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Larry54

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Everything posted by Larry54

  1. Larry54
    My skates are going on 2 years now and I never had that problem. I used a shoehorn during the baking process as recommended, but never after that. I do unlace the top 3 eyelets and really loosen the laces before putting them on or taking them off. It just seems like common sense to me to do so on such a rigid form-fitting skate.
  2. Larry54
    No, that was for the whole skate with an LS2 holder but it was a size 6.
  3. Larry54
    I don't understand what you mean by "drill in the screws". The T-nuts are threaded for a specific machine screw. If they're 6-32 T-nuts, then a 6-32 machine screw will screw into it with your fingers without any effort. On the other hand, if you're trying to force a sheet metal screw into a T-nut, or a wrong thread machine screw into it, you're looking for problems.
  4. Larry54
    In hindsight, they would have been better off charging US customers in US dollars from the start 2 years ago when the dollars were at parity. Then they wouldn't have to give free shipping today to appease the disgruntled.
  5. Larry54
    When VH Hockey skates came out 2 years ago. the Canadian dollar reached 99.8 cents US, almost parity, so Americans are paying around the same now in US dollars as they were when the skates came out, but US shipping is now free. Canadians are also paying the same now as when the skates came out 2 years ago, but Canadians still pay shipping. So what the f*** is everyone crying about... that Canadians are not paying even more? It looks like VH is trying to give everyone an equal opportunity to buy their skates, as opposed to the perceived "price gouging" that the big hockey companies do to Canadians because the market can bear it.
  6. Larry54
    That's how hockey gear has been in Canada as long as I can remember. Even when the dollar was at parity, Canadians still payed over 20% more than Americans even for articles made in Canada. Just wait a bit and if you're lucky the US dollar will come back down, and you'll feel better about paying the same price you're paying now for VH skates.
  7. Larry54
    They have authorized dealers in Georgia, Colorado, and Michigan. They also have authorized dealers in Germany, Switzerland, and Japan. Authorized VH dealers Feel better now?
  8. Larry54
    I assume you're talking about "shimming" the insole? In my experience, that's never as effective as adding a shim between the holder and the boot, or changing the pitch of the blade. No matter what you do with the insole, the lean or angle of the ankle area of the boot doesn't change so you're lower leg stays at the same angle relative to the ice. But it's a cheap mod so you have nothing to lose in trying it.
  9. Larry54
    Post a clip. I'd love to hear/see it!
  10. Larry54
    Who makes real custom skates that need shims, for crying out loud?
  11. Larry54
    Especially if you're accustomed to ice hockey, you don't want to have that front wheel sticking out too far.
  12. Larry54
    I've used 6-32 T-Nuts of that type before and they're flatter than the bulges created by steel rivets so feeling them would not be a problem. And if you air out your skates after every use like you should, they'll still rust but not any quicker than steel rivets. And they're stronger than steel rivets. But still my first choice, like I showed in post #884, would be copper rivets which I doubt will loosen in my lifetime.
  13. Larry54
    Hmm... The first rivets to loosen on my skates were at the toe so it made more sense to me to change those to copper. The biggest reason for changing the rivets at the rear of the front tower was because I always feel the bump a steel rivet makes right under the joint of my big toe.
  14. Larry54
    After a year and a half, I noticed the front rivets were a bit loose. So I had this done recently. Supposedly steel rivets are needed to prevent a holder from moving laterally but I think this should be a good combination of steel and copper rivets. And the fact that some of the synthetic leather goes between the holder and the composite VH boot provides plenty of lateral grip between the boot and the front tower. Maybe the rivet system that started back when steel holders were attached to leather boots has become inadequate for today's composite soles and needs to be replaced by something better. On the other hand, I just had a look at a 50-year-old pair of Super Tacks that I have in my basement and it has 2 copper rivets at the toe!
  15. Larry54
    I've done it to mount Sprung chassis on 2009 RBK 5K skates because Sprung recommended doing it that way, and when winter came around I put the E-Pro ice holders back on also using this T-Nut method. I had to slightly enlarge the old rivet holes to take the 6-32 T-nuts. I've also mounted Sprungs on Flexlite18 skates with this method.
  16. Larry54
    But the VH toe caps are thick, hard and seem very tough to me... a lot tougher than Plastidip, anyway. After a season and a half, mine are in very good condition except for a few nicks and scratches that any other skate's toe cap would have. Anything that can barely damage VH toe caps will destroy a rubber coating like Plastidip. It's like asking Woody Allen to be Mike Tyson's bodyguard. I think you're over-thinking this, but if tinkering makes you happy, don't let me stop you.
  17. Larry54
    I would have made both screws the same but I'm a bit OCD with that kind of stuff. :) BTW, why cover the toe caps? Is it for the look or is there a practical reason?
  18. Larry54
    I've done this and have never lost a screw while skating. Mine are the socket head type for an Allen key so it's easier to really tighten compared to a Philips head type. Otherwise you can put blue loc-tite on the screw threads.
  19. Larry54
    At around 0:20 in this video, we see him actually making a pencil tracing of a foot mold of Blake Wheeler's foot. So I guess the process has been tuned to fabricating with tracings. Even if you sent him a foot mold, he would just make a tracing of it on paper. http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/winnipeg-jets-players-wearing-locally-made-hockey-skates-1.2558666
  20. Larry54
    You can use the pronged T-Nuts and cut off the prongs with wire snips. What little is left of the prongs will be just enough to grab onto the surface and prevent the T-Nut from turning while you're tightening the screw.
  21. Larry54
    I'd go with the first of those two because its smaller barrel diameter is barely bigger than a rivet diameter so it might fit into the old rivet hole. And you should look for truss head screws instead of pan head screws because the head diameter is bigger and you wouldn't need washers.
  22. Larry54
    I found that the VH insoles took up more volume in the forefoot than the SIDAS customs, but because of their spongey compressible nature my heel sat slightly lower on the VH insoles. When I traced my foot and measured the circumference of the forefoot I wasn't standing so the forefoot ended up being a bit too tight with the VH insoles. With the SIDAS I managed to get them to fit just right.
  23. Larry54
    Are you sure they're 8-32 and not 6-32. I've worked with 6-32 T-nuts and even those were slightly bigger than the old rivet holes. You might be able to force 6-32 t-nuts in without drilling if you're not afraid of cracking the outsole, but from my experience there's no way an 8-32 t-nut will fit in an old rivet hole without enlarging it. The 8-32 screw itself fits snugly in the hole, but not the t-nut. BTW 6-32 T-nuts are plenty solid. I measured a few things for reference: Rivet diameter 4mm. 6-32 T-nut barrel diameter 4.4mm. 8-32 screw diameter 4.1mm. I don't have any 8-32 T-nuts around to measure but they're obviously bigger than 6-32 T-nuts. Edit: 6-32 screw diameter 3.4mm. Seeing that the 6-32 T-nut barrel is 1mm larger than the 6-32 screw, I would estimate that the 8-32 T-nut barrel is also around 1mm larger or around 5.1mm.
  24. Larry54
    Caseyjones, did you align the chassis with the boot or with the outsole? The reason I ask is that sometimes the outsole is not perfectly centered on the boot so if you align the chassis with the outsole, it may be mis-aligned with respect to the boot. And did you mark the center of the ice holder on the boot before removing it to install the chassis? If the skate was okay with the ice holder, you could have used its centre line as a reference to install the chassis.
  25. Larry54
    Just put a strip of tape across the heel, let it stick out past the edge and fold it over into a tab like in this picture. Then you just pull on the tab to remove it from your skate.
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