after six years of hard use, the binding on my snowshoes finally gave out. basically the metal teeth of the snowshoe where the ring of the binding was attached to broke. has anyone attempted to weld it back? would welding work on aluminum? i was at the mechanic getting my muffler welded back to the truck and thought about asking him about the snowshoes but didn't want to look ridiculous.

Hey Kevin, welding aluminum is possible but tends to take more skill/experience than steel. I'm having a hard time picturing the exact piece you're talking about, but if its a thin piece, it could get pretty ugly, tough to weld.

Is this broken piece not replaceable?

I know some of the metal pieces on my snowshoes (MSR Denali) would require replacing a few rivets, but that would probably be easier than welding.

Show us a picture (or 2) of the broken part?

It's amazing what you can do with a small metal plate, rivets or screws, and urethane glue.

But don't you just want to use that REI coupon on some new MSRs with heel lifts?

Chances are it is under warranty. If you attempt to weld it, it will probably void the warranty. MSR warranty policy:

http://cascadedesigns.com/Service/Warranty-and-Repair

If its MSR then talk to them first, they might replace it for free, had all good experiences with them. After you do that, use this as the opportunity to get off the slowshoes and onto some sort of skins (AT, splitboard, approach). You'll never look back--except at your friends on slowshoes as you break trail way ahead of them--after getting on skins, and that's the just the up track, taking 1 hour to go down what takes 5 in snowshoes is epic.

Kevin,

I broke a pair of MSRs exactly like you described. MSR was willing to replace the part if it was less than five years old (which they weren't). There's some sort of code on the plastic part that they can decipher the age of your snowshoes from, if you don't know for sure. The replacement part was around $25 as I recall.

Do we know he has MSRs? Most MSR snow shoes have steel crampons.

I recently broke a binding on a pair of 8 year old MSR denali ascent's: the metal actually fatigued and broke. I called up MSR expecting to pay $20 for a new binding, but they sent me a pair for free. A couple years ago I broke a few rivets on some MSR lightning ascent bindings. Again, they sent me a replacement pair gratis. Well, almost free .. I had to package up the old bindings and send those back to MSR in Seattle.

No welding is needed to replace the bindings, just a pair of pliers and a screwdriver to change out the clevis pins. Love MSR's customer service

Once again, he never mentioned he had MSR snowshoes; but if does have MSRs, let's clear up a point about aluminum vs. steel. I haven't seen every model of MSR snowshoes, but the two I have available do not have any moving hinge part in aluminum.

Here's the "older" style on the plastic MSR shoes:


And here's the "newer" style:

The outside frame is made of Al, but the hinge support crosspiece is steel.

i have the MSR Denali classic. per your picture, the vertical piece broke at the ring. so i guess it is steel.