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shoot_the_goalie

Does taping the toe really protect the blade?

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44 minutes ago, shoot_the_goalie said:

I tape the toe of my blades, but they would still chip and crack, with regular use.  Does anybody find taping the toe prolong the life of the blade significantly?

Significantly?  No...not really.

For me, the primary benefit of taping the toe is that it gives just a bit of extra friction to assist with toe-drags and other stick-handling voodoo.  

If I'm being honest, I need all the help I can get in that arena....

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I would say yes, it helps.  I run a strip along the bottom, arround the toe and along the top.  Then tape all the way past the toe and cut off the excess.  I've never had any chipping of the toe using this method. 

I started taping that way when I was a kid using wood sticks.  I found it helped keep moisture out of the blade a little longer, so the blade would take a bit longer to go soft.

The strip along the top helps a little bit if you take draws or get slashed on the top of the blade a lot.

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That probably no significant problems but I always tape the toe because my OCD doesn't want to risk it chipping and I like how it looks/feels better taped to the toe.

My dad also doesn't tape to the toe and gets chips and can't figure out how to tape it to the toe the way I can do (which isn't hard) but hates my tape-jobs on the blade so he'll tape the blade all the way to the last couple of rows and will have me finish his tape job. Family finds it funny because he's been playing since he was 6 and was really good back in his day, but has his son finish his tape jobs haha. 

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38 minutes ago, boo10 said:

I would say yes, it helps.  I run a strip along the bottom, arround the toe and along the top.  Then tape all the way past the toe and cut off the excess.  I've never had any chipping of the toe using this method. 

I started taping that way when I was a kid using wood sticks.  I found it helped keep moisture out of the blade a little longer, so the blade would take a bit longer to go soft.

The strip along the top helps a little bit if you take draws or get slashed on the top of the blade a lot.

 

I do this too, and I find it definitely helps. My sticks rarely chip at the toe. And when they do, it's because I wasn't diligent in retaping once the tape wore away. 

I have sticks that are several years old and when I strip the tape, other than a few surface scuffs, the blade is almost new. 

I also run strips of tape up the shaft, top and bottom, to protect the slash zones.  

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Howdy,

I got sick of using scissors to cut the tape around the toe (yeah.  1st world problems...)

So I stopped doing that and now stop the tape maybe 1" or so back from the toe.

I have not noticed any difference in how long my sticks last, stickhandling, etc.

YMMV.

Mark

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there are some other variables. higher-end CCM/Reebok sticks I've used in the past, the toe would disintegrate if there was no tape on the toes. Sherwood and warrior sticks I've never had that problem (except for that time when they were made in vietnam), so i hardly tape the toe at all. 

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9 hours ago, boo10 said:

I run a strip along the bottom, arround the toe and along the top.  Then tape all the way past the toe and cut off the excess. 

Ditto. It helps tremendously by protecting the toe when you dig pucks off the boards and it extends the life of the tape job with that layer running under the bottom edge of the whole blade. Obviously, it's not going to add any protection from snapping, but it will definitely keep the blade from chipping and wearing down at the toe's front edge. I started doing that after destroying the edge of the toe on a brand new stick in 1 game and after I saw how some of the used pro-stock sticks I bought had apparently been taped by professional trainers.

Edited by YesLanges

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4 hours ago, start_today said:

Most importantly, it looks better to tape the toe. 

Funny how taping can be seen from a style perspective.  I never liked how it looked, probably because I grew up seeing guys tape just part of the blade.  I remember seeing pics of Bobby Orr (that was a little before my time but still) with like an inch or two of his blade taped.  Now I tape the whole thing because once I tried it with a P28 pattern I liked it from a performance perspective.

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