Welcome to Louis (Lou) Dawson's backcountry skiing information & opinion website. Lou's passion for the past 50 years has been alpinism, climbing, mountaineering and skiing -- along with all manner of outdoor recreation. He has authored numerous books and articles about
ski touring and is well known as the first person to ski down all 54 of Colorado's 14,000-foot peaks, otherwise known as the
Fourteeners! Books and free ski touring news and information here.
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Should (does?) Salewa just hire Maruelli to design/engineer/manufactuer this stuff? I believe this is the second Maruelli product design to find it’s way to Dynafit – the first being the flip-up heel lifter featured on the Radical bindings.
Tom, I know for a fact that they talk quite a bit. Who knows the inner workings of the great Salewa….
Maruelli is a super bright guy, very friendly. I enjoyed getting together with him last winter and messing around with his Natural Walking Plate.
I obtained a couple of these kits from Salewa at the beginning of the summer. Very easy to install, took me about 10-12 minutes per pair of skis.
The devices seem to work fine, although they are dinky little things made of molded plastic, not metal, so I’m not optimistic they will last.
I still plan on picking up a couple of pairs of Stefano’s devices when I get back to Europe, because Stefano’s version is made from metal and look like they can take some abuse.
I obtained a few of these for my shop this past spring, and yes, they’re simple and minimalist in design–likely the lightest option for anti-twist. Wish we had more real-world test beta, but I guess that will have to come next.
So, how necessary is the retrofit? I’ve used the Radicals for one season (35 days) with no problems. In fact, I prefer them to my TLT-Verts. It’s now mid summer and I’m pretty sick of listening to OCD, gear-head bikers bragging on spending thou$$ands to shave a few grams. Is the Radical retro-fit just another OCD fixation?
Does anyone know if the radical will have any other fixes for next year?
Rod, we’ve been covering everything for some time, but not sure I ever made a list. I’ll probably miss something, but here are the changes I can remember. Most of these or perhaps all have already been done “inline.”
– Improved heel AFD to prevent loss of spring.
– Defective metal under heel lifter should be history.
– Rotation lock pin changed to improved version, and binding supplied with anti-rotation fitting for the brake retractor plate.
Busy at OR show, probably forgetting something, anyone else care to chime in?
Any word on a solution for the Radical Speed (sans brakes)?
Maruelli sells a version that doesn’t need the brake installed for it to function.
http://www.wildsnow.com/6859/anti-twist-dynafit-radical/
Thank Lou, but it doesn’t appear anywhere on his website…when you click on the URL for radial speed upgrade you get the walking plate.
http://www.maruelli.com/RADICAL%20UPGRADE/DYANAFIT%20RADICAL-SPEED%20UPGRADE.htm
Also I guess I was asking if Dynafit will have an OEM offering for the speed radial or not
So the million dollar question, “Do you remove the anti-rotation pin when using the anti-twist device?”
I’d remove it, but it’s optional.
All, I’m noticing some political ads that Google is filling our ad spaces with. We’re not picking those and I’ll work on banning them. Just thought you guys should know, so we don’t get in trouble from either side of the fence!
Back to the rotation problem…
I’m thinking about buying a pair of Radical Speeds this year – but don’t know if that is a good idea if the rotation will be a pain…
I haven’t seen any hint of a Dynafit fix for the rotation/pin problem in the Radical heel for the many people who choose not to use brakes (e.g., Radical Speed or just removing the brake from the other models).
Other than simply removing the pins and putting up with any rotation when it happens, I’ve only heard about the aftermarket option from Maruelli, but that won’t be something accessible by many people.
One would think Dynafit would have an option that was likely a warranty fix… but Lou would likely have heard of that by now…
Perhaps a return to the old, time-tested non-round cylinder?
I just logged on this old thread to get the instructions for installing the anti-twist part which arrived today. Salewa got it to me quickly after I called them this week. They are a workable solution as long as one uses brakes. Now what is the protocol for dealing with the defective metal in the heel lifts? Is that something one can be proactive about, or wait until they break?
John, I’m not sure. It’s about the vintage of the binding, if you bought them quite a while ago you might want to talk to Dynafit. Lou
I bought them as soon I they came out, so they are an early model. I will probably ski them and deal with any breakage as it happens
To John Gloor’s question about the heel lifts on the radicals. This just looks like bad design. Take that top plate off and look how that little plastic plate is designed to hold the pin that anchors the heel lifters. My top plate snapped under the pressure when one of the screws backed out far enough for the plate to flex under the weight of the loaded lifters. The top plate should be metal. Overall, the vertical has been a less complicated binding and it looks to me like its design will outlast the radical.
Like I’ve said many times Vertical FT 12 with Power Blocks under toe is definitely at the all-time top of the list. ST 10 isn’t too shabby either.
Yes Lou; I agree. The FT/ST bindings are very good, virtually bullet proof, and, extremely durable. I have no interest in the “Radical” bindings. Dynafit is driving me into the “arms” of other “tech’ binding manufacturers.
Long time Dynafit users have been waiting for a lighter model based on the original concept, but, all we get are models designed to please the marketing guys who only think about new customers, and, take the old customers for granted.
Bar, be sure to call them the “Vertical” bindings. The Radicals are also FT/ST.
Thanks Lou, for the terminology assistance. After all; if you’re going to “rant”, you want to name things correctly.
Cheers;
Bar
Update: my friend just suffered the same heel lifter failure on the radicals that I described above.
I suspect that they fail when the top plate screws back out and the top plate flexes. There may be some prevention value in keeping them snug. Be careful because they strip easily, another design feature that could be improved.
This top plate takes all of the pressure from the weight on the lifters. Call me old fashioned but why isn’t it metal with tapped screws?
Mark, sorry to hear that, during the whole history of the Radical binding we’ve heard reports of lifter breakage. Of course, that happened with the Vertical series bindings as well. We have no idea if the frequency of breakage with Radical is more or less than that of the Vertical. Thing is, however, the Vertical breakage was usually caused by human error, while the Radical breakage is either a materials or design defect, or perhaps a combination of both where the design can’t handle minor variations in material strength. Also, good point about the screws. They shouldn’t be backing out, if they are something is wrong as we’ve not seen that here and we’ve been running multiple pairs of Radicals for a while now. Lou
Anyone know if the Dynafit antitwist device can be placed on the Comfort model brakes -(and will it work? ) The heel rest platform in the lowest mode is a bit different on the Comfort.
You guys are so totally rad, this was insanely helpful.
Hey Guys,
Just had a Radical ST10 first gen breakage of a heel unit last season. It cracked due to the anti-rotation pin.
I contacted Dynafit and they sent me replacement parts under warranty and the new antirotation device which I installed on the brakes.
The only thing I have doubts with is that they only sent me 1 heel unit. My other remaining heel unit is fine with no cracks in it. But the new heel unit I received has substantially more plastic width at the base of the tower.
Question is if it is safe to use the newer version of heel with my older heel on the other ski(since it doesn’t have any cracks in it).
Dragos, you need to replace BOTH heels. This is ancient history from year 2011 … Lou
https://www.wildsnow.com/6442/dynafit-radical-recall-repair/
Lou
Thanks for the info Lou.
I’ll try to contact them to see what happened to the other heel unit I was supposed to receive from my local dealer. I received 2 of the newer antirotation locks but only 1 new heel unit.
Sorry for digging this up, but the new ST/FT2.0 is a little out of my budget for now and I want to see if maybe I can get my old bindings back to life 🙂