marka

Howdy, The ones I have (A6.0, A4.5, X Core, etc.) all have the same dimensions as the Sr. sticks. Mark

Howdy, Looked to my fairly inexpert eyes like 25 played it fairly well, perhaps a bit too much gap, but the guy who carried the puck into the zone is just a good enough skater to smoke him to the outside (which could be why he gave him a little more gap). The weak side D is just hanging in space while that is going on and doesn't come over to support so you end up with the puck carrier in front of the net in close alone and presumably he makes a hands-y play to score (I can't really tell). Honestly, to me it looked good right up until the puck carrier was able to get completely around the outside of 25. If he'd been able to stay with him well enough force the puck carrier behind the net or to the corner, everything would have been fine. Mark

Howdy, I never know where to post these "Thanks for Winterfest!" posts... Move this as necessary. 🙂 Just wanted to post and say thanks for another great Winterfest! Really nice to see folks again, particularly after being hurt this summer and missing SummerJam. I particularly appreciate everyone being nice/welcoming to Laura. She had a good time, even though she thinks we're all weird. 🙂 My first time going up to Guernsey's as well, which was probably the part of the thing I enjoyed the most outside of chirping Dave. Already looking forward to the next one. JR and everyone else... Thanks! Mark

Howdy, I'm comparing clones, not direct Bauer stuff, but I just switched from p28 to p92... The p28 (TC4 in my case) lie is the same as the p92 (Sherwood PP96 and TC2) from the heel until just a bit past the mid blade. Then on the p28 the rocker continues upward (putting the toe higher) as compared to the p92. Its early days yet, but so far I'm finding the p92 to be more forgiving of not having the puck in the exact right position on the blade. Mark

Howdy, Let me try this a different way. I try and keep my checking account # confidential. I do this by not giving it out to people that don't need to know about my checking account #. In this day and age if a company is both sending out promo materials to every hockey shop in two countries well in advance of a product release _AND_ simultaneously expecting that to remain secret... They're freaking idiots. I assume they actually _aren't_ freaking idiots, they expect the information to become known, and they're incorporating that into their marketing strategy. Clutching pearls when everyone behaves EXACTLY as you would expect them to is ridiculous. Mark

Howdy, Mark

Howdy, In this day and age, the idea that you can blast info out to every retailer and not then have it become basically immediately available is crazy. I mean, I guess its cute and quaint and all that some folks think it still works that way, but that's just nuts. Why do they send out upcoming product info to the retailers before they're allowed to tell anyone anyway? Presumably at that point in the process there's nothing a manufacturer is going to get back from the retailers that will modify what they release, right? Is it just so that they can decide what they want to order in terms of stock? Or is that just a hold over from earlier times as well? Mark

Howdy, If this stuff is such a big secret, maybe they shouldn't blast it out across the hockey world. Mark

Howdy, I think it was the Chiclets podcast where I first heard about the need for respect... To me, that's really where the line is. Peters probably would have been fine if he'd respected Aliu enough to recognize that he'd offended him with his choice of words, then apologized and meant it, for instance. Hockey is a sport where you're occasionally just this side of assault on the ice, then an hour later you're shaking a guy's hand and congratulating him on a well fought game. I think, done correctly, that's what respect means. Heat of the moment, wires cross, and you lose it? What determines if that was over the line or not is what happens after that. When you've got time to think / reflect. That said, I think some stuff is too far over the line, even in the heat of the moment. A coach legitimately unable to control their reactions to a game situation / mistake well enough to stop from kicking/punching a player? Hard to walk that one back. Using overtly racist language? Unacceptable. Its going to be interesting if this keeps building or not. Its also going to be interesting if it builds to a point where things like the casual misogyny that's so common becomes unacceptable. Or I guess a better way to say that is it'll be interesting to see how fast it builds. Its going to build... That much is clear. Mark

Howdy, 1ms at 80mph is ~1.5". I think I'll worry about other things first. 🙂 Mark

Howdy, Hard to see how that would pitch the blade back 2/32 or whatever it was. Mark

Howdy, I would strongly recommend that you go skate on some synthetic ice before you decide to spend money on it. I thought I wanted to do that, then tried it and decided that it felt differently enough that it wasn't worth it to me. Mark

Howdy, Any chance there will be True reps at Winterfest and they'll have some of these with them? I want to check out out in person. Like the idea of the MIPS system. Mark

Howdy, Are you using the same edge checker, in the same manner (i.e. which way the edge checker is facing)? I would think that if an edge got beat up enough to go from being even to being way off level, then the damage would be both visible and not uniform. But an edge checker that wasn't actually indicating level correctly could perhaps explain what you're seeing... Mark

Howdy, How'd they do that? Mark

Howdy, That's great! Good luck! Mark

Howdy, Are softball teams really that hard to come by out there? Because if not... Other teams beckon. Mark (had something sorta like that happen twice on a hockey team I was playing on. The 2nd time was my last game with them. Good guys on the team in general and I liked playing with them, but life is too short for me to be pissed off when I'm playing hockey for fun).

Howdy, I think for every throwback jersey, they should be required to have a throw ahead one. Like Buck Rogers styling cues or whatever. Mark

Howdy, When I was in the same situation, I was leaning towards the Wissota but ended up going with the Sparx. The primary driver for this was comparing profiles on new blades vs. ones that had been sharpened for a while. There were drastic differences, and they'd been sharpened by folks that did them every day of the week (local Pure, known for decent sharpening). I figured if decent pros couldn't keep the profile within reason, then there was no way someone like me who would sharpen once or twice a week ever would. Other than that, the lack of dust everywhere and the "press go and do something else" are also big wins, but they weren't my decision point. The only real downside is that the Sparx is a significantly more complicated machine than a basic manual sharpener, so there's more opportunites to fail and its less likely that you can fix it yourself if the company goes away. Mark

Howdy, Its been quite a long time since I moved from 5/8 to 5/8 Fire... My recollection is that I felt more "stuck to the ice" in a straight linewith the 5/8 ROH cut, but its been so long I wouldn't put much weight into that impression. Mark

Howdy, Ideal RPM is going to depend on grinding wheel diameter, isn't it? I would assume what you really care about is the SFPM, though would also assume that there's a reasonable operating range. Mark

Howdy, So, got a 3/4 Fire and tried it out last night. My impressions are coming from long-ish time use of 5/8 Fire... I didn't find it a big change at all. In fact, it was close enough to the 5/8" Fire that I'm not sure I'd be able to tell them apart in a blind test. Other factors like ice hardness, how recently they were sharpened, etc. etc. I think would have a bigger impact on the feel. Strangely enough, if anything I thought I could feel my edges more with the 3/4 Fire than with the 5/8 Fire. I'm assuming that this is just because I was paying more attention to that, since I'd made a radius change and I use the CXN holder so back to back tests are a bit harder to do than with the quick change holders. We'll see how it goes over the next few hours of ice time, but at least so far I'm liking the 3/4 Fire fine. I should note that I'm an old-ish guy that just started playing 4 years ago. So maybe my skating just isn't good enough to pickup the differences and someone else would find them more significant! Mark

Howdy, All things are not equal. The grinding rings change and I've proven to myself that the center of my current 5/8" ROH ring is about four clicks off the center of my current 5/8" Fire ring. I also think that if you want actual even edges you need an edge checker. The difference you see between a few clicks on the adjuster is extremely minor in the optical tool... Enough so that you could easily be off. The edge checker makes it clear. You can make the argument that the edges may not be off enough to be noticeable and I won't disagree, but in my experience if you want even edges on an edge checker, you will need to make adjustments you can't see via the optical tool. YMMV. Mark

Howdy, So the machine references the existing bottom of the runner (where it contacts the ice) when clamping the running into position? That seems like an odd way to do it. Mark

Howdy, Ah... I'd seen 612, which wasn't all that helpful, but appendix II looks to be better. I'll need to check that out more. 🙂 Thanks! Mark