Expensive Divorce - The Split Thread

[pow_hnd]

So you're the person that bought a set of Plums....

[tp1_kenobi]

Ran Sparks and they had too much flex for my liking. Wasn’t going Karakoram’s out of principle.

Engineering on the Plums are nice, however they’ve got a shit ton of screws. Haven’t had any issues with them getting loose, but the binders are stiff af (which is what I want) and light.

[coleslawed]

what's your principle against Karakoram?

[tp1_kenobi]

I believe there was some legal stuff Karakoram issued against plum on the binding locking mechanism and blocked them from being sold in some locations. I don’t have any source info on hand and will need to dig.

In the end, I’d rather have more options available rather than companies trying to patent shit like rocker profiles, B’s notoriety back in the day, etc.

This is when split bindings were developing past what Voile’s rail system was offering at the time.

[benjinyc]

I like my karakorams and their customer service. I run them on both split and solids now.

only drawback is you have to retighten all the screws, they have the propensity to fall off, but I guess that's what happens with metal-on-metal.

[casjcade]

I think both Karakoram and Plum is kinda building on the binding that was designed for Burton in Austria (?) back in the day, I somehow still have a working version. So if Karakoram has patented that in the US, it's hard to get on the market with something similar, and maybe it didn't feel right. Don't remember the full story on the Voile vs Burton war, and then Spark and Karakoram pops up later. I talked a little with the engineer at Plum while they were developing, so I know they didn't just copy, and I don't feel like it's much of a crime to take inspiration from someone who already took alot of inspiration from someone else. That's how progress happens I guess. Was going to buy Plum bindings, they make nice stuff, but the Sparks are still going so... Might be slightly to blame for the Now straps, as I was using them at the time. The sieva strap is real nice for walking if you don't tighten it too much. The floorboard stuff though, kinda makes alot of other splitty tech obsolete, so that could lead to simpler and more comfy bindings, and make a real difference in splitboard design/flex. I had expected this to take off alot more already.

[benjinyc]

id def be curious to know more about the backstory... I only have plum hooks on my board, otherwise never seen their tech in person. Looks like Plum as a company is similar to Voile (makes skis, ski bindings, and full splitboards too). Also looks like you can buy Karakoram stuff in Europe but not vice versa

I have a pair of Karakoram Straightlines and Free Rangers... the Free Rangers are one of the more interesting bindings I've ridden on... the baseplate is two pieces, the outer part is really stiff, the inner part is really soft, you can def tweak it. In terms of tech I can tell the diff the most on, it surpasses the Salomon shadowfit and Now skatetech for me. Having said that, I will say the fit and finish of Karakoram is way lower than Salomon and Now... I guess that's what you get for Made In USA™

[tp1_kenobi]

So I think you brought something up that’s super important. You can buy K’s in Europe but you can’t buy Plum’s in other places where K does business. That for me is enough to say fuck em. I’ve had some good customer service with Plums sales team and even introduced their sales guy to one of the larger back country shops down in Oz (whom sells Sparks and K’s). Anyhow I don’t think it panned out but imho options are a good thing especially in the split scene.

When I was in the market post Spark, saw a European on the Plums and asked his experience. He swore by ‘em and raved about the quality (and was planning on going down the hard boot path with their hard boot bindings). This is when I was hearing about K’s bindings having board to binding edge issues causing cracks on boards and the like. Mind you this was easily 4-5 years ago and haven’t looked at K’s recently so I just don’t know.

Happy to speak about my Feyans. I think they’re great for what I want regarding response, stiffness for sketchy ascents (boots obv come into play here as well), and overall build quality. Not perfect, but no binding is.

[benjinyc]

experience with the Fjell^ MT1365S ^ W Splitboard?

[unsuspected]

No actual experience, just that they expensive catalog boards. They look nice.