Hey Tom, on your avvy beacon, it was recalled a few years back. It can turn off from send if it gets hit too hard/squeezed, like if the user got caught in an avalanche. If you haven't already, make sure it gets serviced.
Tom, it would be interesting to know how you approach waxing your skis, especially in warmer conditions. I don’t think you’ve touched on that subject yet. As always, thanks for posting!
On this trip I'm skiing a traction patterned backcountry ski (Voile Objective BC). The traction pattern works very well for the highly variable conditions we have this time of year. I do use skins for long steep ascents. The tips and tails of the ski have been hot waxed with a glider wax and the traction pattern section was waxed with maxiglide, which is a paste wax. I always carry rub on glider wax (in this instance, a small tin of Swix F4 Universal Glider Wax) and a scraper with me in case ice begins to form on the base. Here is a link to a video I made several years ago on my waxing regime czcams.com/video/K7U7JfB1U3w/video.html
There are some beacon parks and beacon checkers out our way, one in the Wyoming Range (park) at the N Horse Creek parking area you may want to check. I had 2 Pieps fail on me. They didn't work right with the checkers and their antennas were not working right for send and receive, I sent them back to Black Diamond where they found they were defective. Please check yours soon there is no point carrying one that isn't' right. You may also want to learn more about the pattens made by the various antennas in order to understand what happens when you first pick up a signal! It has to do wiht the planes it emits signals on (one plane per antenna) I know you can work that out!
Thanks for the great info Claudia. I've had a couple of posts regarding issues with this unit, but mine seems to be working fine and I always do a quick test with my ski partner when we start our ski if we are skiing avalanche terrain. It had been many years since I've done a buried hidden test, so I was definitely out of practice.
The pulk on this trip belongs to Tom H. I emailed him and this is his response : This rig was built by my wife and used for hut tours. The sled is an ERA Pro Expedition Sled. The pull cordage runs through hollow PVC poles. At the waist end, the cords are attached to nylon webbing via carabiners to create a waist belt. The waist belt tended to work its way down from my waist, so on the return trip I tied a piece of cord cross-body over my shoulder and fastened it to the waist belt to prevent it from working downward. Two ideas came to mind to improve the current setup. One would be to wear a pack with a belt and clip each pole onto a pack's waist belt. Another would be to rig the poles onto an actual waist belt. These can be bought or “recycled” from an old pack.
As a side note, if you are in the US, here is a resource for pulk components. They have rigid poles, harnesses and hardware which would make for an easy build. www.skipulk.com/products/components/
Here's what i consider to be a useful beacon practice session: 1) spend at least ten minutes stomping down an area of aleast 50 meters by 50 meters; preferably bigger, to avoid cheating. 2) when the stopwatch is pressed, remove shovel from the pack and get out/deploy probe and/or pop basket and screw together probe poles, 3) remove skis (most avalanche debris fields are resemble uneven piles of bowling ball sized hardened snow; it's faster to run than ski. In a powder avalanche, skis may be better). 4) conduct search at a run, not sauntering as shown in this video. when sufficiently close, probe, dig, and recover. I like to put the beacon in a stuffsack full of clothes (to present a larger probing target) and bury it progressively deeper as the practice goes on. It's significantly harder to get close when the beacon is several feet down. When everyone in the party has several practice searches with a total time of under 60 seconds, then we can think about skiing through avalanche terrain. All aspects need to be practiced: I've seen supposedly competent people take 3 minutes to get their probe deployed. When the adrenaline is flowing and your partner/friend/ spouse is under the snow, everything needs to be automatic. After 10 minutes of burial survival rates go way down, and it is likely to take several minutes to dig down to the victim and clear the airway.
Wonderful winter in spring time... :-)
Morning Tom…☕️
Thanks for the video 👍
New Brunswick Canada 🇨🇦
Morning to you as well. Have a great weekend.
Hey Tom, on your avvy beacon, it was recalled a few years back. It can turn off from send if it gets hit too hard/squeezed, like if the user got caught in an avalanche. If you haven't already, make sure it gets serviced.
Thats good to know, I'll check into it. Thanks
Tom, welcome back, miss your videos 🤝
Thanks for tuning in and for being a subscriber. Be safe and have a great week.
Tom, it would be interesting to know how you approach waxing your skis, especially in warmer conditions. I don’t think you’ve touched on that subject yet. As always, thanks for posting!
On this trip I'm skiing a traction patterned backcountry ski (Voile Objective BC). The traction pattern works very well for the highly variable conditions we have this time of year. I do use skins for long steep ascents. The tips and tails of the ski have been hot waxed with a glider wax and the traction pattern section was waxed with maxiglide, which is a paste wax. I always carry rub on glider wax (in this instance, a small tin of Swix F4 Universal Glider Wax) and a scraper with me in case ice begins to form on the base. Here is a link to a video I made several years ago on my waxing regime czcams.com/video/K7U7JfB1U3w/video.html
There are some beacon parks and beacon checkers out our way, one in the Wyoming Range (park) at the N Horse Creek parking area you may want to check. I had 2 Pieps fail on me. They didn't work right with the checkers and their antennas were not working right for send and receive, I sent them back to Black Diamond where they found they were defective. Please check yours soon there is no point carrying one that isn't' right. You may also want to learn more about the pattens made by the various antennas in order to understand what happens when you first pick up a signal! It has to do wiht the planes it emits signals on (one plane per antenna) I know you can work that out!
Thanks for the great info Claudia. I've had a couple of posts regarding issues with this unit, but mine seems to be working fine and I always do a quick test with my ski partner when we start our ski if we are skiing avalanche terrain. It had been many years since I've done a buried hidden test, so I was definitely out of practice.
I know there are different instruction sites out there but I’d be interested to see how you put your pulk polls together
Thanks for the video!
The pulk on this trip belongs to Tom H. I emailed him and this is his response : This rig was built by my wife and used for hut tours. The sled is an ERA Pro Expedition Sled. The pull cordage runs through hollow PVC poles. At the waist end, the cords are attached to nylon webbing via carabiners to create a waist belt. The waist belt tended to work its way down from my waist, so on the return trip I tied a piece of cord cross-body over my shoulder and fastened it to the waist belt to prevent it from working downward. Two ideas came to mind to improve the current setup. One would be to wear a pack with a belt and clip each pole onto a pack's waist belt. Another would be to rig the poles onto an actual waist belt. These can be bought or “recycled” from an old pack.
As a side note, if you are in the US, here is a resource for pulk components. They have rigid poles, harnesses and hardware which would make for an easy build. www.skipulk.com/products/components/
Got it. Thanks!
Here's what i consider to be a useful beacon practice session: 1) spend at least ten minutes stomping down an area of aleast 50 meters by 50 meters; preferably bigger, to avoid cheating. 2) when the stopwatch is pressed, remove shovel from the pack and get out/deploy probe and/or pop basket and screw together probe poles, 3) remove skis (most avalanche debris fields are resemble uneven piles of bowling ball sized hardened snow; it's faster to run than ski. In a powder avalanche, skis may be better). 4) conduct search at a run, not sauntering as shown in this video. when sufficiently close, probe, dig, and recover. I like to put the beacon in a stuffsack full of clothes (to present a larger probing target) and bury it progressively deeper as the practice goes on. It's significantly harder to get close when the beacon is several feet down. When everyone in the party has several practice searches with a total time of under 60 seconds, then we can think about skiing through avalanche terrain. All aspects need to be practiced: I've seen supposedly competent people take 3 minutes to get their probe deployed. When the adrenaline is flowing and your partner/friend/ spouse is under the snow, everything needs to be automatic. After 10 minutes of burial survival rates go way down, and it is likely to take several minutes to dig down to the victim and clear the airway.
Good advice and would be the proper way to do this, especially for a class.
I'm curious - why do all the trees look dead?
A forest fire burned through the area and left many standing burned snags.