Roller skis I have known
Gary Jacobson
post yours, especially if your list adds to these.
Weird and esoteric earns you extra points. The winner will receive a box of
worn out wheels if you pay the postage.
Owned:
1.Moon "monsters":four wheels,large platform/frame with outrigger wheel.
2. Roleto touring, Roleto Racing
3. Excel Touring, Excel Racing (front wheel clutch)
4. Edsbyn 2 wheeler (forks would break every 10 km or so)
5. Jenex-first model- black I beam alum. shaft
6. Jenex 920, 920 k, 850, aero
7. Bont speed skate boot with racing 4 wheel frame with Jenex ultraslow
wheels.
8. Karhu skate. Talk about rough ride.
Used/tried/borrowed:
1. Moon/Reliable Racing wood shaft three wheeler.
2. Swedski single fork skate. c. 1985. wouldn't run straight.
3. two wheel "combi" Swedski. one mile long, heavy, gushy wheels.
4, Proski early two wheel classic, and urethene wheeled skate.
5. Start Skate with lock urethane wheels.
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Jay Tegeder
1) Exel-three wheelers-one in front-two in back side by side (early to mid
80s).
2) Swedski-basic classic model that was sold by Elpex up until a few seasons
ago (early to mid 80s).
3) Karhu-skating rollerskis-wicked fast and wicked control (late 80s)
10) Homemade model 1-extruded aluminum-inline skate wheels-wicked fast-didn't
track well at all! (80s).
11) Practically the ame as the above model with similar results (80s).
4) Start Combis-too fast, didn't work too well for classic but were rockets for
skating (late 80s to early 90s).
5) Marwe Skating-wide wheel model (early to mid 90s).
6) Marwe 610-big wheeled skating model-best ski I've owned (mid 90s to
present).
7) Elpex Classic-same as Swedski Classic-what goes around comes around (mid to
late 90s).
8) Elpex F-1-skating model-very similar to the Marwe 610 (mid 90s)
9) Marwe Classic-excellent classic rollerski-(late 90s to present).
Rollerskis I've been in possession of for various lengths of time;
1) Rolletto Classic three wheelers (I had possession of them in the early 90s).
2) Exel three wheelers even older than the ones I originally had (possession in
the early 90s).
3) Aasche Skating rollerskis (early 90s).
4) Ski Skett skating (early 90s).
5) Ski Skett combis (early 90s).
Rollerskis I've tried;
V-2
Proski Dual Technique
Swenor I think?
Jay Tegeder
"Stick around this sport long enough and you'll try every rollerski at least
once!" JT
Christian
1. Pro-Ski classic about 10 years ago.
2. Falcon skating ski about 12 years ago. (Short with barrel type wheels.)
3. Royal skating ski from Sweden. These were blue and almost killed me and
a few others on the NMU ski team in the early 90's. The flimsy fork would
break in mid-stride.
4. Bill Boards. Made by a former U.S. Ski Team member from Alaska, they
were very interesting. (Didn't own, but used)
5. Now I use Marwe 610 skating and Marwe classic. Both with Pro-Ski speed
reducers mounted on them. (Works great.)
--
Christian Byar
Control Engineer
Elk Rapids Engineering
sknyski
one mentioned the Road Ski that we used to buy from Akers in
Maine. I believe that you can still get them. Wood shaft,
heavy as hell, and a wonderful ker-chuck sound with each
stride. Added bonus - unsealed bearings, which meant that the
front wheels would freeze up without warning if you got caught
out in the rain. Face, meet pavement!
bt
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J. Hart
mentioned by either Gary or Jay. But I have one new type at the
end of my list.
Swenor Road Skis (circa 1986) with front wheels that you could
adjust the resistance by a lever near the bearings. Heavy and
mushy wheels in retrospect and wooden shafts which I broke a few
times, but I loved them at the time.
Karhu Nordic Skate (circa 1988) light and almost as fast as
rollerblades.
V2 (Jenex) 910/920 (circa 1997). A nice pair of roller skis.
The wheels wear out relatively fast if used for skating and the
wheels are not cheap, but great roller skis for double poling
and some people like them for classical roller skiing.
Nordic Rollers (2000). Plastic shafts (which seem
indestructible) with black rubber wheels or red urethane (?)
wheels. The red wheels are fast, the black wheels are maybe
slightly faster than V2 920 wheels. One red and one black wheel
on each roller ski makes for a nice combination for a relatively
easy ‘over-distance’ skate workout. Having two red wheels on
each ski makes for a fast ski and really only usable for a
vertical (up) race, such as the Mt Greylock Roller Ski Race .
In the past few months I have blown out (not worn-out) two red
wheels. This is probably not a common occurrence since others
have used the red wheels for up to a year without a problem. In
addition, the retailer is sending me replacement wheels at no
cost. Maybe I need to lose some weight. However, wheel wear
seems to be much less than on V2’s and since the wheels are a
bit wider, they ride over bumps and cracks that might cause
problems with narrower V2 wheels.
In summary, I see myself sticking with my V2’s and my relatively
new Nordic Rollers.
Hey Gary, didn’t I see you almost doing Mach1 downhill while
testing out a pair of Nordic Rollers with two red wheels???
John
Gary Jacobson
>Hey Gary, didn't I see you almost doing Mach 1 downhill while
>testing out a pair of Nordic Rollers with two red wheels???
I thought I was dreaming then- in the midst of a nightmare.
---
Jay T.- Could you say something about the roller ski you used that had two
of the letter "a"'s in it's name?
And Billy Boards- weren't they asymmetrical skatebordlike things?
Anyone seeing the new urban phenom. of a cast aluminum scooter that is a
skate roller ski with a folding handle stalk? Saw them first used by
employees in Helsinki Airport. Now they are all over New York City.
Timo Salmi
Gary Jacobson <skatek...@hotmail.com> wrote:
:Anyone seeing the new urban phenom. of a cast aluminum scooter that is a
:skate roller ski with a folding handle stalk? Saw them first used by
:employees in Helsinki Airport. Now they are all over New York City.
Gary, I have to check, if I visit there in the near future, but I am
not completely sure if they (the airport personnel's) are quite the
same. At least, the janitors of some of our universities with long
corridors use comparable contraptions, and they most certainly are
different. Much more sturdy and with considerably bigger wheels.
Anyway, I just digged up from my old newspapers' pile a local mall's
ad brochure. It calls the new device "Super kickboards" (a
misnomer?). The price there seems to be 99 Euros. They are all over
Helsinki, too. The wheels are dangerously small, and in recently
riding my bike around I have already observed more than one fall.
All the best, Timo
--
Prof. Timo Salmi ftp & http://garbo.uwasa.fi/ archives 193.166.120.5
Department of Accounting and Business Finance ; University of Vaasa
mailto:t...@uwasa.fi <http://www.uwasa.fi/~ts/> ; FIN-65101, Finland
Cross-country skiing page: http://www.uwasa.fi/~ts/info/timoski.html
erik brooks
> skate roller ski with a folding handle stalk? Saw them first used by
> employees in Helsinki Airport. Now they are all over New York City.
Yah, my wife bought 2 of 'em a couple of days ago. Kinda fun. She got them
for the kids. I don't see myself doing much with them personally, other
than
doing with the kids.
Interestingly, we had a dinner guest the next night. She is an English
lady,
about 65 years old, and very full of life. When she saw these, she was
eager
to try it, and did. Then she heard that we also have roller blades, and she
asked
if she could try those, so we did a hour outing at a nearby tennis courts.
She
never quite let go of the fence, but she did a few laps, and we called it a
success.
I wish more of us had her kind of "I'll try anything" spirit, and I hope I
can
still have myself when I reach that age.
Erik Brooks, Seattle
Jay Tegeder
made out of hard plastic. One of the fenders cracked off when I bumped into
something. Anyway, I got them from John Underwood when he worked at Reliable
Racing. He told me to take them for a few months and test them out.
Regardless, the speed was pretty slow so I had to use them when I skied by
myself. As for the cracked fender, Underwood said that was a problem with that
brand of ski. Someone might be able to correct me but I believe the Aasche
rollerskis were made in France.
I'll drop a note on the Bill Boards; They were made by former U.S. Ski Team
member Bill Spencer. He was a pretty decent skier in the 80s but never had the
success of Dan Simineau (sp), Audun Endestad, Bill Koch, Tim Caldwell, Kevin
Brochman or Todd Boonstra. As for the rollerskis, they were rockets, much
faster than the models of today as I recall. They were a decent ski though and
a few people in the Twin Cities had them.
Jay Tegeder
"Stick around this sport long enough and you'll beat everyone at least once!
JT
Gary Jacobson wrote:
> John Hart wrote:
>
> >Hey Gary, didn't I see you almost doing Mach 1 downhill while
> >testing out a pair of Nordic Rollers with two red wheels???
>
> I thought I was dreaming then- in the midst of a nightmare.
> ---
> Jay T.- Could you say something about the roller ski you used that had two
> of the letter "a"'s in it's name?
>
> And Billy Boards- weren't they asymmetrical skatebordlike things?
>
> Anyone seeing the new urban phenom. of a cast aluminum scooter that is a
> skate roller ski with a folding handle stalk? Saw them first used by
> employees in Helsinki Airport. Now they are all over New York City.
MikeR
"erik brooks" <er...@wolfenet.com> wrote in message
news:002501bffea4$ae47dca0$ab369fce@erikb...
> > Anyone seeing the new urban phenom. of a cast aluminum scooter that is a
> > skate roller ski with a folding handle stalk? Saw them first used by
> > employees in Helsinki Airport. Now they are all over New York City.
>
them
> for the kids.
Are we talking about the same thing here. Toy shops sell an aluminium micro
scooter for children.
The big boys ride a 'scooter' with two wheels up front plus a brake and
steering tube which they treat like a skateboard.
Try www.k2skates.com for this one
mnadell
they worked.
2) "Roleto Touring" Gold model three wheeler. The classic workhorse roller
ski of its day.
3) "Roleto Racing" Blue model. Used just a bit for the occasional roller ski
race we had back then. Rocket ships.
4) "Edsbyn" Wood 3-wheeler. A very heavy, but solid ski I used for quite a
while.
5) "Edsbyn" Metal 3-wheeler. I didn't find them to be as nice as the wood
ones.
6) "Edsbyn" Metal 2-wheeler. Didn't have these very long.
7) "Swed-Ski" 2 Wheeler. These were assymetrical skaters. I got rid of them
when the tiny little "pin" that held the wheel on flipped off on a steep
downhill. That was sure exciting!
8) "Karhu" Metal Skaters. These had rollerblade wheels kinda "glued
together". They made my teeth chatter.
9) "BillBoards". Bill Spencer sold three different sets of wheels for these.
I didn't find the slowest ones to be too fast, as someone else mentioned
here. I did find that they were incredibly "heat" sensitive. When the
temperature was warm, they rolled smooth. When it was a cold autumn morning,
those things felt like they had the wrong klister on.
10) "Pro Ski" RoadSkater
11) "Pro Ski" C3. Currently my classic pair
12) Marwe 610. Currently my skating pair.
I'm sure I'm leaving out one or two types of skis in the 25 years of
rolling, but if I did, there's probably a good reason for it (and a few
scars as well.).
Mark
sknyski
mechanical failures (any even better, the result). Every ski
had its own "character". Here's mine.
* Road Ski - I mentioned before the open bearing that had a
tendency to freeze up if you got caught in the rain. Bad news -
you're on your face. Good news - my dad would sand down the
axle a bit and they were ready to go again!
* Roleto Golds - I cracked a shaft in half once, which led to a
loooog "scoot" home. There's really nothing you can do with 2
roller ski halves. Also, the bearings in these things tended to
go after a while, which made a nice clicking sound and simulated
skiing on VF20 on a sunny Sierra Saturday afternoon. One good
thing was that you could pry the tires off and use them again if
the bearings went. The tires were actually made by Continental!
* V2 930s - on a long ski up a local hill, I noticed an
increasingly loud rattling sound each time I kicked. It turned
out that the holes in the shaft that the rivets go through had
worn so much that the plastic housing was flapping on the
shaft. Funny thing was that it happened to both skis at the
same time. No physical damage here - the real pain came when I
tried to get one of those midwestern mail order places to send
me a new pair in anything less than 3 weeks.
* Proski Roadskaters (or something like that) - This didn't
happen to me, but a buddy last weekend. He's skiing along
behind me and *blam* - yard sale. I thought that he had lost a
rear wheel, but it turned out that the fork had broken off not
one, but BOTH skis. Eerie. Now he's in three-week waiting
mode. Friend: "the forks broke off both my skis". Mail Order
Place: "were you hurt?" Friend: "no, the pavement broke my
fall".
Well, we've shown by this thread that we all have entirely too
much time on our hands (and in my case, a chip on my shoulder).
But it's been fun.
bt
Gary Jacobson
known. He also points for wierd and esoteric.
Congratulations Mark, just send me $20.00 for shipping and you can collect
your prize of a box of worn out roller ski wheels.;)
________________________________________________________________________
Gary Jacobson
>: Sun, 06 Aug 2000 13:29:13 -0700
>
>How about changing directions a bit. List your best rollerski
>mechanical failures (any even better, the result). Every ski
>had its own "character".
I have had few mechanical failures. Among them was a broken fork leg on a
Jenex Terra ski. (Forgot to include them on my original list of skis owned.)
That lead to a modified hop/skoot
bailout.
As mentioned earlier I used to regularly bend and ultimately break the
extruded al. forks of my Edsbyn two wheelers. The correction for that, and
for off kilter Roletos was banging the wheel on pavement to adjust the
alignment. Anywhere within 1/4 inch would be close enough.;)
The most common mishap is not related to mechanical failure, but to a stone
lodged between the fork and wheel. The bail out for that frightening scene
is keeping that stopped wheel from touching the ground, and trying to roll/
hop to a stop using the oher still rolling wheels on both skis. Always
interesting and impressive to pull it off without crashing.
Another ski to add to my collection that I don't think has been
mentioned was an abomination made by Roleto who used their thin
shaft and mounting two amazingly gushy and heavy beer barrel shaped wheel to
each end. This must be c. 1983 as skating was about to filter down the
ranks.
Talk about time on my hands- I am about to vacation with a bunch of equally
enthusiastic skiers, for two weeks where there are endless miles of bike
paths. First two week do nothing vacation ever. By the time I get home the
list serve should be in full swing with a lot of important and useful
information being posted. I guess I'll mostly be reading then!
Rob Bradlee
various pro-ski, and almost every model of Jenex V2.
My only two rare models that I haven't seen mentioned are:
1) Bergen 3 wheelers. Used these around 1972 to 1975 on my high school
team. They were very stable, but the shaft was high off the road and they
were fast. In those days we rolled in our cotton sweat pants (lycra was
only in ladies girdles) and mine developed many holes from crashes. We also
raced in these in the winter and those holes let in a lot of cold air!
2) Formo 3 wheelers. Named after a great Norwegian skier (Jay T. can you
give the history?). They included a speed reducer that worked very
similarly to the Jenex ones, except that it fell apart quite quickly. The
wheels were plastic with rubber tires. I once skated around a corner in a
rollerski race and the outside rear wheel broke off and when flying off into
the bushes. I quickly followed.
Rob Bradlee
Terje Mathisen
> 2) Formo 3 wheelers. Named after a great Norwegian skier (Jay T. can you
> give the history?). They included a speed reducer that worked very
Ivar Formo was great skier and good allround athlete, he is one of the
few recipients of the 'Egebergs Ærespris', an award only given to
athletes that have been worldclass in multiple sports.
Today, the rule is that you have to be world class in your primary
sport, and national championship level in another, totally unrelated
sport. It used to be that these should be one summer and one winter
sport, but I don't know it that is still a requirement.
Anyway, this award is the most prestigious in Norway, partly because it
isn't presented every year, only when someone really deserves it.
Terje
PS. I believe Ivar Formo's other sport might have been running?
--
- <Terje.M...@hda.hydro.com>
Using self-discipline, see http://www.eiffel.com/discipline
"almost all programming can be viewed as an exercise in caching"
Gary Jacobson
>To: <skatek...@hotmail.com>
>Subject: Re: Roller skis I have known
>
>Thanks for the plug, Gary. What kind of wheels?
>
>Have fun on your vacation.
>
>Mark
>
>
> >>>>It is clear this reader offered the most complete list of roller skis
>he has
>
>Congratulations Mark, just send me $20.00 for shipping and you can collect
>your prize of a box of worn out roller ski wheels.;)<<<
Looks like Rob Bradley dove headfirst over the finnish line just as your
first place effort was becoming apparent. I have to withdraw my offer,
unless of course Rob will pay the shipping for you to receive the wheels.
That, I suppose would be in the tradition of world class athletics, but
don't count on it. He may be fearful that you would take it as a slight.
Tough to be nice these days.
What kind of wheels?
Really it is hard to tell. Most of them are so peculiar in shape that it
would take a Norwegian forensic scientist, or neohistoric archaeologist to
figure it out. All I know is that I use jenex wheels until the speed reducer
doesn't engage
at all. I'd use roleto tires until I wore down to the plastic hub.
Take Care and be safe out there ya'll.
Jay Tegeder
1976) until the rise of the Ulvang-Daehlie-Alsgaard era. He was on some great
teams with Magne Myrmo, Pal Tyldum and Oddvar Braa.
Anyway, I think I forgot to mention the Edsbyn rollerskis I had in my possession
when I was President of the Minneapolis Ski Club. They were way out of date by
that time though. That's when I had the Rolettos too.
Speaking of mechanical problems, the wheels on my old Karhu rollerskis used to
literally melt down when the temperature got into the 80s Farenheit. Also, does
anyone remember the Swedski 2000s? The wheel slid onto the ski from the side. In
other words, the ski frame only covered one side of the ski where the wheel was
attached. A guy named Kent Green, who many in the Twin Cities will recognize had
a pair. He was a top 5 local skier at one time beating a few Olympians in his
day. Anyway, he wore his wheels down very evenly (good technique) to the point
where there was maybe a milimeter or two of rubber. He doesn't ski a lot these
days but usually shows up for a few races.
Gary, am I getting closer to the box of parts?
Jay Tegeder
"Stick around this sport long enough and you'll beat everyone at least once!" JT
Rob Bradlee wrote:
sknyski
to have luge races on them down the hill by my grandparents
house. You held onto the metal clamp on the rotefella 75mm 3-
pins that were mounted on them. All right, enough reminiscing...
Chris Esposito
>
> John Hart wrote:
>
> >Hey Gary, didn't I see you almost doing Mach 1 downhill while
> >testing out a pair of Nordic Rollers with two red wheels???
>
> I thought I was dreaming then- in the midst of a nightmare.
> ---
> Jay T.- Could you say something about the roller ski you used that had two
> of the letter "a"'s in it's name?
>
> And Billy Boards- weren't they asymmetrical skatebordlike things?
>
> skate roller ski with a folding handle stalk? Saw them first used by
> employees in Helsinki Airport. Now they are all over New York City.
> Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com
They appear to be selling very well here in the Seattle area, and it
appears to have taken the stores that sell them a bit by surprise. I was
at the downtown REI flagship store yesterday and the fellow I talked
with said that they have quickly sold out of several models (costing
between $130 and $300) and are having great difficulty getting more in.
They were out of the $130 model I wanted, so I went to a bike store in
Redmond near where I work and got a similar story. The owner was
initially skeptical about selling these things to adults but no more,
since he is almost sold out. My company has a couple of buildings
separated by a 10-12 minute walk, and parking is a real hassle at one of
them, so several people here use the scooters for a 4-minute commute
between these buildings.
Chris
--
Chris Esposito, Ph.D. Senior Software Engineer
TeraBeam Networks chris.e...@terabeam.com
14833 NE 87th St, Bldg C 425-376-1557
Redmond, WA 98052
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xctruckee
3-Wheel Carbon-shaft skis. I used these for years for classic (they were
awful for skating). Light, responsive, straight-tracking. I might still be
using these if I hadn't run out of wheels.
Gary, does this put me back in the running? I was really looking forward to
those wheel parts.
Mark
Jay Tegeder
ramblings...More information than you need to know!
Sepp Candinas (sp), a Madison, Wisconsin ski shop owner ( Sepp Sports) who
brought in the Roletto rollerskis from Switzerland. He's a Swiss native who
loves to classic ski according to "Big Bill" Stuber. Stuber is a good friend of
Sepps and has known him a long time. He told me how Sepp used to run a
rollerski race tour across the Midwest back in the 80s. He even had his own
rollerski brand called "Sepp Skis." However, I think the races were done on
Rolettos. Back then, a lot of the best skiers in the country would show up for
the races. Anyway, Stuber has gone to Switzerland a few times in the Summer
with Sepp to install carpeting (Stuber used to work in the business). They
would install the carpeting at some of Sepps properties there and then go
skiing a few days on the local glaciers. For the past few years, Stuber has
worked with Sepp's kid making Swiss chocolate in Madison, Wisconsin. BTW, the
chocolate is fantastic!
Jay Tegeder
"Stick around this sport long enough and you'll beat everyone at least once!"
JT
Bill Stuber
Marwe/610
V2/920
Mitch Rocket/two wheel
Made by the famous Mitch Toumi og stainless steel shafts
with roller blade wheels. These are very fast and seem
industructable.
Swiss-Roller/Wisel Kalin
Made by Swill Alios Kalin and Sepp Candinas (Sepp Sport
of Madison). Light weight shaft with very soft fat wheels
that did not wear well. Speed was slow. One nice thing
about these skies was the ability to be used on limestone
trails like the Sugar river trail in southern Wisconsin.
R S Sport Graphite/three wheel
These were/are a extremely soft (shaft flexed)classic ski.
Just very nice. Again Sepp designed these and had them
manufactured. At this time replacement wheels are a
problem.
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