The Kōm’s fishscale (no-wax) base works well for climbing moderate angles. Compared to XC ski no-wax bases it is quite aggressive and will climb well in most conditions. We still use climbing skins for steeper mountain touring, but the fishscale base remains incredibly useful for poking around (snow assessment) short climbs, or crossing flats or small climbs encountered on a run. Approaches to tours and ridge line traverses can often be done with just the fishscale base as well. You will find that they climb best in warm wet snows and are less effective in deep cold snows. The fishscale is least effective on really hard icy snow, as the scales cannot penetrate to gain traction.
Yes. Regular skins can be added to the Kōms just like a normal backcountry ski. The Kōms have a tail notch for the skin hook. We are also working on developing our own dedicated skin that will be available as an add on for the Kōms.
Yes, you can hot wax the tips and tails but do not hot wax the scales, as they will plug up with wax and lose effectiveness. We recommend a liquid or paste wax on the scales like Swix F4. This can be used on the whole ski and works well to eliminate snow sticking (clumping) when in transitional new snow right around or above freezing.
Wax the base occasionally (see waxing the Kōms) and clean snow off after use. Store in a dry place when not in regular use
Yes, but carefully. The Kōm has a wood core with fiberglass reinforcement but there is only a binding plate in the toe area of the 162 and 150. If you are doing really aggressive skiing we recommend Quiver Killers for added binding retention. (http://quiverkiller.com)
Our measurements are measured in s straight line from the tail to the “pin line”. This is the line where the pins (or imaginary pins) sit on a 75mm or 3 pin binding. This is a standard reference point used for nordic (XC) bindings.
Kōm is the name of one of the main mountain villages in the Chinese Altai. The locals have a KH sound we do not use in the west so it could be spelled Khom but for (relative) ease of pronunciation we simplified it to Kōm.
