8 replies to this topic

[Hockeyman90]

looking for ideas on how to do this. Due to recent higher than normal humidity in Northern California, my locker has stopped drying out my gear. I skate bare footed, and as you can imagine my wheels have become quite "ripe"... I'd hate to toss em, but the smell is something fierce... I'd love to hear any tricks you may have.

[rmacleod]

Try throwing in some bounce sheets. It used to work for my boxing gloves.

[BigCy76]

I always spray febreeze after every skate and let it air dry, never had a problem, I could eat ice cream off them if you asked me to.

 

You're barefoot, smell can be worse obviously, only advice I can give is exfoliate your feet as much as you can, the dead skin cells on your feet is what's causing the odor and febreeze after every skate, you should see a big difference

[kimchee411]

Wash them. First, remove insoles and laces. Fill your washer tub and stop it, put in a generous scoop of detergent, swish around and rub, soak for 30 mins or so, turn the washer dial to drain/spin cycle and turn it on again to drain, stop after it drains but before it starts to spin, fill up again with water only and stop, swish and rub to rinse, drain and repeat the process. After the 2nd time, use a towel to dry skates and blot the boot lining as best you can, then hang dry. I hang mine upside-down by putting the holders on doorknobs, takes a couple days to fully dry. Works great from experience. No amount of lysol, febreeze, sport spray, whatever could come close to just a plain wash. Water won't hurt your skates, they get wet everytime you use them. This is for a top loading washer. Don't know if/how it would work with a front loader, but you could use your bathtub or a big bucket instead.

[kimchee411]

Wash your laces and insoles too, obviously, but I think it's better to remove and wash them.

[mutiny14]

I used to skate bare foot but when I got new skates I told myself I would not ruin my skates like that again haha. I could never get rid of that odor. Maybe take them to a place that sanitizes gear.

[Ruimy71]

As rmacleod said, I'd give dryer sheets a go. Or maybe try airing em out outside. 

[Mapleleafs-13]

The best thing for skates is this tool:

 

 

https://www.maxxdry....oduct/MaxxDrySD

 

The concept for the product is it heats up air then the air travels up the tube and in your skates, it makes the moiture in your shoe/boot/skates dry out.

 

Every night when i get home i take all of my equipment out of my bag. Underarmour underwear goes into the wash, jerseys get hung up to dry, helmets/gloves/pants are also hung up to dry along with shins and elbows.

 

Lastly my skates get put onto this device and i plug it into the wall overnight. The temperature doesn't get super hot or anything but there's consistent amount of dry warm air passing through the skate which helps remove moisture. Unfortunately this device doesn't have an off/on switch but i can tell you i've forgotten about the item and left it on for 3-4 days on end and nothing ever happens except for my skate is super dry. It's only 12 watts or so as well so it's not wreaking havoc on the electricity bill. I've had my skates new since January and even till now you could stick your face in it and there's no real smell, i know cause i've done the test.

 

Bacteria needs moisture in order to live like almost any living organism, if it's dry then bacteria can't live and feed off of things and give off a bad smell.

 

They have other devices on the site as well that would probably make the skates dry faster, the one i listed is probably an overnight time for drying depending how soaked the item is that you put inside it. 

 

The best part is always having nice dry skates to play in. 

 

 

hope this helps.

 

I highly recommend this to anyone that plays hockey. 

[JhockeyM3]

I skate bare foot as well. I toss dryer sheets in mine that seems to help a lot. Before I started using the dryer sheets they smelt horrible. Now they don't smell to bad