One piece of equipment I end up buying every year is the boots. After closing day at Snow Summit I've decided it's time to call it on my 08/09 Vans Hi-Standard Rasta snowboard boots.
Lifespan ≈ 80 Days
These boots saw their first day on hill on December 7th, 2008. I bought the boots to last me through my season in Colorado where I would say I saw about 20 days of riding a month until March where I got maybe 10. That works out to roughly 70 days plus another 10 or 12 from closing the season in Southern California. This makes a total of around 80 days... which is pretty much exactly the average lifespan of your common snowboard boot.
The Breakdown
The Vans Hi-Standard is what I would call a pricepoint boot; it's very basic, very affordable and very flexible. The flex became too much early on in the life of these boots, at least for me. The first thing to go on these boots was the liners. I would say I started to notice a lack of response right around mid-February or the beginning of March, so just around 60 days into the lifespan of the boots. As of closing day at Snow Summit the liners had pretty much no support left.
A lot of folks don't realize that boot liners are the silent killers. I wanted to draw attention to the fact that boot liners can die weeks before any physical wear and tear becomes visible.
The laces both popped (on two different trips) and added $5 for laces to the cost of my day. I'm not complaining, this shit happens, but this raised a conundrum of sorts for me: I was initially frustrated and ready to swear off laces altogether, then I realized how convenient is was for me to be able to just walk into the store and buy new laces. If I had boa or speed-zone lacing those days would have been very different stories... and yes boa and speed zone laces can break.
I've never had a quick-lace system before, and now I wonder; would it be worth it to move to Boa or other quick-lace system if it meant running the risk of blowing your entire day? Then again if you read on it looks like you run that risk either way... I guess it boils down to "shit breaks".
So broken laces don't justify retiring these boots, but while replacing the laces I noticed that the lace loops were just about snapped. Having a loop break on me midday riding isn't my idea of a good time, laces don't hold too well without lace loops.
There are a few scuffs and other physical signs of wear but the real killer for these boots, like most of my boots before it, is the liners. Maybe I'm spoiled, but I can't stand a boot with beat-ass liners... so this is the end of the line for my 08/09 Vans Hi-Standard Rasta Snowboard Boots.
R.I.P.
12/7/08 - 4/18/09
12/7/08 - 4/18/09
Your liner has that wear mark from the velcro, all the Vans this season did it and are warrantiable because that's a manufacturers defect. If you do go with a Boa generally they come with a replacement cable and tool that will fit in your wallet. I've broken 2 cables out of 6 pairs of boa boots. And that cable only snapped one of the micro strands so I was still able to ride. You'll notice the cables have wear on them before they ever break. Speed zone on the other hand you're fucked if it breaks, especially the burton one.
ReplyDeleteWARRANTY!! As in free stuff? Niiice.
ReplyDeleteThanks Avran, I knew you'd be able to shed light on the lace/quick-lace debacle.
So are speed zone laces just as likely to snap as their alternatives, or is the lack of support for that scenario because broken speed zone laces don't happen very often? I'm just wondering why lace boots come with extra laces, Boa boots come with an extra STEEL cable but with Speed Zone boots you are just fucked?
your not fucked if your break speed zone. i went through about 5 laces in my ions. they break alot, and it sucks, but there easy to fix. but waiting for new laces to be shipped in, is a bummer. duct tape comes in handy then
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