I have a pair of Atomics that I bought in 2000, and haven't skied them all that much, maybe a total of 12 days? Haven't had them in for tuning, either in that time. I live in Colorado and do most of my skiing here or in Oregon a few days, so never had to ski on ice like on the east coast.

Back when I used to ski a lot, I would take my skis in for base grinding every two years and I would sharpen/maintain skis myself. I had a device that allowed me to set the angles for sidecut and base edges, but it was made in the mid 80s, and has since broken.

Does anyone know of an edging device that I can buy that allows me to set the angles needed on shape skis these days? I am skiing on a pair of Atomic Betaride 9.22's. What angles are recommended for these all mountain skis?

I'm sure I'll get blasted by this but i've had little luck in the dc area getting folks to tune my skis to their original factoring settings which to me should be a no brainer. I have k2s and while i can't recall the bevel settings and all that sitting right here -- at one time i could and i even had the paper work to back it up. But take them to a ski shop and say "oh and make sure the bevel is set to X" and i have been stared at like i was talking in some alien tongue. I had one place tell them they didn't know if they could set the machine to do it and so forth...

anyway regardless of whether it makes any difference to the way I ski, i think at a bear minimum any shop should set the skis to the factory supplied default! Don't you?

But it gets worse: I called K2 and asked them, "please refer to me a shop in the DC area that will tune the ski to your specs." They said they had NO IDEA. this is just wrong!

But I rant -- and I did not answer your question. I'd probably go (if you can) to some reputable shop there (assuming you are there now and coming to DC?) and just have them set up to the factory defaults and sharpened -- you might leave the edges sharped out to the widest bit of the shovel and tail, some places will knock that off alot ... and i think that little bit of extra edge can be nicer on harder snow and package, glazed off services.

On the hand you might find it "hooky or grabby" which is 100% subjective. But the nice thing is you can always take your hooky and grabby skis and go to the resort ski shop and they'll knock it down a bit and not charge, whereas the opposite: sharping, will cost right?

Now as to the tool: I bought a "bevel" sharpening tool and frankly I didn't think it was terribly useful. Could be user error -- I still have it, I still bring it when I go on a trip... and from time to time I still rub the thing up and down my ski edges... But I think that justs makes me feel better. It's one of these from fk -- i have the "multi" but there are several. http://www.fktools-us.com/ NOTE: i had to buy several stones to go with it.

LOCAL to DC: I still think if you are HERE and you want good work done on your skis, the washington DC ski center is among the better.

Here's one online place to get tools: http://www.tognar.com/

Your SKIS setting: I don't know, did you try calling customer service or checking their website?

First, I don't ski Atomics so I want to be perfectly clear that this is second hand knowledge. I do tune my own skis and spend a lot of time on the Epic tuning forums. The Atomic skiers over there claim that all Atomics come from the factory with 1/3 edges (1 degree base, 3 degrees side).

As for multi-tools I started out using the Ski Visions Ski Sharp tool (here) with most of the stones available. It worked fine, but I wasn't able to do my tips and tails the way I like, so moved to a Beast Base Edge Guide and a Pro Edge Side Bevel guide. I think it really depends on personal preference.

Clay