Ski Builders Forum

Has anyone ever used a solid maple core? Or any other wood for a solid core with out any stringers if so how did it turn out? I have been using ash and maple but want to try the solid core but want to make sure it will work out well. Also for some more info on my method I dont use sidewalls i have been using the maple from the core as the sidewall.

Going to be heavy.

troublemaker wrote:Going to be heavy.

Even if the core is thinned down to say 2, 8 or 10, 2mm?

I've done solid poplar.

I also recycled some old cedar deck boards and used them for skis.

The poplar turned out fine.

The cedar skis looked awesome and were super light, but they shifted off the tip mold (flat tails) and didn't have enough tip to be safe skiing (yes, of course I tried). So I can't really tell you how they skied.

Jekul wrote:I've done solid poplar.

That is what I'm going to end up doing. Maple will be to stiff and heavy for the type of ski I'm going to be making. What kind of sidewalls did you use?

I've used a 1x6 piece of poplar from Home Depot for a core (and sidewalls) before. It worked just fine. It was a bit more difficult to profile down--it didn't want to stay flat, but the skis turned out great. I thought they would break super easily but they didn't. At the time, they were the softest pair I had made. 2mm in the tips x 10.5 x 2.5 in the tail. Solid maple would make a burly ski. The early 4Front Renegades were all maple--and stiff. They add some poplar in there now. You could profile the maple core to be pretty soft; but a heavy, soft ski, might not be ideal. You would get good screw retention and impact protection though.

are you talking about off the shelf face grain wood, or still laminating to get vertical grain, but just with 1 species of wood? i have done both and both worked great! for a species like rock maple, you can profile your cores a little thinner to save weight. they can turn out heavy and too stiff. if you building like a 120mm waist ski, they will be heavy, but if you building like a 85mm waist ski, then not as much of a problem

i have used face grain off the shelf solid maple in early generation skis, they turned out great! i was worried about the wood wanting to move and flatten over the years, but i didnt notice any movement or change in shape, though i bet if i had the right equipment to measure that like lasers and shit i could probably document some change.
those skis performed great! my girlfriend Meagan and i just retired our pairs after about 50+ days of skiing on them over 2 seasons. (both face grain cores) i am still a little amazed how well those held up. i choke it up to the wonders of the maple tree.

(there are many benefits to vertical grain laminated cores, but i say go for it for solid off the shelf cores)

petemorgan(pmoskico) wrote:are you talking about off the shelf face grain wood, or still laminating to get vertical grain, but just with 1 species of wood?

Going to be using one board of untreated poplar for the core/sidewalls. Going to make it a little thicker to make up for how soft the wood is, along with adding more glass underfoot for the bindings. Now just time to find out what will be the best thing to treat the poplar sidewalls.

For sidewalls I used hard maple. I might start experimenting with bamboo, but I haven't hopped on that train yet.

so even for a ski this narrow maple will be to heavy?

That will probably be alright. What are these skis going to be for?

a jib ski, i know maple is not the best idea for it, but i want a solid stiffer ski so full maple core will work for that i think.

For a jib ski, I think you'll be fine.

I made a pair of maple cored skis (the better rockets in the gallery).
They are really really heavy and stiff. But, I use them for kite skiing which means that I go really fast over very uneven windpacked snow and they work amazingly well. The extra weight helps them to power through everything, and it makes them a lot more stable, which is nice when you run into death cookies at 50 miles per hour.

I made this pair last year: viewtopic.php?t=3293&highlight=feral


I dont feel they are too stiff, they ride really nice actually.