La Sportiva Hi5 - Rider reviews, sizing

subpar? means below average; compared to what other paper jig on line? Just sayin'.

Compared to paper jigs for other types of bindings. Check out Look jigs at bindingfreedom.com. Soooo much better. However, those are probably copies of manufacturer releases, whereas the Wildsnow made their own jig and it's the only dynafit I've seen. So if we are just talking dynafit then linguistically you are correct.

[rant]
The bullseyes are visibly misaligned internally and the don't have any measurement ticks or centering lines. In the future I will simply use a the binding itself, a good engineering square/angle and a punch or scribe as my "template".
[/rant]

back on topic, I skied the Hi5s last night but the snow at Hyak was so abysmal that I learned nothing and have nothing to report. I will ski them a bunch this weekend though. I did notice going uphill that they are LIGHT.

Turned out between the inherent alignment issues of the dyna, Wildsnow's subpar paper jig (they could do better) and most importantly the curviness of the ski I had a tough time lining up everything straight because nothing on the ski is straight.  So take it to a shop with a real jig 

Come on. Ski touring is all about DIY.

I've had great results with Lou Dawson's template, though it does lack the perimeter lines that Jondrum's has. All you need to do is create an accurate center line on the ski (folded paper method works fine), print the template on clear acetate or mylar rather than opaque paper, and use something really sharp (like an icepick) to mark the holes initially.

FWIW, Jondrums (Binding Freedom) has both Vertical and Radical Dynafit templates on his site.

www.techinfo.bindingfreedom.com/Binding_Templates.html

(The circles on Wildsnow's template are off, but the crosshairs are right on)

re: The La Sportiva Hi-5, I (5'8" 165) demoed the 178 for a couple of runs at the Marmot event in January. The ski had a smooth, damp and luxurious feel to it, but felt slightly "tip heavy" and was sometimes hesitant to respond to turn input. Conditions ranged from hard groomed to frozen corn with a bit of fresh on top, I didn't get to ski it in 2 feet of fresh where I'm guessing it would shine.

Lou has changed the template for the Dynafits to accommodate the new hole pattern on the latest version of the toe piece. I had used the older version with great success, but had to modify this latest version. I sent him a note, and he was going to fix it, but was having problems with the program he was using to make the modification, but he could not have been more attentive. I suspect it's hard to make the adjustments, and as you know those bindings are very tricky to mount.

REVIEW
TLDR version:
Awesome, game-changing ski worth buying!

Bored at work version:
The idea of taking a stiff, slightly positive camber ski and adding a giant amount of rocker to the tip is a great idea. I've taken to calling it banana rocker when people ask about it, it is visually striking. That large shovel with a ton of rocker solves a large amount of problems in PNW conditions. When I demoed them at Vertfest in 18" fresh the tip (on the 88) allowed them to float much better than the "traditional" rocker of the G3 Tonics I also skied that had similar dimensions. On breakable foam crust high on the Muir snowfield the tip floated and initiated fine while most others suffered, and it helps the ski rise above spring glop. The <ahem> narrower (for me) 105 waist coupled with the thick center and positive camber gave good, secure bite on the steepest frozen terrain I could find in the Nisqually chutes area. The 178 felt neither too long nor too short for me, and at 7.5 lbs/pair plus some dyna-speeds, I went far higher on the mountain than I planned just because I had the unexpected energy to do so.

Downsides: The light weight compromises stability in ugly stuff, and increases vibration on ice. Having any binding besides dyna-speeds will reduce the foot zapping on loud refrozen stuff. These issues are irrelevant to the type or design of ski though.

Because the rocker is 400mm, the fore-aft balance moves backwards somewhat, giving a mounting point that has the front toe right about at the balance point of the ski. Having a heavier heel binding piece would help, but as it is my ski does not naturally pivot up while skinning. Would change the mount point for the world though, and the ski is light enough that I can kick it around on steep skin track turns.

The last, and my only substantial complaint, is that in certain types of refreezing or hard foam death crusts the tip will do fine but the tail will get stuck bad and railroad the outside ski. This is because the tail is entirely positive camber with a flat end and a rather large tail flare. I think the tail spade just gets caught under the layer and won't pop out. Most other people that aren't on a snowboard are having as bad or worse time in this stuff too though....I think a slightly pintailed, tail rockered design would prevent this. The Voile Vector is one of the few backcountry skis that has this design and is another great ski to look at (less tip rocker though and a different ski). In a perfect world I'd shave maybe 10 millimeters off the back tail flare. As it is I just detuned the offending ski edge when I waxed it. (unwaxed from factory).

Thanks Jonn-E, did you get the paired skins with them as well?