It’s exciting to spend your winter holiday on the snowy mountain slopes. However, there are many chances that you may be heavily injured. So, remember to prepare everything carefully for this recreational activity.
How to Choose the Best Bindings for You?
Bindings are the linkers between your feet and your snowboard. Their task is to transfer energy from your body to the board.
If you are a beginner snowboarder, there are a few basic things you should know about bindings before buying a pair for your new snowboard.
Size
The perfect size of bindings is one that fits the size of both your boots and boards. Let’s simplify this rule a bit.
Take your boots size as the standard. First, get the best boots for you. Next, base on the size of the boots, pick the right size of the board and then the bindings. The board and bindings will inevitably fit each other. EASY!
Types
The two most popular types of bindings are Strap-In and Speed Entry (also called Rear Entry). Each is suitable for certain snowboarders and purposes.
- Strap-in Bindings: With this type of bindings, you are free to speedy take in and out of at any time whether you were on a flat surface or a steep slope. Also, strap-in bindings give correct pressure of the binding straps that separated on both toe and ankle.
- Speed Entry Bindings: The Speed Entry is a perfect choice for beginners as well as those who are in favor of groomers, skiers, and backcountry. This type of bindings allows you to strap when standing and rebind quickly. Besides, it’s also great for freestyle snowboarders with personal interests.
Flex
The perfect flex of your bindings highly depends on your level and riding style. You can also choose a flex of your interest, too. But if you are a beginner, we recommend you to select the medium-to-soft flex which is between 3 and 4 on the scale of 10.
Compatibility
Another thing you should consider when buying bindings is that they must be compatible with your snowboard. Because there are different kinds of binding mounting systems on snowboards, make sure that you choose the right bindings for it.
The 4 Hole mounting system is the most common one since it fits for most bindings on the market. And if you have a Burton snowboard, search for bindings that match a 3 Hole system or a Channel system. Or you can buy bindings with discs. These are compatible with both 3 and 4 hole systems.
Why Is It Important to Mount Bindings?
You may wonder what you will receive with a correct bindings setup. Check out this list of the most significant benefits when mounting bindings to your snowboard precisely:
- An exact foot placement at the front of your board
- A centered bindings placement over both sides of the board
- A perfect stance width
- Lower risk of injuring yourself
- And much more
So, never disregard even the smallest detail when placing bindings. Now we won’t make you wait longer. Here’s our complete guide to putting bindings on a snowboard quickly in only 5 steps.
Instruction
First of all, below are the equipment and tools needed for a binding installation:
- 1 snowboard
- 2 snowboard bindings
- Screws and washers
- 1 large Flat or Philips head screwdriver or 1 drill set
Now roll up your sleeves and start mounting your bindings.
Stance Direction
First of all, decide your riding direction to arrange the order of the bindings. There are two common types of stance direction: regular stance and goofy stance.
In a regular stance (left), your left foot is toward the front of the snowboard, which means that you should place the left binding at the front of the board. And if you prefer goofy (right), you will have your right foot at the nose of the board. Also, the right binding should be in front of the left binding.
But how to know whether you ride regular or goofy?
The easiest way to figure out your stance direction is to base on your dominant hand. Those who are right-handed tend to have a regular stance. Meanwhile, the left-handed people favor the goofy style.
Of course, there are cases that your dominant hand has nothing to deal with your stance direction. Just remember to choose the direction that you are most comfortable with.
A small trick to determine your favorite stance is to make a short run and then a long slide on the ground. The foot that takes the lead when sliding is also the one that stands at the front when snowboarding.
Binding Angles
The next thing to do is to set the angles of the bindings. You can easily find angle indicators on the disc or baseplate of most bindings on the market. Based on your ability and style, choose the angles that bring you the most comfort when riding.
For beginners, we recommend using an angle of 9 to 15 degrees for the front foot and zero degrees for the back foot. You can also shift the back foot a bit to 3 degrees if you like.
On the other hand, most intermediate and advanced riders prefer to have a larger angle of the back foot at about 6 to 12 degrees. But usually, the back foot never opens wider than the front foot.
If you are still unsure about the right binding angles for you, try every angle until you find the one that fits you best.
Stance Width
For the next step, measure your stance width and then set the right distance between the two bindings. This step is essential to have perfect turns and flexes in your snowboarding.
Your stance width can be determined as the width of your shoulders. However, our advice is to have the width of the bindings equal or slightly wider than your shoulders width.
Now that you had a perfect stance width for yourself, start deciding which holes on your board to put bindings on. If you have a relatively wide stance, it’s better to select the holes that are nearer to the nose and tail of the board. And if your shoulder is a bit narrow, you should choose holes at the closest position to the center.
Placement
The most crucial step when mounting bindings is to set them in the best position on the board. So, how to do it?
First of all, since you have known your riding direction, it’s time to distinguish which binding is the left and which is the right to put them in the correct order. You may think this is an obviousness but trust us, many have made this silly mistake over and over.
Next, you need to tell the nose from the tail of the snowboard. This is hard to identify as some boards don’t give you any clue. The best way to know is to look for the board on an online store where it’s shown vertically with the nose at the top and the tail at the bottom.
Images of snowboards displayed on the online market
And now is the hardest part: setting the bindings. Carefully put the bindings on your board based on every information collected (stance direction, binding angles, stance width).
You should have your bindings centered so that they are balanced on either side of the board. Otherwise, it would feel quite weird and challenging to ride, especially when you are new.
Usually, you can set up the binding discs in two different ways up. If one is unable to center the bindings, you can try the other.
We also have to mention that this centering is not compulsory. If it’s a powder day, you may prefer to have your bindings a bit backward so that you don’t need to lean back to make the board emerge on the surface.
Screwing
For the final step, in the screw holes of your snowboard, place the washers with the screws inside. Remember to match the screw holes with the slots of the binding discs. Then, use the head screwdriver to attach the screws into your board tightly. Make sure to fasten all the screws as tightly as possible if you don’t want re-tighten when you are on the mood of snowboarding.
What’s next?
Well, leave all your works behind, head for the mountain and have lots of joy with your newly set snowboard!
Tips and Warnings
Yeah, it’s still not the end of our guide. Here is our giant bonus for you: the useful tips and warnings when setting up your snowboard bindings.
Tips
- If you are new to snowboarding, it’s necessary to set the forward lean on the highback to avoid some common injuries with beginners.
- Your boots must fit your bindings. And bindings come in almost similar sizes. That’s also why we advised you to buy the boots first.
- No matter how tight you screw, the bindings will become loose after a time. Therefore, you will need to tighten them frequently. But if you don’t want to keep pausing your vacation for that, we recommend wrapping the screws with Teflon tape.
- It’s not very wise to have your bindings tightly attached in the first time. The best choice is to just slightly fasten the screws until everything is perfect for you. Well you know, almost nobody can succeed at the first try.
- When placing the bindings, you should measure the stance width from the center of one binding to the center of the other.
- Before getting in your car for the trip, remember to bring along a repair kit for your snowboard.
Warnings
- Please make sure that the binding discs are compatible with the screw holes on the snowboard. You won’t want to go the whole way and then stuck at the final step. So, ask the seller before deciding to buy the bindings.
- Some may try to use the glue to attach the screws permanently. But this is WRONG. If you do that, you will damage your snowboard. Also, you cannot change your bindings setup when you get to the next level or try other styles.
- And of course, DO NOT slide down the mountain with an incorrect bindings setup.
To Sum Up
And that’s all for our 5-step guide to put bindings on a snowboard accurately. Now you are ready to go.
After completing our guide and receiving a perfect binding-setup, don’t forget to like and share our article. And please feel free to ask us if you encounter any troubles with the bindings. We hope you have the best snowboarding experience with your mounted bindings!
