Snowboard tuning tips
Having a properly tuned snowboard will greatly increase the performance of your board. A properly prepared board will ride significantly better than a board that's been neglected. Riding will be easier, and you'll have a better time on the snow.
The tips here are intended to help you learn how to properly tune your board. This is stuff we've seen, read about, and learned over many years. There are many different ways to perform many of these steps, but these are the techniques that work well for us. This is the way that we tune all of our own boards here at Happy Monkey Snowboards, Inc., and it's the way we tune every new board that we make.
If you have questions, comments, or further suggestions about the material on these pages, please feel free to send us some email. If you have a good tip, we'll add it and give you credit for it. If we get a lot of tips, we'll probably go ahead and start a special tips page and add them all there.
Important safety note: Many of the things described below are dangerous. Waxing irons are hot and will burn you. Wax smoke is harmful to your health. Metal edges are extremely sharp throughout their preparation (far, far sharper than you realize) and it's easy to cut yourself, driving fine metal shavings deep into the wound, requiring proper cleaning and stitching by a qualified doctor, plus a Tetanus vaccination. You use the information contained here at your own risk. Happy Monkey Snowboards, Inc., cannot be held responsible if you injure yourself or damage your equipment by following these tips. Proceed at your own risk.
Overview
There are 3 basic steps to tuning:
- Initial base preparation: getting a proper structure on the base, removing oxidation, and cleaning.
- Edge preparation: setting a proper base and side bevel, and sharpening.
- Waxing: waxing, scraping, and brushing.
For each step we'll show you what tools you need, how to use them, and what the point is. When you're done, you'll turn easier, go faster, and generally have a better time up on the hill. All of these tips are applicable to skis and snowboards equally.
There are some good resources out there for learning this stuff, too. We buy all of our tools from Tognar Toolworks. They've got an incredible selection, great service, plus a ton of good tips and tricks online. Browsing through their web site is educational in itself, and you'll find every tool pictured or mentioned in this section there. Just about any book on skiing or snowboarding that you'll find in your local book store has a section on basic tuning. Swix puts out a small booklet called "Alpine & Snowboard Preparation Tech Manual" that teaches true race preparation. Toko has a similar manual called the "Toko Wax Manual" that has similar information, plus some good info on the way snow crystals age and why you might care.
Setting up
You need a decent place to tune your snowboard; somewhere you can make a mess. You're going to get fine metal shavings, hot drips of wax, and lots of wax scrapings all over the place. Select a place where this is okay (this is almost never inside of your house)... the garage is best.
Also consider what clothing you might wear. Wax is really hard to get out of clothes... and off your nice leather shoes. At least wear a shop apron.
Next, you need a good way to hold your board in place while you work on it. The best solution is to buy a nice snowboard vise. This is a device that attaches to a work bench or other stable surface and provides a place to set your board on, either base up, or with one edge or the other up. The top is usually rubber, to grip the top of your board and hold it in place while your waxing and scraping.
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If you don't have a vise there are ways to improvise. We're not going to suggest any of those ways to you... honestly, if you don't have a decent vise, you're not going to be able to tune properly. Period. The board is going to slide around, you won't be able to hold it securely on edge, and you'll just hurt yourself and ruin your nice board.