petex gun technique....

[tele.skier]

Lord baby jesus,.... WTFrig is with this petex gun repairs popping out of shallow repairs?

Who's got their petex technique dialed in?.. Come on you ba$tard$, give it up...

Chez, you doing any of this where you work?....

Beuller?....

[Quadzilla]

Lord baby jesus,.... WTFrig is with this petex gun repairs popping out of shallow repairs?

Who's got their petex technique dialed in?.. Come on you ba$tard$, give it up...

Chez, you doing any of this where you work?....

Beuller?....

I have and use a Ptex gun. Some things I have learned about how to get good results from it are:

First, the gun needs to be well warmed up so plug it in and let it warm for 20+mins.

The ski need to be warm.

The ding needs to be prepped so rout it out a bit with a dremel tool.

Then hit the ding with a base planer to get it nice and flat.

Clean the prepped ding with solvent that won't damage the base maybe some compressed air too.

Now, when you are filling, hold the tip of the gun over the ding, real close so the tip heats the base and ding and flow the plastic into the ding slowly running the tip over the ding and filling.

Sometimes I immediately clamp the repaired ding with thin plastic and some big vise grip plyers that I have.

When repair cools, grind it down with a sureform followed by a pass with a base planer.

There will probably be some voids, these I fill with ptex candle. then hit with base planer again.

Buff area with a course Scott pad, wax.

IMO, in your case the ding is probably contaminated with wax and thus the plastic filler won't stick. Also some shallow repairs just won't fill and hold with the plastic filler used in a gun. Maybe there is diffent grades of plastic rods that are sold for use in a gun. I got my gun from Tognar and I use the rods they sell for the gun. I only use the gun for deep dings, I use candle for the rest.

[televisionary]

I just use an iron, not a gun, so that I can mash the ptex in. I clean the gash real well, and try not to even allow skin oil in. Epoxy for a base layer if there's metal showing. Trim up the gash with a SERB, maybe even undercut the ptex a little, and lightly score everything with the SERB to give the ptex something to hold onto. <- I think that's important, but I could be wrong. Then mash the ptex in with the iron, being sure to press it in thoroughly. IMO guns kind of encourage you to just lay it in instead of putting pressure on it. Scrape it down.

Works for me.

[tele.skier]

After watching some youtube videos I almost wanted to buy the iron and string, instead of the gun. It looked like an easier tool to use...

What do you think of white gas for wax removal? I think turpentine is the solvent most often used for wax, and I didn't have any when I was messing with my new gun.

It's a low snow year, so my various skis are taking a beating, so I bought the gun for core shots mostly. Last week my buddy told me sparks were coming off my skis as I skied... Not a good sign of decent coverage...

Thanks Quad, TV.

[James]

I have had two hard core shots this year all the way to the metal. The gun I have uses high density poly but with those two shots the poly came right back out. I have always used this stuff for sticking to steel edges so I used it to fill most of the damaged area. I use a soldering iron to melt it and spread it around. I leave it coarse so the poly sticks on top of it. The stuff works really well for this. I have also used epoxy for this but this repair ribbon is faster and the repairs have held realy well. I hit one of the repairs again today and it still held.

http://www.tognar.com/p-tex-base-repair-ribbon-clear-or-black/

[televisionary]

Actually, I use rubbing alcohol for the final cleaning.

I hardly ever wax my skis, so that may be a factor...

[cesare]

Ditto the rubbing alcohol.

I use the soldering iron and string but that isn't always very durable. Sometimes the string with metal in it works better but sometimes it falls right out. Must be cleaning. When I do use it, I really try to mash it in like @televisionary. But more recently I have succumbed to the simplicity of just filling core shots with marine epoxy and calling it good. Short of doing a base weld with a patch of base that you epoxy in with beveled edges, I don't think there is a truly permanant solution. Some patches will stick but others will fall out. I just want my base fairly clean and smooth but am not too OCD about it. I care a lot more to have smooth edges, sealed core shots, and a wax scrape and brush every two or three days. I don't even bother to fix dings that are not core shots. I just get the base flat. Dents and scratches are just extra texture where I ski.

[James]

Anything wrong with using citrus degreaser? That is what I use. I also have a couple brass brushes that are the size of a toothbrush that are for cleaning polishing stones.. I use them aggressively to rough and clean anything I repair

[Chicken Magician]

Citrus degreaser is fine for a deep clean, but I would use some isopropyl alcohol to clean up the residue after it evaporates.

[B__]

... base planer ...

What do you use?

[cesare]

panzar file

[James]

What do you use?

http://www.tognar.com/ski-visions-ski-base-flattener-structure-tool/

I use the surform shown below for the first few passes but the planer does a great job very quickly of finishing it off nice and smooth.

[tele.skier]

What do you use?

I tried my lie-nielson low angle block plane, which was sharp enough to shave the hair on my arm, and it focused the force at the edge of the repair and pulled at the edges.


I bought 2 surforms to use because the cutting facets are spread out over the whole length of the tool so it loads less force on the edges of the repair. I have yet to try it, but watched a repair video which used a surform and it seemed to work perfectly. I bought these, a curved one.


and a flat based one too.


thanks everyone for their input. Perhaps I will get my technique down well enough to make perfect repairs. I looked at the soldiering iron type tool and the repair string and think it's probably an easier to use tool than the gun... but Oh well, I will perservere.

together they probably cost just over $10.

A medium coarse file would probably work good too, but you will have to clean the file grooves as the petex clogs them as you work it...

[Quadzilla]

What do you use?

I have the one that James linked too. I have had this one for years. I don't use it to structure but it is great for cutting Ptex repairs and cutting off volcanoes.

[tele.skier]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d1khzDLL4_k

IF you watch this video, the guy uses a similar tool as the one James linked too, with a file instead of a stone, to remove the excess material, then uses the stone to flatten and restore the structure....

The guy is pretty much a Nazi ski repair guy... "Never go from tip to tail!!!"... huh?... What difference would that make??? and unless I was racing, do I really need my skis perfectly flat???? or,.... how about "Our tools never harden your ski edges like a base grinding machine!!!" WTF is that all about???