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dannyboy

Polishing your own runners?

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Hey guys,

So I've been skating on my fresh new Mako2s for a week or two now and am LOVING them, they remained a bit narrow but I gave them a second bake with a little padding around the wider part of my foot and they're absolutely perfect now :D  Thanks again to all who helped out with that decision!

I've been thinking (dangerous)... I've been looking at all this V-steel and black edge and whatnot... it all looks very interesting and while there isn't really anything wrong with my current ES4 stainless runners, it never hurts to play around does it?  :)  V-steel seems to get a pretty good rap so I was wondering, has anyone actually polished their own blades?  I have all the gear here to do full mirror polish, as I have a business with six utes and we polish all the visible aluminium tray parts to make em look schmick..

The *only* thing that worries me at all is that by doing this I would take a very small amount of material from either side effectively making the runner very slightly thinner... if I polished the entire blade (including the bit that goes into the holder) there's an unlikely chance that it could be enough to make it sit loose.  But it wouldn't be difficult at all to just polish the exposed part of the blade, so I really don't think that's worth worrying about.  EDIT: I've just pulled a runner out and looking at the way the runner clamps into the holder I don't think that will be a problem at all.

Anyone tried this?

Cheers

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Any skates with polished runners will look twice as awesome, but not sure if it worth any effort. I too doubt that you will be removing enough thickness to compromise mounting, but you will dull them up and they will need to be sharpened.

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5 hours ago, Kgbeast said:

Any skates with polished runners will look twice as awesome, but not sure if it worth any effort. I too doubt that you will be removing enough thickness to compromise mounting, but you will dull them up and they will need to be sharpened.

lol that's kind of what I was going for, at my level I don't really think the benefits of black edge or v-steel are going to be huge but they do look soooo bloody sexy

EDIT: after a bit of proper poking around it seems that the real difference in the Step/Black Edge etc is their claim of higher quality material rather than the actual polished finish..

They will look purdy though hah

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Of course the polished runners will make you skate super fast!

Also get yourself yellow laces - I hear they give you mad dangles - and tinted visors - guaranteed to make you score... both on and off the ice.

And don't forget the massive flop. Everyone knows the dude with the biggest flop is the alpha dog...

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14 minutes ago, GloriousLeader said:

Of course the polished runners will make you skate super fast!

Also get yourself yellow laces - I hear they give you mad dangles - and tinted visors - guaranteed to make you score... both on and off the ice.

And don't forget the massive flop. Everyone knows the dude with the biggest flop is the alpha dog...

You forgot to tuck your jersey left. How can you be the best without a left jersey tuck?

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28 minutes ago, GloriousLeader said:

And don't forget the massive flop. Everyone knows the dude with the biggest flop is the alpha dog...

That's what my girlfriend said, but I don't know if I believe her, especially when she was laughing and pointing. :(

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Any chance that there could be any coating on the steel to protect from weathering? 

 

The only other concern id have is heating the steel up too much from the polishing. But who knows, this could work. Knifemakers do it all the time so i dont see why it would destroy a pair of runners.

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2 hours ago, GloriousLeader said:

Of course the polished runners will make you skate super fast!

Also get yourself yellow laces - I hear they give you mad dangles - and tinted visors - guaranteed to make you score... both on and off the ice.

And don't forget the massive flop. Everyone knows the dude with the biggest flop is the alpha dog...

Get your hand off it.  Was just thinking about ways I might be able to somewhat mimic the little performance advantages that aftermarket runners like V-Steel claim to offer without spending 200 bucks.  Scuse me for trying to use my head and my machine shop to some advantage.

 

1 hour ago, lmooney19 said:

Any chance that there could be any coating on the steel to protect from weathering? 

 

The only other concern id have is heating the steel up too much from the polishing. But who knows, this could work. Knifemakers do it all the time so i dont see why it would destroy a pair of runners.

I wouldn't think so on stainless.  The first stage of polishing (with wet/dry sandpaper) doesn't create a lot of heat, the second stage does a bit but it wouldn't be any more than sharpening would.  Stainless is pretty tough so I'm not worried about that.

As mentioned above I was mainly looking at trying to replicate something like V-Steel at home using my original runners but it seems the polish on V-Steel is largely inconsequential, even Step seem to state there's little difference between their brushed and polished runners.  Bummer, it would have been a half hour job :rolleyes:

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20 hours ago, dannyboy said:

Get your hand off it.  Was just thinking about ways I might be able to somewhat mimic the little performance advantages that aftermarket runners like V-Steel claim to offer without spending 200 bucks.  Scuse me for trying to use my head and my machine shop to some advantage.

There are some hockey shops that can send your steel off to receive a DLC (diamond like coating) finish; like the black runners Step offers or on some CCM skates. I started looking into it as Step doesn't offer runners for the Edge holder because of the Bauer patent.

As far as actually polishing them, I don't know there is a real advantage to it. Maybe snow not sticking to your runners as much? Who really knows.  

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26 minutes ago, tpedersen3118 said:

There are some hockey shops that can send your steel off to receive a DLC (diamond like coating) finish; like the black runners Step offers or on some CCM skates. I started looking into it as Step doesn't offer runners for the Edge holder because of the Bauer patent.

As far as actually polishing them, I don't know there is a real advantage to it. Maybe snow not sticking to your runners as much? Who really knows.  

You can get Step for the Edge holders, you just have to go to Canada or have someone from Canada ship them to you. I have them on my X90's and they are nice :) I love the little extra height it gives you too over the LS2. I don't know if there's much of a difference in height over the LS4 though. The Blacksteel for the edge is about $120 USD.

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3 hours ago, darkhors said:

You can get Step for the Edge holders, you just have to go to Canada or have someone from Canada ship them to you. I have them on my X90's and they are nice :) I love the little extra height it gives you too over the LS2. I don't know if there's much of a difference in height over the LS4 though. The Blacksteel for the edge is about $120 USD.

I have the LS3 steel and do like the extra height, took a little getting used to but now I like it. Unfortunately, I don't think my wife would understand that I have to drive to Canada for some skate blades. She'd think I was bat sh*t crazy.

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1 hour ago, tpedersen3118 said:

I have the LS3 steel and do like the extra height, took a little getting used to but now I like it. Unfortunately, I don't think my wife would understand that I have to drive to Canada for some skate blades. She'd think I was bat sh*t crazy.

... let alone pay $120 for them once you get there :)..

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7 hours ago, darkhors said:

You can get Step for the Edge holders, you just have to go to Canada or have someone from Canada ship them to you. I have them on my X90's and they are nice :) I love the little extra height it gives you too over the LS2. I don't know if there's much of a difference in height over the LS4 though. The Blacksteel for the edge is about $120 USD.

Where'd you find the Blacksteel for the Edge?  I can't find a Canadian retailer anywhere.

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6 hours ago, Kgbeast said:

... let alone pay $120 for them once you get there :)..

 

$120 Canadian? That's not too bad. About the same price as LS4 runner.

 

I'm taking my son to play in Winnipeg in June. I'll have to check them out.

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4 hours ago, 218hockey said:

 

$120 Canadian? That's not too bad. About the same price as LS4 runner.

 

I'm taking my son to play in Winnipeg in June. I'll have to check them out.

No, $120 US

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2 hours ago, tpedersen3118 said:

No, $120 US

Remember the $120 is for the BlackSteel, not just the regular Step. I believe the V-Steel is about $95/$100. I figured that since I was going over there, I might as well make it worth it :) Syinx, I got them from Brian's Custom Pro Shop in Windsor (just across the tunnel from Detroit). 

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20 hours ago, tpedersen3118 said:

 

As far as actually polishing them, I don't know there is a real advantage to it. Maybe snow not sticking to your runners as much? Who really knows.  

I wish. I have the hyperglide blades and all I can ever see is a SHIT TON of snow on my blades. 

 

Way more then I ever saw on standard CCM steel.

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22 hours ago, HarpGuy said:

I wish. I have the hyperglide blades and all I can ever see is a SHIT TON of snow on my blades. 

 

Way more then I ever saw on standard CCM steel.

The more irregular a surface is, the easier it is to keep things from sticking.  A polished chef's knife is more likely to have pieces of tomato stick with each slice than a scalloped one!

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