How to bake thermofit liners

[Dr.Faustus]

This is a "reprint" that I saved from TTips. I just baked a new pair of boots and thought I should share the info with a small addition of my own.

How to Bake Thermo-fit Boot Liners by Cesare:

1. Crack open a beer.

2. Drink some beer.

3. Preheat the oven to 300 degrees F. (Take out the rack before preheating your oven.)

4. Turn the oven OFF.

5. Put the liners in on the cold rack.

6. Wait 9 to 12 minutes until they puff up or start to smell like burning rubber.

7. Drink some more beer.

8. While the boots are in the oven, make toe caps for your feet. I just use tissue paper to good effect.

9. Put your footbeds in a pair of thin sock and put your feet in the socks with the toecaps and footbeds.

10. Take a soft liner out of the oven and put your foot in it with the toecap, footbed, and liner.

* {I've had better luck putting the footbeds in the liners and sliding the liners into the boots by hand, then putting each foot with a toecap and sock into the boot.}

11. Pull the liner up all around to snug it and then, with a friend holding the shell open, slide the liner in, tap the heel, and buckle up.

12. Repeat steps 10 and 11 for the other boot.

13. Open another beer and stand with your toes on a 2x4 and light pressure on your shins until cool... about 15-20 minutes.

14. Don't forget to drink beer.



Thanks,
Dr.F

[aka-bigsteve]

^^^old skool
new school vvv
https://intuitionliners.com/fitting/...-instructions/
works way better for me, at least.
just don't expect to eat the rice after, so go generic rather than your favourite organic basmati.
beer is of course still mandatory, but anything "lite" will just not do the job properly.

[Quadzilla]

Yep, new generation Intuition liners are multidensity and the different foam densities are glued together. So, if you over heat, the liners may delam and will die of old age in a hurry. So it is best to stack heat them and maybe Rice tech will work for you. The rice never worked for me. Of course only dealers and bootfitters have a stack heater.

[James]

I find it nearly impossible to get that rice bag all the way up to the toes. Quad, I think part of the reason those T-2 boots did not fit is because the toes did not get fitted properly.

What is a stack heater?

[Quadzilla]

Stack heater is the type where there is a pipe that blows heat up into the boot. So, the boot is "stacked" upside down over the pipe and hot air blows into the boot heating the liner and prepping it for molding.
The boots I got from you, those T2's in question were also too snug for me. I went to a bootfitter and had the toes punched out with a hydrolic press. Fit great now.

[cesare]

I use the stacks almost exclusively these days. Since I work in a gear shop I don't always have to resort to the ghetto tactics in the OP. I will add that since those halcyon days, Intuition has made some improvements that make the newer tongue liners easier to get into the shell without having to put your foot in them. The older wrap liners, especially the non-Intuition ones either from Scarpa or Garmont, are so floppy coming out of the oven I can't get them into the shell at all with my hands.

Stacks are where it's at but ours keeps blowing (internal) fuses.

[aka-bigsteve]

The rice never worked for me.

You must have used the wrong beer.
Might I recommend a local favourite?

[James]

Quad, I am glad to hear those boots are working out for you. I find the NTN boots just fit better in the toe box. I hope the TTS binding holds up because regular NTN bindings don't make much sense to me with a T-2 or lighter boot.

I have used a convection oven. I lower the temp a bit and put the liner directly in front of the fan. It works like a charm but I could easily see the difference between works like a charm and wrecks the liner as a very subtle difference in temp or timing. I think cooking liners is like toasting pine nuts. Look a way for a second and

Smithwicks is my favorite beer for drinking so it is my favorite beer for ski and bike work or pretty much anything. I suppose it is local to my ancesters. I am thinking of trying a fine Scotch for my next ski mount to see how that works. I might have to pace myself a bit more. With the Scotch that is.

[MattB]

Toasting pine nuts! I've made that expensive mistake more than once. But they make the pesto SO good when toasted just right.

[TheWheel]

RE the toe box statement. I'm still struggling with getting enough room in length. New Intuition wraps and 3 sessions with a fitter and my toes are still curling when I drop a knee. The fit is fantastic otherwise. I had the same problem with my Evo's also. What's interesting is that dialing down the spring tension from red 4.5 to 3+ has helped some but nowhere near enough.

Quad, I am glad to hear those boots are working out for you. I find the NTN boots just fit better in the toe box. I hope the TTS binding holds up because regular NTN bindings don't make much sense to me with a T-2 or lighter boot.

I have used a convection oven. I lower the temp a bit and put the liner directly in front of the fan. It works like a charm but I could easily see the difference between works like a charm and wrecks the liner as a very subtle difference in temp or timing. I think cooking liners is like toasting pine nuts. Look a way for a second and

Smithwicks is my favorite beer for drinking so it is my favorite beer for ski and bike work or pretty much anything. I suppose it is local to my ancesters. I am thinking of trying a fine Scotch for my next ski mount to see how that works. I might have to pace myself a bit more. With the Scotch that is.

[James]

I hate to say it but that sounds like the wrong shell size. My problem was width in the toe box. The T-1 and T-Race fit me with a performance fit. The T-2 ECO is not the same last and is much more narrow especially in the toe box. The T-2 ECO is the only thing I have ever put on my foot that was to narrow. I had to size up from a 28 Scarpa to a 28.5 on my Evos. I really like the performance of th Evo but I swim in the boot a bit. A new liner and some bontex shims make them work.

Red 4.5. Dam dude that is pretty active.

[TheWheel]

Shell size is a skinny 2 fingers. The issue is that every toe minus my piggy are as long or longer than my big. It's the 4th and pig that curl. I'm in a 29. The 29.5 was 2.5 fingers. Looks like a shell punch is in order next.

And yes 4.5 was way too active. Dialing it back made a huge difference. I'm considering playing with the blues next.

[aqua toque]

...cooking liners is like toasting pine nuts.

Good name for a band:

The Pine Nut Analogy

[polemonium]

Over on TGR there is a thread where someone tried molding liners with boiling water and a freezer bag. I tried it and it seems to work for a moderate remold. It won't soften the outer of the liner enough to mold it to the boot, but if that's already been done, then you can stick the room-temp liner in the boot, put the bag in, and carefully fill it with hot water. Let rest, then pour bag out, put foot in, close buckles, wait. I haven't tried the hot rice method, but it seems that the water bag should be easier to get to fill the interior volume, down to the toes, etc.

[TheWheel]

Then there's the Zip-Fit method. I ran these for about 10 seasons and tried this method once. It seemed to work. Different tech than Intuition though.
http://www.zipfit.com/howtozipfitsteps.html