Knee Bindings

Saw this on SkiDivas site. Anyone have an opinion on these?

http://www.kneebinding.com/

Didn't Look try something like this in the early '80's-a vertical release toe. The heal has an uncanny resenblance to a Look heal

I assume it's a vertical release toe, the link doesn't show much.

Edited by Altaman - Tue, 03 Feb 09 23:59:11 GMT

I reviewed them positively here:

http://www.epicski.com/products/kneebinding-knee-friendly-binding/reviews#73

Quote:

Originally Posted by CHRISfromRI 

I reviewed them positively here:

 

http://www.epicski.com/products/kneebinding-knee-friendly-binding/reviews#73

 

I'm not sure, is that a joke

What, exactly, do they different than any othe binding

Quote:

Originally Posted by CHRISfromRI 

I reviewed them positively here:

 

http://www.epicski.com/products/kneebinding-knee-friendly-binding/reviews#73

 

Chris, could you please tell us what bindings you were using before and what settings you were using them at?  Thanks for the detailed review.

Altaman: These are the ONLY bindings available with Lateral Heel Release to protect your ACL from 70% of the situations where your ACL is at risk.

Garrett: I am using my 3 sets of Kneebindings on different skis at a DIN setting 6.5. I also have Looks and Markers set to 6.5 (Dynastar Contact 11 and 9, Nordica Hot Rod Top Fuel, K2 Apache Outlaw). I tore my ACL on Looks set to 6.5 (PX12 on the Omeglass Comp Slalom Race Skis). I am selecting "Type 2 skier" for a balance between retention and release, and have not had a problem with pre-release on any of the bindings (except Salomons which I haven't used this season and they tended to pre-release if I went 5 ski days without re-tightening their toe wings to my boots).

Altaman: Unfortunately, vertical toe release cannot reliably protect your ACL. For example, far more ACLs are torn playing soccer than skiing - in soccer your body weighted cleat traps your heel in place while your toe is perfectly free to go anyplace just before your ACL ruptures (there is absolutely no toepiece or toe retention device in the case of the cleat).

Confused about the vertical toe deal. I thought most modern setups had full vertical, with exception of Sollies. Am I wrong? Also think that while Chris is right about one kind of ACL, a vertical toe release is more relevant IMO  to slow twisting rearward falls that tear MCL's, or straight on tip rams into the backside of a bump that sends your lower body forward, but rotates your upper body backward. Which can also tear an ACL. 

Quote:

Originally Posted by beyond 

I thought most modern setups had full vertical, with exception of Sollies. Am I wrong?

A lot of performance oriented modern bindings do not have vertical release features.  Examples being Look 15 and up, Rossi of same, Atomic 614 and 1018, blah blah blah.

Thanks for the detailed info Chris.

Quote:

Originally Posted by beyond 

Confused about the vertical toe deal. I thought most modern setups had full vertical, with exception of Sollies. Am I wrong? Also think that while Chris is right about one kind of ACL, a vertical toe release is more relevant IMO  to slow twisting rearward falls that tear MCL's, or straight on tip rams into the backside of a bump that sends your lower body forward, but rotates your upper body backward. Which can also tear an ACL. 

Upward toe release won't help much in a 'phantom foot' fall, the leverage ratios and force vectors work against release. the lateral release of the kneebinding is new technology that may really help.

I just wish the little details like the brake mechanism and the teflon AFD's (4 per pair) were executed better.

Thank you for this information and the link to your review. These bindings are very interesting to me, having just experienced a bad knee injury.

My injury happened after a series of pre-releases, the last one on one foot followed by a not-soon-enough release on the other. So the fact that you have not experienced any pre-release on these bindings is encouraging.

Also, the lateral heel release feature just seems intuitively the right thing. I can still see my ski and foot stuck in one direction while the rest of me went in movie-style slow motion (perceptually anyhow) in the other. It's the stuff of bad dreams.

If these really work, it would seem that they will become the standard - or ought to.

How is this different than a turntable heal?

Altaman: The turntable heel that both Look and Marker had was simply an improved pivot point right under the heel that reduced friction and allowed the toe to release better laterally (I had the Marker Rotomat years ago). However, the heel cannot release laterally with a turntable heel because there are side lugs alongside the heel of the boot that trap the heel of the boot in place - but this was not the point of the turntable whose raison d'etre was to improve the reliability of the toepiece's lateral release.

One of the things that interested me in the Kneebinding was that there are two pivot points opposite the two lateral releases (heel and toe). The idea is to eliminate a blindspot that results from having only one vantage point, similar to having two rearview mirrors, etc. Check out the video info on www.kneebinding.com for more info. There are 3 releases: laterally out of the heel, plus laterally out of the toe and forward eject out of the heel. All modern bindings have lateral toe release and forward heel eject, but only this new binding has lateral heel release. There is some science that concludes that lateral heel release will greatly reduce the "Phantom Foot" type of ACL injury.

Chris, I just read your review and the comments you've made in this post.  I've looked at the Knee bindings website and I just don't believe it. 

I'm not trying to offend but what I'm seeing and hearing about this binding is quite frankly, nothing.  You talked about them releasing when you were in a collision and therefore they saved your knees. There is just no data, no testing that proves that this binding will protect a skier's knees.  Just because a marketing department for this company put out   I feel like your statements are just reiterations of the website.  Give us some specific proof that this design reduces ACL injuries

Skierhj: Only time will tell for sure - however, there are no negatives like pre-release - so the potential knee saving benefit comes without material negative effects. In the end, even if there is absolutely no statisical difference in incidences of knee injuries to users on these new bindings compared to those on the status quo traditional bindings, the only thing that the users on these new bindings will have sustained is some extra cost (spent while trying to better protect their knees). So, even if there is absolutely no improvement in knee safety all that is really lost is short money compared to the prospect of a grueling ACL reconstruction rehab and $20K in medical expenses. It sounds a little like an insurance policy to me, and having been there well worth the premium...

To be sure, I know from personal experience that the status quo in modern bindings were on my feet at a modest DIN setting when I tore my ACL, so the status quo isn't a great option for knee safety! Had I not been through this experience, and known the true downside of an ACL rupture, I might be a naysayer too and unwilling to adopt a new technology that has the prospect of possibly preventing a repeat of what I went through. OTOH, if you do your research you will see that there is actually science behind lateral heel release and it preventing a large percentage of ACL injuries, and my bet is on the science.

On the collision I was in, I don't believe I said what you said I said. I merely reported the facts: I was in a bad collision on steep terain and the bindings released, the brakes kept my skis nearby, and I did not sustain any knee injuries or bone fractures. I never said the collision I was in was knee-threatening, mainly because I don't even know what happened when I was knocked out. I was skiing just fine, initiating a new turn, and then someone was in my face asking if I was OK. Maybe these new bindings prevented an injury by releasing and maybe they didn't, I won't ever know. All I do know is that I was hit hard enough to knock me unconscious on steep terrain a couple of weeks ago. After shaking it off, I skied away from the collision and continued skiing that day. Today, all the bruises are gone and everything is fine - though I still have a chipped tooth.

Reality Check:

This system was first introed in the very early 80's under the name 'ESS'  It used a Look N-17 toe and the heelpiece that is basically as shown. The downfall at the time was that the lateral cam in the heel was calibrated too soft and inadvertant lateral release was common.

In the years that I worked with the Look factory in France there were some samples of this binding in the test battery. While the system does in fact release as claimed, the knee protection stats are inflated. The vast majority of knee injuries occur from a load that is unrelated to twist in any vector (OR) occur before the twist component develops.

A graphic example of this type of injury was the wildly successful Italian racer Deborah Compagnioni. She blew out her knee skiing SG on TV in either a WC or Olympics and never fell or even twisted. This is the Phantom foot injury that is the most common cause of severe sprains of knee ligaments. The knee binding would be irrelevant in this (and most similar) cases.

SJ

Sierra Jim: Interesting points, though they do not jive with the montreal research paper that's out on the web. BTW, I wonder which companies' products you Rep? 

FWIW, I was skiing on Lange WCFit 130 boots, Look PX12 Bindings on Dyanstar Omeglass Comp Slalom skis when I tore my ACL last year, so clearly the status quo is NOT working to prevent ACL injuries.

Yeah, realize that racers may need to stay in with serious upward loads at toe, also realize it's spread to freestyle/ride for similar reasons, was speaking of normal rec bindings in the 11-14 DIN range. But since you bring it up, I've have heard two versions of your statement from reliable sources: 1) "race/high DIN" bindings do not allow upward release, and 2) They do, but the spring is so heavy that it only works at very high loads.

Haven't taken anything apart, but the above 14 toes I have (several Look and Tyrolia 15's, one Tyrolia 17) look very similar to the 12-14's, just beefier and all metal. No evidence of a different design or missing bit. Do they just block the motion internally?  

Quote:

Originally Posted by CHRISfromRI 

 Today, all the bruises are gone and everything is fine - though I still have a chipped tooth.

Ski with a full face helmet.
 

It sucks that you tore your ACL. (I'm missing a few parts of my knees, know what rehabs like.) And I applaud your attempts to build a better binding. Very binding conscious myself, will be first in line if you pull off something better.

But it does not follow from your ACL injury, or the total number of ACL injuries, that existing bindings don't work to reduce risk. Or that they do. Your models/cited papers are interesting and worthwhile reading. But as you realize we do not know how to measure ACL risk from actual ski falls in the absence of other confounding variables like technique, terrain, ski shape/length and boot design, let alone anatomical variation in knees. Even cadavers don't really help except to elucidate the properties of the a comparatively few samples of ligaments under controlled kinds of loading. And does a particular fall on the slopes, say with the boot nailed to the ski, mimic those loads and angles and timing precisely? Or even vaguely? What about with a real binding?  

As you said when describing your fall when you were knocked out maybe they (your new bindings) did prevent injury , maybe they didn't. In my experience, my worst falls (worst impacts) were the knee friendliest. It's those slow twisters in soft snow, or the awkward recoveries from near falls that I fear.  

This is not to say we shouldn't try, nor that we won't eventually come up with a safer binding. Maybe you have. But IMO a lot of this isn't about bindings, it's about too many intermediates using skis and boots that allow higher forces than their technique can handle. Herd them all into ski school, in flexier boots and straighter skis, and you'll have a far bigger drop in ACL tears than any binding redesign.

PS - Sierra Jim's been a voice of sanity around here for a long time, he doesn't hawk his own stuff (well, at least until he announces his next line on sale; waiting Jim ), and uh, how does being a rep affect the quality of an argument?  

 It sounds like we need to wire ourselves up with sensors and a "black box".

IMHO, bindings, no matter how well conceived, will forever be limited in their ability to prevent injuries as long as they rely solely on mechanical processes.   The new age in skier safety will only arise when someone takes the leap to develop a binding that uses electronics to determine when a binding should release....similar to how high tecnology has made the modern hi-end automobile almost idiot and death proof.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Richie-Rich 

IMHO, bindings, no matter how well conceived, will forever be limited in their ability to prevent injuries as long as they rely solely on mechanical processes.   The new age in skier safety will only arise when someone takes the leap to develop a binding that uses electronics to determine when a binding should release....similar to how high tecnology has made the modern hi-end automobile almost idiot and death proof.

Unless you put a straingauge IN the knee, how will the binding know when to release?

Quote:

Originally Posted by epic 

Quote:

Originally Posted by Richie-Rich 

IMHO, bindings, no matter how well conceived, will forever be limited in their ability to prevent injuries as long as they rely solely on mechanical processes.   The new age in skier safety will only arise when someone takes the leap to develop a binding that uses electronics to determine when a binding should release....similar to how high technology has made the modern hi-end automobile almost idiot and death proof.

Unless you put a straingauge IN the knee, how will the binding know when to release?

Clearly that is the obstacle.   But put it this way, if they managed to figure out how to make an air bag explode in your face with enough force and velocity that it is effective without ripping your head off or being deployed while playing bumper cars in the supermarket parking lot, then I am fairly confident that if there was enough of a financial reward, they can figure out how to make a reliable electronic binding. 
 

Hmm. It does seem like slow, twisty falls (at least in my case) are more dangerous for the knee than fast, hard falls, which will generally release the current state of the art bindings as designed. but the same forces applied slowly don't always.

So, could an electronic sensor tell if the forces were increasing slowly and release at an earlier setting?

Even with the very little I know about sensors, accelerometers and the like, I can imagine the fundamental items needed to differentiate between a slow twisting fall and a high speed crash.  A dynamic binding, by way of electronics, would be the solution.  Think of speed dependent dynamic steering.  Steering gets tighter as the car speeds up but gets one-finger easy when you are parking.

btw - how much would the Uber binding cost? People are balking about spending $500 on the Knee Binding. 

FWIW, electronics are not a magic bullet.      Think of electronic implementation of engineering solutions as a programming language.        A tough algorithm is still a tough algorithm.

Being able to tell slow twisting falls from some people's skiing is a tough algorithm.

Quote:

Originally Posted by beyond 

It's those slow twisters in soft snow, or the awkward recoveries from near falls that I fear.   

+1

Quote:

Originally Posted by Whiteroom 

Quote:

Originally Posted by beyond 

Confused about the vertical toe deal. I thought most modern setups had full vertical, with exception of Sollies. Am I wrong? Also think that while Chris is right about one kind of ACL, a vertical toe release is more relevant IMO  to slow twisting rearward falls that tear MCL's, or straight on tip rams into the backside of a bump that sends your lower body forward, but rotates your upper body backward. Which can also tear an ACL. 

 

Upward toe release won't help much in a 'phantom foot' fall, the leverage ratios and force vectors work against release. the lateral release of the kneebinding is new technology that may really help.

 

I just wish the little details like the brake mechanism and the teflon AFD's (4 per pair) were executed better.

You nailed it Whiteroom.

I tested these bindings extensively during the last month or so. I found the interface between the binding and user in need of serious attention. I was losing one AFD per day of skiing. The factory quickly addressed the issue with a redesign on the heel and the new design has no AFD at the heel. However this introduces an entirely new problem in that if the heel now just has a plastic interface which was not in the original design, and is not smooth, will it still release as predictibly as the teflon AFD in the original design? Only time will tell.......

I was informed by the manufacturer that the toe AFD is more of a critical release issue. I eventually ended up losing a toe AFD and the factory said that there was nothing they could currently do with the design. It would be addressed in the future. They quickly replaced the toe AFD and entire toe plate, after hours. Their service was excellent and they seemed genuinely concerned about my experience. I went home and was able to peel up the new toe AFD with a short pull from a blunt fingernail. The AFD is an issue that needs attention. 

I pre-released once when I gained enough confidence in the binding to push them hard on my Mantras. My standard setting has been 8.5 for years and I run Marker Comp 14.0 on two sets of Mantras (184/177) and have never experienced a pre-release even during 10'- 20' drops off cornices. I've crashed and released (thank God, but never pre)

These replaced my Markers and the heels  were set at 9.0 The heel was the source of the pre-release and  I attempted to crank up the heel with a large 6" Stanley screw driver (It's a big screwdriver) in excellent condition to finish out the day......the heel adjustment screw is plastic and promptly stripped w/o moving and I could no longer make an adjustment. I've adjusted the Markers, Sollies, Freeflexes with out an issue in the dead of winter on other sets of skis.

For the price these bindings need to be bulletproof. They are not. I found them unreliable because if you travel with them and you have no extra toe AFD's in your pocket or in your car, you'll have to rent skis to finish out your day or possibly your trip. If you're hiking on a one way trip to the top of a cornice and happen to notice it gone.....you're hosed..........that is a MAJOR problem.......especially if you cannot get down via easier terrain.......

Knee binding is on the right track but need more R&D in the boot interface department...........