Installation and Adjustment
Remove your old fin and clean any corrosion accumulations from your fin block. Slide your new WhisperFin into the loose clean fin block. Again, if you have to force this installation, the fin block is too tight.
Mount the fin as shown in the illustration above, with three index marks barely showing at the front and back of the fin. Keeping these index marks equal ensures the fin’s turbulators are ideally oriented for maximum acceleration. Move the fin back and forth by hand, adjusting all three set screws to limit the fin’s movement, until the measurement from the back of the fin to where the tail of the ski starts to curve upwards is as follows:
WhisperFin PRO: 1¾” (4.45 cm)
Original WhisperFin: 1⅞” (4.75 cm)
If you have a caliper, set the DFT to:
WhisperFin PRO: 1.830″ (46.5mm)
Original WhisperFin: 1.950″ (49.5mm).
Extreme precision isn’t necessary at this point.
Mount the wing using your current angle. You can download free wing-angle gauges at: Free Wing Angle Gauges
Leave your bindings where they are if you want quick tight-radius turns. Move them back ⅛” to ⅝” for even quicker turns. If the tail of your ski feels unsupportive or too slippery around turns, maybe with the occasional tail-slide or tip-grab, move your bindings forward to increase tail support. This binding move may seem counter-intuitive, but the further forward the bindings, the longer the ski’s tail. This means the tail will have both more surface area and the fin will be further away from the bindings giving it more leverage against smear.
Moving the bindings back and forth has very little effect on the ski’s tip behavior, but significantly affects smear at max lean angles around the ball. Moving the fin in and out of the ski (while keeping the front and back index marks the same) mostly affects smear at the very end of the turn as the ski rolls flatter out of turns. And of course there is overlap between the effects of these two adjustments.
If you’d like to learn more on fine-tuning your ski’s behavior with you bindings and WhisperFin, see: The WhisperFin Tuning Flowchart
Avoiding Set Screw Damage
Your WhisperFin is made from hardened aircraft aluminum, but it is no match for the sharp tips of the stainless steel set screws used in most fin blocks. Forcing a tight fin to move by cranking on the set screws will cut grooves into your fin, making precise adjustments impossible during future ski-tuning efforts. If you do damage your fin like this, you can rescue it by filing out the grooves.
To avoid doing this damage in the first place, always move the fin by hand when making adjustments. Loosen the clamping bolts, move the fin out of harm’s way by hand, and adjust the set screw(s). Then by hand, move the fin snugly up against all three set screws and tighten the fin clamping bolts to hold the fin in place.
If your fin can’t be easily moved by hand when it’s loose, refer to: Working with a Tight Fin