SE Trad Rack - What do you really need?

UncleBen wrote:Ah, yes....rack salad. 00 C3, 0 Mastercam, blue Alien, blue/green Alien, green Alien, yellow Mastercam, yellow/orange Mastercam, 0.4 Camalot, 0.5 Camalot x2, 0.75 Camalot x2, 1 Camalot x2, 2 Camalot, 3.5 Wild Country, 3 Camalot, 4 Camalot. Utter confusion usually ensues. Just blame it on the "gaps".

I know people whose heads would literally explode if you passed them this rack.lol

Raul P wrote:Metolius IS life though.

This guy is one of 'em!!! Hahaha!

Yeah, all good fun until runout and trying to remember which Alien/C3/X4 is equivalent to a blue Metolius....

Then, it's just fun for the belayer to hoot insults while Elvis-leg ensures.

Climbing friend,

For climbing sport of trad, you must have big nuts.

TomCaldwell wrote: Nice! Hopefully I can keep it up. The tri-cam question, nylon versus dyneema. The EVO is only made in nylon, problem solved. Don't buy non-EVO tri-cams! Seriously, they are just a better tri-cam with no con's compared to non-EVO. Same sizes, one-handed placements, better setting, and lighter. Don't double your rack in the same brand. Climbing in the SE, I have realized doubles in the same brand will not help you fill the gaps in sizes. The camalots are a great cam, but there are many unique placements due to width of placement or size that a BD may not work or be ideal. Personally, I like the metolius sizes as they fit right in between the BD sizes. The metolius sizes are actually very similar to tri-cam sizes. It may not matter yet, but the granite and quartzite around here can be very unique. Sometimes you need a specific size and brand to protect a spot on a climb where nothing else will fit or fit well enough that you would feel comfortable falling on. I'll be glad to name several climbs that fit into this realm. The hexes work in the alpine, because the placements are often very large. It is rare on the SE faces that you will need anything bigger than a 3 camalot. The really small hexes can be good in the SE, but nuts and tri-cams are almost always more versatile. If you do carry hexes, make sure you hang them off the back of your pack when hiking in. I always get a chuckle hearing the cow bells coming up the trail. "I need more cow bell".

I would not say the evo is completely better than the non-evo. The surface area on the evo tip is smaller than that of the non-evo which depending on where you are at could be good or bad thing. It could fit into a small spot better but it also means you have less contact if it is a big flat area.

I personally carry 1 of each for the pink and like both.

Aleks Zebastian wrote:Climbing friend, For climbing sport of trad, you must have big nuts.

Spoken truer words has never happened.

ViperScale wrote: I would not say the evo is completely better than the non-evo. The surface area on the evo tip is smaller than that of the non-evo which depending on where you are at could be good or bad thing. It could fit into a small spot better but it also means you have less contact if it is a big flat area. I personally carry 1 of each for the pink and like both.

And as a tricam enthusiast, but non-evo owner, I believe I am converted. For the dualist approach.

To our climbing friend's point, tricams are similar to large stoppers in bomberlarity (is a word). I took a 40' fall on a pink tricam in an expanding flake high on Laurel Knob once. Roadrash aside, it was a confident tumble.

They work.

ViperScale wrote: I would not say the evo is completely better than the non-evo. The surface area on the evo tip is smaller than that of the non-evo which depending on where you are at could be good or bad thing. It could fit into a small spot better but it also means you have less contact if it is a big flat area. I personally carry 1 of each for the pink and like both.

Even though non-Evo looks like a bigger tip, it is rounded. From the picture, the contact areas are about the same. This is apparent in the larger tri-cams. Brown Evo has a bigger tip than non. Red is about the same size. I also feel like the evos set better, which is nice considering the stiffer sling.

Red dyneema left Evo right

Brown nylon left Evo right

First new gear purchase (aside from bolts) in years...black thru brown evos. 25% off at gearexpress right now.

Ben I would be totally at home with that hodgepodge rack. When you're talking about gear that small it really pays to be familiar with these distinctions.

Rob Dillon wrote:Ben I would be totally at home with that hodgepodge rack. When you're talking about gear that small it really pays to be familiar with these distinctions.

+1. My rack is hodgepodge primarily because I wanted to try all the different cams and see what I like best, and because I got some really good deals on used cams here on MP. I don't think it's confusing because I have my biners color coded to the racking scheme I learned to climb on (BD from .5 up, Metolius from orange down to purple). Additionally, it allows me to have a selection of different camming angles, which I also value.

Oh, and as for the tri-cams, I haven't found the differences between the evo and non-evo to be important enough to care. and since the evo costs a little bit more, I don't have any of em. FWIW, I rarely place my tri-cams passively so an additional passive placement option doesn't really matter to me.

eli poss wrote:Oh, and as for the tri-cams, I haven't found the differences between the evo and non-evo to be important enough to care. and since the evo costs a little bit more, I don't have any of em. FWIW, I rarely place my tri-cams passively so an additional passive placement option doesn't really matter to me.

The passive placement difference is only for black tri-cam. All of the older model tri-cams could be placed passively already. They increased the strength of the pin on black. It hasn't mattered to me that much either to place black passively, since this is a standard 9 or 10 stopper. I have placed the larger ones passively several times in quartzite especially. That stone has a tendancy to form v-grooves that most nuts would have a tough time setting into due to the taper of the nut not being aggressive enough.

For me, the Evo is all about being able to place the piece one-handed, especially high above you if needed. This makes placing one in a difficult stance easier also. I used to tape my old dyneema slings with athletic tape so that the sling would be stiffer to allow for more one-handed placements. It still is not as good as the Evo. You would almost always need a second hand to orient and engage the stinger. The Evo, you can hold the sling only with one hand, which keeps the tri-cam folded over, put it in the hole and pull back, done.

TomCaldwell wrote:For me, the Evo is all about being able to place the piece one-handed, especially high above you if needed. This makes placing one in a difficult stance easier also. I used to tape my old dyneema slings with athletic tape so that the sling would be stiffer to allow for more one-handed placements. It still is not as good as the Evo. You would almost always need a second hand to orient and engage the stinger. The Evo, you can hold the sling only with one hand, which keeps the tri-cam folded over, put it in the hole and pull back, done.

I could be wrong but I'm pretty sure they made all the new slings stiffer, not just the evo. I have the old dyneema set from before they stiffened the sling and i've found that I can place the pink and red no problem with 1 hand. I don't ever place them overhead, though, because I like to be able to see the placement very well. I'm that guy who puts his eye like 1" away from the crack.

These are the current model tricams. One is an example of dyneema the other nylon. Both are not stiff enough to allow easy one-handed placements.

Black nylon versus evo

Red dyneema versus evo

TomCaldwell wrote:These are the current model tricams. One is an example of dyneema the other nylon. Both are not stiff enough to allow easy one-handed placements.

I've got dyneema non-Evo tricams, and they are stiff enough for single-handed placements, at least for me. Maybe some earlier/later models are stiffer...