Greetings from new member.

[goofyfoot53]

I've been to five different bootfitters, many came with high recommendations and all claimed they could help me. None did. My results ranged from about the same pain as no fitting to a lot more pain. Eventually they all gave up and said they could not help me. It cost me money to find that out.

Everyone always tells me to get shaped insoles. I have the orange Superfeet in right now and frankly, I can't tell the difference from skiing without them. Another waste of money. When I had custom orthotics made at a cost of several hundred dollars, the fitter wanted to put my foot in a neutral position. After trying to ski, I discovered that when my foot is set to neutral, my ankle locks and I lose all ability to flex forward. Needless to say, attempting to ski that way was extremely painful. I went back and had him grind it down till it was just a normal footbed. Another waste of money. This was at a place called Footloose at Mammoth Mountain, CA. They claim to be premier bootfitters but I guess they met their match with my foot. I have resigned myself to just living with the pain. That's why I need to try on the boots. Some have less pain than others so I look for the minimum. I could live with the boots I have now but they are not high enough performance. It's hard to find high performance ski boots here in southern California. Soft boot snowboarding is the rage here so most shops won't take a chance on anything else. That means if you do find something, you will pay a premium price. I have considered injectable liners. Anybody have any experience with them?

Since a moldable liner won't help me if I have a bad shell fit, I have been considering the new Salomon Falcon CS Pro with its moldable shell. It has two inserts on the shell, one on each side of the forefoot, with the outside one extending back to the ankle. The inserts are made of a material Salomon is calling kaprolene. It apparently becomes pliable at a low temperature of about 212 degrees F. You can then insert the liner and clamp down the buckles for 15 minutes and those parts of the shell will conform to your feet. Salomon claims that the normal narrow 98mm last can move out to 104mm in those areas. Once the shell has molded, you quick cool it to set it by immersing it in water. Unfortunately, even if the concept works, it won’t help me for alpine snowboarding since it’s highly unlikely it will be applied to hard alpine boots. BTW, where can I find out the widths of the lasts of various alpine snowboard boots?

[nils]

Goofy:

Have you tried injected liners

Reading your story i thought: customize by deformation a hardboot shell ( heat + pressure overnight). Then injected liner of some kind ( sidas..?)
that would be able to fill the gaps where they are, and get tight where u need to be firmly held...

I am no specialist in injected liners, but i remember having narrow feet was totally taken care of by the foam: Anyway: good luck: its already hard to find matching shoes when you have regular feet, I can imagine the hassle when you are out of 'normalized" ranges...

Nils

[Hans]

I have considered injectable liners. Anybody have any experience with them?

I let made a custom foamed injected full leather liner for my Deeluxe Track 700 with Strolz. They have it in the USA too. I did this cause I have difficult feet. The left one is shorter and smaller than my right and I have a hugh arc in both feet. So I always have a problem to get in my boots. I needed a full size bigger to get in, but then I had too much room in my heels, then they were too small in the front, yes my feet are wide there.
All problems solved with that liner. I had too adapt for one hour in that liner, because they feel pretty tough in the beginning. Now they work like a charm, very responsive feel and control. Good luck with it.

www.strolz.at and www.strolzusa.com

[joemzl]

I think Hans´ proposal is the best.
But therefor you need boots new or used.

[starikashka]

Goofy i would recommend you not visit bootfitters anymore. I have tight boots - i bought suzuka with regular liner for 270 MP feet, throw this liner out ant get thermoflex.I have 290 MP feet. So, here is a perparation process.

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I ask the bootfitters just to work on shell a little to get little more space for big fingers Anyway, my experience says that best bootfitter is you Two times would be enough to get perfectly fitted boot. But my method would require to survive a pain when you extract the leg from the boot

[goofyfoot53]

Yes, I agree. I am the best bootfitter for my feet. I have learned a great deal from visiting bootfitters over the years. I am glad to hear that some of you have had good experiences with the injectable liners since there is a place that does that about 35 miles from me. Only a 30 minute drive or 45+ in traffic. I will call them to see if they have any knowledge about alpine hard boots and which shell and size would be the best starting point. The thermoflex would be my second choice if I cannot swing the injectables. If I am going to replace the liners, I might as well get used shells if I can find them in good shape at a reasonable price. my only concern there would be not getting too old a shell since the technology seems to be improving each year, even with the relatively few bootmakers still left to spur competition. I will contact the manufacturers and see if the can/will tell me the width of the last on their various models. My biggest hurdle now would seem to be to decide if I should go wth a 28-28.5 shell or a 27-27.5 shell like my current ski boots.

One good thing about skiing in pain for a few days it that it will leave a red spot which is tender to the touch, making it easy to pinpoint the spot the boot stretcher needs to apply pressure.

Thanks very much for all your suggestions and advice. I will scour the archives to learn as much as I can about the equipment and the techniques.

[Schneewurm]

Hi goofyfoot53,

It seems finding some stores with alpine snowboarding goods is as hard to find in southern California, like finding some stores for big game fishing in the Alps.

Well, we have a lot of sporting-good stores around the alpes which are labeled for bootfitting. Every time I go for snowboarding in any direction, there are some stores. They have all the machines, the ovens and the injectable liners for to fit boots. In normal cases they can help. But people should remain this are shops for selling sporting goods like skis, skiboots, clothes an so on. The sellers are only trained to sell sporting goods and they have no or a vew orthopaedic background.

If Your feets are not in line to the standard-ledges, it's a good idea to turn to orthopaedic shoemakers. They don't sell some funky goggles, shiny boards or whatever, like sporting good stores does, because they are master of orthopaedics.

Watch e.g. Heierling Sportorthopädie Davos
or ask user Felix (moderator on German section), he knows some other good addresses.

Most time this orthopaedics stores can help people also if the are seeking on other parts of the world for similiar stores.

For an overview of available shells for alpine snowboarding see here:
Hardboots 2008/2009 - some impressions

[goofyfoot53]

I talked to a bootfitter last night from a place called Surefoot. They are in Santa Monica, California but they have stores all over the USA and in Europe, including London, Norway, Switzerland, and a couple in France. You can check them out online. They make custom orthotics and custom injectable liners. They have their own line of ski boots but the bootfitter told me Lange supplies the shells without liners and then they add in their custom liners and orthotics. This keeps the price just a slight amount higher than the MSRP of high end boots, but, of course, nobody really ever pays MSRP. You can see their fitting process on their website. Unfortunately, they don’t sell alpine snowboard boots so I will have to supply my own shell. In that case, I am probably better off looking for a good used boot since I will have to throw the liner away anyway. I know I should not go too old since the technology seems to be improving and plastic goes bad when it gets old. Perhaps some of you can suggest which of the older boots would be good choices. I thought about trying to use ski boots but the consensus here and on other carving sites seems to be that ski boots are a poor choice.

One solution might be the UPZ, since you can add toe and heel pieces for skiing. In addition, I have read that they are narrow in the heel and wider in the forefoot which is how my feet are shaped. I haven’t seen any good deals on any used ones but I’ll keep watching. Has anyone had any experience with UPZ boots? And does anyone know how well they work as ski boots with the optional toe and heel pieces? The reason I ask is that the cost of the custom liners and orthotics precludes me from having both ski boots and snowboarding boots fitted. Thanks.