Ski Builders Forum

I have been thinking about his VDS thing a bit lately.

I made some skis years ago without it. I recenty used this ski to test sidewall strength (with a sledgehammer), this made the edges pop out. The edges had rusted inside the ski. This is a bit strange since I have made skis (with VDS) that I have opened up later and found no rust inside, even if the edges were badly treated on the outside.

This made me think that the real intention of the rubber is to seal the edges, so that no water can be sucked in by dry fibres

I have allways found it hard to believe that the super thin rubber sheets dampen anything (but irrelevant vibrations), so what about start calling them what they are: gaskets?

this could be something!

do you really think water got soaked in by dry fibres? i can hardly imagine dry fibres that soak water that deep into a ski... where did the edges rust? just on the outmost part or on the whole width of the teeth?

i had an other idea: due to vibrations, shear forces between metal and fibreglass there could open up small haircracks between edges and fibreglass through which water could get sucked in due to capilar forces. what do you think about this theory?

if you agree on this theory we could name them AVG, anti vibrating gaskets

funny, I though t you worked in the industry. It is common knowledge that VDS is for bonding/sealing and has no dampening at all.
Maybe if you sandwiched the entire core in a wrap of rubber, but then the skis would be heavy as hell like allot of rossi skis.

common knowledge

The main purpose of vds as far as I know is to provide a shear layer between the steel edge and the fiberglass. This would make sense in regards to water getting in to the ski and causing the edges to rust.

I do believe in rubber dampening though it may be all in my head.

I do think that kevlar actually dampens the ride more than rubber, but again maybe it's all in my head.

MontuckyMadman wrote:funny, I though t you worked in the industry. It is common knowledge that VDS is for bonding/sealing and has no dampening at all.
Maybe if you sandwiched the entire core in a wrap of rubber, but then the skis would be heavy as hell like allot of rossi skis.

Yes that is funny, i guess I don't need common klowledge then. I figured that one out myself.

just sayin... thought you guys were all that and a bag of socks

MontuckyMadman wrote:funny, I though t you worked in the industry. It is common knowledge that VDS is for bonding/sealing and has no dampening at all.

Hmmm. Odd then that they are called Vibration Damping Strips.

So in summary: Do VDS strips cause "dampening" or damping?

brewster wrote:
Hmmm. Odd then that they are called Vibration Damping Strips.

Marketing dood

These things make me think of K2's way of naming ski lengths. Since they believe that skiers seem to buy shorter skis, they are named (like they are priced): 179, 189 etc. In real life they are everything from 3-11 cm longer (the Hellbent 189 is 200cm). So when Mcconkey goes out in Powder Magazine and advise people to buy 10cm longer when getting rockered skis, it all ends up pretty awkward: A kid asked me if he should get the 189 hellbent, he had skied 179 vct's (he is 170). I don't know if he would have actually done it in the end, but +30cm is a big ski, rocker or not.

That's why we should call things what they are.

-adhesion gaskets?
-rubber foil?

what ever, just don't put vibration in there.

wonder what a bead of silicone would do.. lol

RoboGeek wrote:wonder what a bead of silicone would do.. lol

you could call it "delam deluxe"

MontuckyMadman wrote:funny, I though t you worked in the industry. It is common knowledge that VDS is for bonding/sealing and has no dampening at all.
Maybe if you sandwiched the entire core in a wrap of rubber, but then the skis would be heavy as hell like allot of rossi skis.

If it works to assist the bond of the edges to the p-tex sidewalls, has anyone used it to improve the bonding of the sidewall to the core?

brewster wrote:
Hmmm. Odd then that they are called Vibration Damping Strips.

So in summary: Do VDS strips cause "dampening" or damping?

Im pretty sure when your dog is peeing on your floor he is dampening your carpet, and when you are trying to reduce vibration you are damping.

either term can be used.

I think it does absorb some vibrations, but probably nothing that you can feel. The rubber creates a shear layer for the different materials as they flex. This improves the bonding between materials, especially the metal edges, since it allows things to slide rather than breaking epoxy bonds.

-kelvin

oops. should have read the whole post, others have said the same thing.