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Flow NX2 Carbon 2022-2023 Snowboard Bindings Review

Tested and selected for our top 100 snowboard products of the year: the Flow NX2 Carbon

  • Price: £399 / €430 / $430
  • Sizes: M, L, XL
  • Flex: 10/10
  • Entry System: Rear Entry

Why We Chose The Flow NX2 Carbon: It gives aggressive freeriders a whole new option when it comes to stiff, responsive bindings – with the added benefit of speed entry.

To paraphrase Baz Luhrmann, there are certain inalienable truths. Prices will rise, politicians will philander, you too will get old… and carbon makes everything cooler. In fact the responsive benefits of carbon have been proved by scientists, whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience.

“Flow’s new flagship takes a tried and trusted design and cranks up the response level to 11”

With that in mind, witness the Flow NX2 Carbon. It’s a brand new model from the original speed entry experts that builds on the successful NX2 by adding a bunch of plastic. Nah, just kidding. Carbon. And yes, prices will rise…

Who Is The Flow NX2 Carbon For?

Riders in a hurry. They wanna go fast. Like, really fast. And they don’t have time to piss about with straps at the top of every run.

MORE INFO:
NOWBINDINGS.COM

 

Baseplate

A little strangely given the name, there’s actually no carbon to be found in the frame of the baseplate. Instead it’s the same aluminum platform found on the regular NX2. To be fair, aluminium is a similarly stiff material (most binders use plastic) so you can expect zero lag when transmitting power into the edge. It’s also less brittle – those of you ancient enough to remember the pricey pure carbon baseplates of the 90s will also recall they had a nasty habit of cracking. The NX2, by contrast, is built tough. And it’s still super light.

The supplied disks have a hole pattern that will fit any board (yep, including the Burton channel) and the footbed can be fitted or removed tools-free. Said Slip-N-Grip footbed is slightly canted for greater comfort and designed to make entering the binding even easier by minimising friction when sliding your boot in with the highback reclined. It’s made from carbon-composite (ooh, carbon – now we’re talking!) to shave a few grams and provide firm response underfoot.

“Riders who like to get low down the fall line and need maximum support for burly backcountry lines will dig it”

Straps and Highbacks

The whole F1 vibe steps up a notch with the highback. It’s a single piece of carbon-infused nylon that doubles as the heel hoop, delivering hair-trigger response on the heel edge. Riders who like to get low down the fall line and need maximum support for burly backcountry lines will dig it. The asymmetrical shape fits your boot naturally, and this being Flow it reclines at the flick of a lever, enabling quick entry and exit from the rear. The system has been refined endlessly over the years and now includes Active Strap Tech to raise the straps automatically when the highback is reclined, granting you a little more space to shove your boot in.

Speaking of the straps, in keeping with the aggressive nature of this model, the NX2 Carbon deploys a stiff and lightweight Exo Frame Pro design with AuxTech cells which expand uniformly around the foot, eliminating the need for extra padding. There are two options to choose from here: the Fusion version is closer to the classic Flow design, a broad one-piece strap that’s easy to slip your boot under and which gives a more ‘top down’, locked in fit; or the Hybrid version, which looks and feels closer to a regular binding strap, with more lateral flex (read: tweakability) and a toe cap that pulls your boot back into the binding. The Hybrid will appeal to riders making the move to Flow for the first time, and although it can require a little extra effort on entry, we found its more relaxed fit brought some welcome freestyle balance to what is primarily a less-than-forgiving freeride binding.

Aluminium Slap Ratchets let you set the fit out of the box and then lock the strap in place for the same tension every lap. Of course, you can still make adjustments on the fly or even swerve the whole rear entry thing and use the NX2 Carbon like a regular binding – for instance if the slope is too steep to flip the highback down.

“Carbon makes everything cooler”

Roundup

Flow’s new flagship takes a tried and trusted speed entry design and cranks up the response level to 11. It’s a recipe that’s sure to please advanced riders whose idea of a good time is clocking a ton of laps on steep faces, whether on or off-piste.

So, should you buy it? As a wise man once said, be careful whose advice you buy, but be patient with those who supply it. Advice is a form of nostalgia. Dispensing it is a way of fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts and recycling it for more than it’s worth.

But trust me on the carbon.

Pros:

  • Top-end aggressive response
  • Super lightweight

Cons:

  • Too stiff for park rats
SHOP ALL SNOWBOARD BINDINGS ON

 

Tester’s Verdict 2022/23

Coming soon…

Trade Secrets

Lucien Vink – Engineer, Flow

“The Slip-N-Grip plate on year’s NX2-TM was received so well we decided to put it on every new high end Flow product we make. The carbon footbed on NX2 Carbon is easily our stiffest one yet.”

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