Leif

Even my good LHS never did a perfect sharpening. In my experience the Sparx does the closest you’ll ever get. The profile is preserved, the edges are level, what’s not to like? Before I got one I drove 25 miles to get a sharpening. 50 miles round trip, a morning written off, petrol and car to pay for, and sharpening to pay for. There’s almost no learning curve with a Sparx. But do buy the edge checker ie BAT gauge.

My last blades before I bought a Sparx went from standard Step profile to flat after a year. Manual sharpeners do of course vary in the amount of metal they take off, and their uniformity, and hence the rate at which the profile changes. I don’t believe that any manual sharpener can preserve the profile despite what most claim. I believe Sparx’s claim that their machine does not alter the profile, at least not noticeably so. Anyway, whichever profile you have, you’ll lose it soon enough! If you don’t like the idea of a quad profile, flog the blades unused and unsharpened.

Regarding the second kind of custom skate, it’s not quite a retail skate as you can have different lengths and widths on each foot. Also we don’t know what slack they have in the width, it’s possible they can go wider or narrower than stock. But as you say, they use heat and pressure to mould to a custom last. In principle there could be feet that don’t suit this process as they are so far from stock. I have custom Bauers, and I get minor pain on the side of my big toes where they rub against what I assume is the join between the quarter package and the toe cap. Or maybe the toe cap is a tad narrow. The discomfort goes after a few minutes skating, possibly because I go into a hockey stance and the feet pull back. The problem might be because I have flipper shaped feet. That said, the skates are amazing, the best I’ve ever worn by far. A friend has custom Trues, and his feet go numb. He has problem feet and says the Trues are the best skates he’s ever worn. I’ve had two Bauer scans, a few years apart, and the results were noticeably different. The second was for off the shelf inline skates. Of course with stock skates you can try on several pairs to check the scan. Would this make a difference with customs? No idea.

Unfortunately they are hard to get in the UK. It looks like the Vapor should suit, I’ll wait for some clearance ones to appear.

I agree with your comments that we need a proper comparison by a disinterested party. I assumed the ProSharp claim of 500 sharpenings meant cycles, but they say 2-3 cycles per sharpen, and 500 pairs of skates per wheel. Assuming 2 cycles per sharpen, that means 2 * 2 * 500 cycles per wheel ie 2000, which compares to 320 cycles per Sparx wheel ie roughly 6 times as many cycles per ProSharp wheel. If only ProSharp stated the number of cycles per wheel! Assuming my figures are right, here in the UK a Sparx wheel is about £75, so one ProSharp wheel compares to £113 for a ProSharp wheel. Six Sparx wheels cost £450, which would last me 9 years, and an extra £337 over ProSharp. So for me in the UK the ProSharp Home is about £800 more expensive than a Sparx, it would take me over 20 years to start saving with the ProSharp. For a team of 20 players, they would save in one year assuming all use the same wheel. In practice you might need 4 or 5 wheels, so it’d take maybe 5 years to save. I think you need less time in the US to save as prices are much lower eg no VAT at 20%. I worked out that the Sparx paid for itself in three years, and I paid £1200, as I save on car use to and from the LHS at £10, and the cost of the sharpen at £8. Added later: I found further details about ProSharp wheels in a PDF here: https://www.prosharp.eu/pub_docs/files/Engelska/SkatePal-EP-wheels.pdf This states that for fine wheels, which hockey players will use, each wheel gives 1,000 cycles, so roughly 3 times as many sharpens as a Sparx wheel assuming 2 cycles per skate. The 500 sharpens figure from ProSharp must assume 1 cycle per sharpen, which IMO is inadequate unless you sharpen before each skate. In any case, my earlier figures are wrong, it’d take me 40 years to start saving with the ProSharp.

I find it hard to believe that the Prosharp Home works out cheaper after 3 or 4 wheel changes. In the UK it is a bit over £1600 including tax and shipping. The Sparx is £787 including shipping and tax. We pay £70 for a wheel, so the difference is more than ten wheels. And the Sparx is cheaper in the US due to lower shipping costs. I bought the original Sparx which cost me £1200 including shipping. One Sparx wheel lasts me 18 months, one two pass sharpen per week. The reason the Sparx is cheaper is because it’s made in China, the ProSharp is made in Sweden.

They are even more spendy in the UK and Europe.

Are Vapor elbows lower volume than Supremes? I have Supreme 2S Pro elbows, small adult, and they slide down my arms. The next size down are too short ie leave exposed arms. I was able to tongue flop with my Supreme 2S Pro shins when I tried out tongue flopping, though I don’t normally do so.

Haven’t you read all of the posts in this thread? Please do so. 🤣 Being serious, I second Mark’s comments apart from the Wissota polisher remarks as I haven’t tried it. I have the original machine, and I do two passes each week to refresh the hollows, skating about 7 hours a week. Wheels are pricey, the starter pack might be worth trying, although in my case I skate on 7/16” and 5/8” included in the starter pack is too shallow. Your Black Friday holiday is coming soon, perhaps they’ll have a Black Friday deal. Then again, it might be best to just buy now given the distance of your sharpener from your home. I was given some wheels including two 5/16”, I don’t see myself trying those ones.

It’s steel bonded to carbon fibre, presumably with glue, and I think many of us are sceptical that the join can hold. Some years ago I bought an Apple Watch. The crystal is glued to the case. After one year the crystal fell off. The watch was replaced under warranty. 18 months later, same again. The third one I sold on ebay, unused. Just over two years ago I bought some glasses with temples (side arms) glued to the Zeiss lenses. One year later the glue fails. After two years, new prescription, new Zeiss lenses. This time I didn’t wear the glasses while inline skating, or ice skating, just in case I have sweat like the creature from the Alien film. After two months two joints failed. These so called high performance glues are not as good as claimed. As for these runners, I’ll let others beta test them.

I thought about a traditional eyelet but slot shaped then realised it would buckle, a ring having much more strength. Perhaps a one piece moulding is the only way to create slot shaped eyelets. I may well go the traditional route next time round, just to compare.

The skates could look like a pair of turds (1), as long as they perform that’s what counts. I would want feedback from others before buying into them, although realistically it won’t be many years before my current skates wear out anyway. (1) I hope I don’t give Bauer ideas. It’s not meant literally. But the way the designs are going, you never know. Turdlite. It’s kinda catchy.

They’ve significantly changed the injected facing, compared to my 2s pros. The additional round holes at the top have gone, to be replaced with deep notches to improve (I assume) forward flex. The injected facing is fantastic as it locks the laces in place. Does injected facing have any disadvantages other than reduced durability?

I had pain on the outside of my big toes, and calluses formed. Two additional heat mouldings of my 2s Pro skates helped reduce the pain, and I wore silicone big toe sleeves for a few months. My feet aren’t wide, but the widest part is at the toe end ie flippers. It seems to rub where the toe cap joins the quarter package.

Then they have changed as I have custom 2s Pro with injected facings. I like injected facings a lot, but past feedback here generally is against it. The Bauer site allows you to select the eyelets, and it only gives standard. So I stand corrected.

I’ve only had them two and a half years including a year with 6+ months of closed rinks, and I only play rec, 3-4 hours a week, but they’re excellent, they should last many more years.

Bauer claim that the Supreme and Vapor custom skates suit different skating styles. The Supreme skate is stiffer, for power and stability, the Vapor is less stiff for agility and speed. If you look at the non custom, there are differences. Vapor has the injected facing, standard tendon guard and asymmetric toe cap, Supreme has standard facing, flex tendon guard and symmetric toe cap. Custom allows either to have the injected facing. I have the 2s Pro, I’ve not tried the Vapor 2x, so I can’t say if there is any real difference for a good but non high level skater. They are incredible skates simply because they are so comfortable, and the injected facing works well. I have no idea if they are too stiff for me. Someone recently asked if my laces were undone, they weren’t, as he said my ankles were flexing so much, so I think that’s a good sign that they allow good ankle motion. Note that CCM and True use one piece boots, I have no idea if that makes a noticeable difference. By all accounts True are the most thermoformable, Bauer the least, and CCM somewhere in between. It took a few months for my 2s Pros to break in, due to the toe area rubbing, but now they fit like gloves.

I have no idea, sorry. If it’s only a few bits, it’s probably insignificant but I really don’t have a clue.

I have the same stick, albeit an intermediate. A small 5mm grey ‘stone’ fell out of the end. If you imagine cutting a short of length from an extrusion with a triangular cross section, that’s what it looks like. I assume the blade is packed with ‘stuff’ to get the right response.

Anyone with any sense is picky about sharpening as there are so many poor sharpeners out there. That’s why I splurged out on a Sparx, worth every penny. I have top end skates, helmet and pads, but only because they provide more comfort and protection, and at my age that’s worth paying for. I have mid range inline skates, and after an hour my feet are hurting and I have to take a break. I’ve worn my top end ice skates for four hours with no discomfort.

Does anyone actually use that hollow? It’s one step up from the death grind. I was given two unused 5/16” Sparx wheels, I’m not tempted to try them.

The biggest problem with these machines is the cost of wheels, which eats into a shops profit. The first grind on new blades is horrendous, it eats up the diamond coated wheel. I know several shops that dropped automated machines in favour of a traditional Blackstone sharpener. I even got a bag of Sparx wheels from a shop that had sold their Sparx machine. The automated machines are useful if the shop does occasional sharpenings as there’s no need to train any of the staff to use a traditional unit. After all you might have a saturday staff member in once a week.And while the machine is working the staff can serve someone else. One local rink stopped their grinding service as their were too many complaints, and I heard there was legal action too, but that’s just a rumour. I have the original Sparx ES100, changing wheels is easy. It’s no harder than dressing the grinding wheel on a traditional machine. I bet the Fireball is expensive.

They have an informative video on YouTube:

For UK sales you have to include the cost shipping skates by air from Quebec, Canada or elsewhere in North America. Then you have the relative cost of labour, North America is a high wage area compared to China, or wherever stock skates are made. They will save some money by not having to store stock in warehouses, and not having to sell off excess stock at a potential loss when the new model is introduced. And they will not have to guess what quantity of each model and fit to make. They have almost implemented just in time (JIT) manufacturing. As far as I know there is only one shop in the UK that sells CCM custom skates, and I don’t know if there is any good reason for a non hot shot rec player to opt for CCM over Bauer and True when the journey to buy them is 250 miles each way.

Here in the UK there are two big retailers that I am aware of, one is huge and I think they carry stock for all Bauer skates. However, they are 250 miles away. The other, which is nearby, cannot afford to have each size and fit in the high end skates. I went custom, as I wasn’t prepared to buy skates without trying them on. I am told that they make more profit on lower end skates which just adds insult to injury as come the end of the season, they struggle to sell off excess high end stock before the new models come in. They love Bauer custom, and True custom, as they make profit without risk, and the customer is happy which is good for their reputation.