Bataleon Magic Carpet Review
The Bataleon Magic Carpet has a design that you can’t find on many boards – a wide, twin shaped powder board. I was pretty skeptical, and didn’t expect that I would like it too much.
Features of the Bataleon Magic Carpet
Twin
Definitely not a common shape for a powder board. Normally powder boards will have a longer and wider nose, with a shorter narrower tail that is designed to help the nose to float, and the tail to sink. The tradeoff of the classic design means that although it floats better when ridden regular, it is much harder to ride switch, and much harder to land switch in powder.
The Magic Carpet design gets around that by keeping the twin shape, but with a wide width for lots of surface area.
Pow 3BT
The Pow version of the 3BT base shaping is the most extreme of the Bataleon designs, which means that it has a very narrow centrebase, and very exaggerated uplifted corners of the board. Looking straight down the board, you can see how much of a “boat” shape the nose and tail have.
SideKick
Another little exaggerated shape, which pushes the contact points a little higher on the uplifted sections of the board.
Mellow Camber
Overall there is a fairly small amount of camber on the board, that gives it a little bit more of a spring, but it never feels catchy with the Pow 3BT shaping.
Dual Super Tubes
Two tubes of carbon, that take away a little of the weight from the core, and add some more pop.
Triax Laminate
Three directions of fiberglass mean that the Magic Carpet has a bit more torsional (twisting) stiffness.
Ultra Light Core
A lighter core option, it has a 70/30 blend of paulownia and poplar wood.
Carbon Stringers
Super Slick X
An extruded base material, so while it is softer than sintered, it is easier to repair.
Solid Walls
Just standard ABS sidewalls.
How It Rides
Board size: 154cm
Boots: Salomon Launch Boa 27.5
Bindings: Salomon Highlander
I rode the Magic Carpet with a fairly narrow stance, with my front foot on the narrowest inserts, and my back foot on the recommended, with angles of +9 and -6 degrees.
I was riding in some fresh snow, with nice deeper windblown sections of fairly light powder.
Camber Profile
While technically all Bataleon boards have some camber, the Mellow Camber of the Magic Carpet means that it doesn’t have a very noticeable amount of camber. Combined with the 3BT, it has a very loose feeling when you are riding it with a flat base.
Flex and Pop
It has a medium flex, which was pretty ideal for a board like this. It was stiff enough to smash through chopped up powder without a problem, but still didn’t need much effort to flex or twist the board in tight situations.
Edge Hold
In the soft conditions I was riding it in, it wasn’t a tough test on the edges – any board would have done well. The wider width of the Magic Carpet meant that I could get quite a lot of angle in a carve with no problem.
Powder
The Magic Carpet did feel nice in powder – not like a regular shaped/tapered powder board, but with more of a regular balanced feel. The nose never seemed to have a problem keeping up above the snow, and I could feel the tail flex nicely for a bigger turn in deeper snow.
Speed
The Magic Carpet just has a regular extruded base, though the speed felt fine for me. It never seemed like it wanted to slow down, though a lot of that could have been helped by the 3BT and wide width helping it to stay on top of the snow the whole time.
Switch
One of the main features of the board is that it is a twin powder board, so riding it switch is just the same as riding it regular. It was an odd feeling to get used to, landing switch in powder is hard enough anyway, but on this board it seemed to pop the nose back up on top of the snow straight away.
Overall
The Bataleon Magic Carpet isn’t a board that I would buy to ride everyday, but it does have an interesting design that would make it a great options depending on how you like to ride.
The wide width and loose feeling of the Pow 3BT make it a fun board for riding and spinning on side hits, and it won’t matter which way you land, even in deep snow.
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