This is interesting. Not an easy task to start a new binding company. Anybody seen these in person yet?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZuAHIfK-AQ
https://www.alpenflowdesign.com/collections/flow-89
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This is interesting. Not an easy task to start a new binding company. Anybody seen these in person yet?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZuAHIfK-AQ
https://www.alpenflowdesign.com/collections/flow-89
Looks pretty cool. I wonder what the ramp angle is. Looked all over their website and couldn’t find that info. They’ve got a pre order going right now but they aren’t cheap
I fondled them at Palisades when they had a demo day, but didn’t ski them. They seem nice and look pretty durable.
However, I’m not really sure how these are much better than tectons. Still a tech toe, so they won’t ski like a full alpine bindings. All metal design and execution could give them an edge there, and they do have more elasticity overall I think. But 160g more than Tecton per binding. I haven’t seen any real issues with Tecton durability. 120g less than shifts.
Seems like these are better than kingpins in the same way tectons are.
I’d like to ski them on snow back to back with shifts and tectons and see what I think of them in the resort, but I’m skeptical they ski better than shifts, or tectons for that matter (I’d assume they’re on par). But the jury is still out. They could thread the gap between those two bindings and be a great resort powder and touring binding
Noah Gaffney and Jed use them and they ski harder than 99.5% of people though so that tells you something about them at least. I think I’d be a lot more confident sending it on these than tectons if that’s your thing. I’d also much rather support a local skier owned company than giant mega corps as well.
Ramp angle is zero based on the specs on their website. We had another thread discussing these bindings somewhere in here, but I cannot find it now. I know a few mags had tested them during some of the demo days and had good things to say.Quote:
Originally Posted by altacoup
Haven't skied them but see a lot of people touring on them around Tahoe.
I think I'm with Muggy though, seems like a heavier and more expensive tecton. As someone who doesn't exactly send it in the backcountry I'm more into sub 300 gr bindings but obviously the 50:50 binding is big business.
Cool to have a small company making bindings though, that's a big undertaking.
There's a blister gear 30 podcast with them and atk guys that was quite interesting if you filter out the promo speak.
Tectons (I have 2 pairs) laterally release at toe. The Alpenflow is best seen as an exercise in ‘design a Kingpin but make it better’. Rotating toepiece, beefy aluminum construction, etc. But shares the release at heelpiece idea. I’ve seen em & they look pretty well designed to me.
Nice to have options on the market. The very sturdy heel elevators are better than the plastic ones on my Tectons.