act as a rudder nor the fin exclusively as an elevator. Maybe I should make a Beechcraft style Vtail waterski? Slippery slalom illustrates that a fin is not necessary. With the proper design, a dedicated slalom ski might not need a fin. There are already excellent skis with big bites taken out of the fin or big holes drilled in them. Current skis do require a fin so don't take your fin off on my advice (videos if you do!). Fins do add stability which is important as speeds increase. But there are ways to design in stability into a ski. Fins are getting smaller and less solid (some with big holes!). Who knows where it will end up? I doubt it will revert to the huge deep fins of banana skis of the past. Slavishly sticking to misleading traditional thinking is limiting. Think with an open mind to make improvements - like flexible carbon fins. Sorry about such a long post. I hope it's entertaining holiday fodder. Eric

@Horton Does the fin actually do that much relative to slippage in the turn? Big old Vogue fins were able to run passes. Fins are effective at controlling the angle a ski achieves. At the narrow tail, it is most effective. I did mount a fin mid ski - it didn't feel good. Fin placement relative to the back of the ski matters a lot. Not sure how that affects slippage or how big a ski feels. I wonder if a 60 inch ski with a fin hanging 4 inches out the back would work? Geometrically, the fin is a minor factor in ski slippage when a ski is on an acute edge - like in a turn. A concave bottom tends to make a ski ride deeper. Why would you want the tail to ride deeper? Instead, lift on the tail when at a steep angle will make a tighter radius turn and keep the tip down - both good characteristics. That's probably why most skis have a relatively flat tail. Spray is generated by the speed of the ski, the pressure on the ski and the angle of the ski to the water and direction of travel. The underwater picture shows minimal slippage by the buoy and a non carved turn after the buoy. Is that because the ski is slipping or the tail has been stuffed deeper in the turn because the front of the ski is not slipping? It's certainly not a sideslide. Note that if the ski was slipping (along the lines of what a flat trick ski will do) the ski would be quite a bit further downcourse. Would you be able to get the ski heading cross course? You'd be late for the next buoy. Real world slippage may happen - but too much limits your buoy count. For some reason, you have embraced slippage as a critical factor in ski design. I'd agree if minimizing it is the critical factor. But slipping downcourse is NOT a good feature of a ski. A ski that is loose in the turn is not going to feel good - unless the alternative is too locked in. Ski design is a balance between stability and responsiveness that is personal. Every person will have different preferences. Someone whose preferences are different from yours is not wrong. @Spineofgoo I did Google Sprint cars before posting. They run on both dirt and pavement. F1 runs on pavement so there is overlap. Google also noted a significant advantage to F1 in speeds the cars attain. Your statement about solid vs liquid??? I'll stand by my claims - and my engineering understanding. And I usually like shorter skis because I can set them up to turn tighter and hold more angle across the wake - no theoretical basis just a lot of empirical experience. I do run my bindings quite forward as well but that's a different thread. Eric

@Horton I don't understand you. "No"? To what? Ski slippage has NEVER been a good thing for buoy count. Until some recent voodoo engineering explanations come along. (Remember coordinates?) I'm not going to Guyana with Jim Jones to drink Koolaid either. Panda me again if just having a dissenting opinion based on decades of experience that disagrees with the trend du jour is wrong. Get on roller blades (which don't slip much). Have a friend pull you behind a bike. Weave around like running a course. You can run a sinuous path (like a slalom course) with no slipping. @Spineofgoo An F1 car will easily outrun a drifting car by sticking to its line. Sprint cars are fast because of minimal rule limits - but not as fast as other race classes (that don't skid away their speed). And in the real world, there is slippage. It's just something that is minimized for optimal performance. Eric BSME (Bachelors of Science in Mechanical Engineering - not social media management)

A downcourse component of motion does not guarantee slippage (and most skiers would appreciate a ski that minimizes slipping away distance downcourse). At the apex of the turn, the ski is aligned with the boat so there is zero slippage during part of the turn. Any ski slippage characteristics of a ski will be least important in the turn. Sometimes I earn my pandas. Sometimes the "common knowledge" deserves the panda. Eric

At the risk of getting banned again, the turn is NOT a controlled slide! A good turn will minimize any sliding - and certainly not feel like it is sliding. Trick skis which slide easily aren't the best slalom skis and keeping them from slipping is critical for slippery slalom. Most slalom skiers would be best served by following a solid carving edge. The best skiers don't slide the ski as much as punch it deeper in the water. A deep shortline turn is not perfectly carved or linear. A shorter ski can move easier - especially in a forced turn. But the turn isn't everything. The long ski will carve better, hold edges and angle better and be more stable - all very desirable traits especially crossing the wakes. Length is just one factor in the feel of a ski. Rocker, tunnel, edges, width, shape, weight and flex matter as much as length. Try your ski to see if it fits you. And part of the trial is being willing to move binding and fin - sometimes a lot (especially if the ski isn't conventionally sized for you). You might be surprised by what can work for you. Eric

@Icebergman Leeskis!

Number analysis: 16.08 seconds for the course. Entry and exit gates take a bit of time. So maybe 14 seconds dedicated to the buoys. 14/6 is a little over 2 seconds per buoy. Not too much steering response for the time behind the boat or when there isn't much load on the rope. So maybe half a second where the skier is really pulling the boat off line. With human reaction times around .15 second, a human driver will dally for a third of the critical time - leading to bad boat paths and feel. The human driver that anticipates accurately will time reactions properly for both the skier and path without weaving either way too much. A computer with millisecond response time can react quickly enough to match the skilled human. @rico Yes the boat will move. It does now. Keeping the movement in tolerance (like for skiers in the past) is the goal. Zero movement, especially if it complicates things, is not necessary. If zero tolerance requires weaving against the skier, that's not proper as intentional movement against the skier is not allowed by rule (obviously, weaving against the skier involves movement - even if the boat ends up perfectly centered at the buoy). A computer control will have the same forays into the tolerance for everyone. As long as the program stays in tolerance, the playing field will be level even if the path varies from exact. @Chad_Scott I agree that boats are ridiculously expensive. But ZO is a cool feature and worth the $1800. A Perfect Path might also have the same value (and cost?). Losing all those French scores represents a huge and expensive loss - way more than a cool feature might cost. Eric

Click a stopwatch as fast as you can. .15 second is my human best. Computers have millisecond reaction time. This could allow the reactive response of a computer to match the proactive response of a human. The allowed tolerances and historical use of them probably doesn't require "learning" to stay within those tolerances. Chasing some holy grail of 2cm variation is difficult to build, possibly quite different in feel, and excessively expensive. And not necessary. Care must be taken to not use the millisecond response time to make a pull that is not humanly possible - even if it is more accurate. Anti weaving programmed in is as much against the rules as weaving intentionally. Allow as much use of the tolerance as needed to avoid cheating the skiers by weaving against them. Auto steering is inevitable. It's possible and will prevent another French scandal. Eric

I don't personally use the Reflex as my first string binding. I do have lots of time with it. I recommend it as a reasonable high performance system. Reflex bindings do release a lot. For me, many were pre releases. I didn't get any serious injuries from them. I have experimented with many different bindings. Lots of pre releases, no releases and broken equipment. No serious injuries. This is not rock climbing where any mistake is critical. You might get wet waterskiing. Rust on the plate means you have a steel plate. Heavy and possibly corrosive to the Reflex hardware. Upgrade that. Corrosion on an aluminum plate is cosmetic unless it's really gone. Ski that. Every Silveretta clip I've seen from salt water has some rust spotting. Nothing serious. But I've seen LOTS of broken Silveretta clips (someday I'll weld one back together). Silveretta clip failure is a known and not rare event with minor risk. Usually breaks when clipping in. Internal spring failure (which will leak rust) can change release characteristics. However, my shells have been soft enough that I have the spring cranked down all the way and the flex in the shell gives me a release. I see lots of Reflex bindings set to the max. If you use the spring, check it frequently. Smooth clip in and a step out release are the functional tests. Disassembly, inspection, lubrication and reassembly will check and preserve the spring (disclaimer, I have never done this so I can't help with instructions). I also don't know an appropriate interval - but it's dependent on your water quality. Oozing rust probably means it's time. Have a backup Silveretta clip on hand. That way it won't ruin your day if something happens. But use the old one until it starts to feel sketchy. Or replace it with the new one and overhaul the old one to keep it as the spare. Eric

If it's actually the plate (and I've seen a couple of steel plates) replace the steel with G10 plates. You can drill Nascar style lightening holes to make the plate even lighter. You should notice a difference with the lighter plate. The G10 will last forever. The common aluminum plates do corrode sometimes. Clean the plates with a light oil (WD40). Don't sand them as that will cut through the anodizing and lead to more corrosion. If you are talking about the arms to the Silveretta clip, those do get rusted. They also break. WD40 might help. But be on the lookout for a new clip. Usually the corrosion and rust isn't going to ruin things. Ski it until it fails. But it's not a good sign. Eric

@DanE I'm absolutely not saying we should have a weave programmed into an autosteer! That might feel even worse and violates the spirit of the rules. But if the boat is pulled off line, the correction should match the human and historical response, not the maximum robotic input. @Horton I'm worried that a slavish electronic response seeking extraordinary tight tolerances will feel different. Using tolerances to mimic historically accepted style is not cheating and will keep the feel similar - even if a computer is capable of something different. Reality and history must be respected as much as the verbiage in the rule book. Eric

@chrislandy It sounds like you are going to be able to build a pretty nice ski. A conventional binding will help the evaluation of the ski. Of course, homemade hardshells are pretty conventional. I'd love to see your paper. Eric

@MuskokaKy I really need a cable so I can ski at my lake when I don't have a driver! @BraceMaker I have a couple ideas on how to deal with the cable swing. If (when) I build a personal cable at my lake, I'll be sure to keep you posted. @Horton Hopefully a non commercial system wouldn't be so expensive. Again, building one for my lake on my to do list, just not a super priority. Eric

@DanE My comment was a reflection on why ZO is so hated. ZO is programmed for absolute perfection in timing. Instead of using the allowed and historical variations, ZO hammers the skier to stay far closer to actual than anything we had ever seen. Stargazer was horrible as well, hammering me at 5 to make up for a slow segment earlier - the end course was perfect. The grumbling has subsided now that we have a decade to adapt. But if ZO had used some of the tolerance (+- .03 instead of +- .01) to match previous driving styles (including PP Classic) the sport would be better off while still not violating the wording or spirit of the rules. Working too hard for a path that is within electronic tolerance but does not resemble current hand steering feel would be an expensive disservice to the sport. Some of the tolerance is there to protect the skiers from being hammered, steered into or jerked around, not to cheat a couple cm. Let's hope for a smooth consistent pull over a perfect path. Eric