Field Repair Kit for Day-Tours? What’s Your Day-Tour Load Like?

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My friends and I attempted an all-day ski tour last weekend on a perfect day on the lovely Waterloo Hiking Trail.

My trusty old ski broke at the one-third point.

I tried to fashion a repair from an old kiddy sled but it snapped.

I ended up scootering back to the car on one ski. On a snowpacked road the scootering went really well, actually, and was darn fun. It wasn’t as good on the trail itself. Surfing the downhills was pretty OK fun, too.

[UPDATE: I’ve been informed by the wise American of all things snow-scootering that this sport is already well under way in Scandanavia. Of course! …Skate-tourers use a single ski to scooter on snow out to the good skating ice. Check out this link for very cool pics www.snabelslash.com/bo/?m=2&date=2004-03-06 or check the pic at the bottom here! Crazy and fun! That ice-touring looks lovely, too, for sure!]

Still, we wondered if you can easily bring enough simple, light stuff to repair a broken ski on a tour.

And it makes me wonder about repair kits for other all-day adventures.

It also reminded me TO INSPECT ALL GEAR BEFORE OUTINGS! (I have a nagging memory of a developing crack in that ski from last year…but had not inspected it at all this year…just skied on it every day for the past month.)

So we were thinking that in addition to normal emergency gear (Leatherman tool, cigarette lighter, zipties, duct-tape…space blanket?) that on all-day ski tours we should surely bring the following:

*spare pole basket

*spare ski tip (they sell em for modern skis at Akers-Ski.com)

*hoseclamps

*screws

*flat thin spring steel plates (like ski scrapers or furniture scrapers) cut to size for top and bottom of ski and sidewalls, too—about 6-8″ long

*2-sided tape (for friction, cohesion)

Has anyone ever field-repaired a ski that’s broken in half so that it could be skied on and would glide OK even?

One guy online said that on a tour his friend just remounted the binding on the remaining half of a ski. That sounds pretty good. But not great glide.

One thing I noticed about my field repair—before it broke—was that it had ZERO GLIDE. I had a thin sheet of plastic screwed to the based, with a ziptie around it plus ducttape. There was at most 1/4″ of obtrusion sticking up from the base and sidewalls—and it stopped the ski DEAD. To make a quality repair so the ski keeps gliding one has to make a VERY FLUSH repair. Possible?

Tim thought he could fashion a set of carbon plates with feathered edges that had channels in them for the hoseclamps, so they wouldn’t stick out. I hope he makes them and brings them along next time! : )

What To Bring On a Day-Tour?

I’m still not dialed in on what to bring along on long/half-day ski outings. I find that I quite hate the weight of a load. 10 lbs is probably all I’d want to carry. I find that a pack makes me VERY sweaty—I need my back to breath. Man, I didn’t bring much on this trip but it felt like a lot. (What a wimp, I know.) I suppose 2 big waterbottles (or a lightweight bladder—save weight on bottles!). 5 powerbars. Dry hat, gloves, shirt, thin windvest. Emergency kit. Waxes. Mini-camera. That would do it.

Could that all fit in fanny pack? I’m thinking that it could.

(I had apples, cookies, containers—it all added up to about 15 pounds—ugh—and a drenched back smothered under a pack.)

An *all*-day ski outing would require a pack. I better get over it. I like the IDEA of a pack, but making one work for me…

Here’s a funny and semi-goofy thing: I brought BOTH a fannypack and pack with me. The fanny pack gave me easy water access. Rucksack for dry clothes, etc. I just stacked the pack on the fannypack. Still, it was lame.

I suppose some day I’ll get a sippytube pack! I’ve also heard that a NARROW pack is what you want for XC. It’s probably what the mtbikers use, too.

Hey, someday I want to do the Canada Ski Marathon. I’ll have to get tough enough to ski with a pack. Or figure out how to handle the sweat. Maybe a narrow pack breathes better.