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Are Alien Cams Gonna Kill You?

Original Post
andy patterson · · Carpinteria, CA · Joined Apr 2007 · Points: 2,400

Recently, I had an Alien cam (the purple size, which is roughly equivalent to the #1 BD cam) completely fail on me. The failure was catastrophic: the lobes completely separated from the stem. I realize that cams can fail when placed poorly, but this cam was set very carefully and properly in a clean, hand-sized crack. What's more, the previous day I encountered a climber who had a small blue Alien break when he fell on it while leading. To be sure, my stories are purely anecdotal, but I seem to keep finding climbers who have their own Alien "horror" stories. Am I the only one who thinks this is an issue? While I'm not out to slam the manufacturers at CCH, I'd like to hear if anyone else has their own examples of cam failure/problems.

Here's to hoping that I'm crazy and have just been very unlucky,

ANDY PATTERSON

Sir Camsalot · · thankgodchickenhead, Ut · Joined Sep 2007 · Points: 201

unless you decide to climb with them they're perfectly safe!

jon vandub · · westminster,co · Joined Feb 2007 · Points: 0

like dude,,,,,, WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN????

DID YOU CHECK THE DATES?????
DID YOU LOOK FOR THE DIMPLE AT THE BASE OF THE KNOB?????

IF YOU HAVNT DONT USE EM!!!!!

Josh Audrey · · LAS VEGAS · Joined Jun 2006 · Points: 160

Dude, what I can't beleive is you used a purple alien!
that size is for retards. If your gonna use aliens at least
get the badass sizes. Black through red. I understand
some people don't use them at all because of their history of being
"unsafe",but come on a purple alien!
josh
P.S. You seriously are just finding this out?
you know.....that purple aliens retarded.

Buff Johnson · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Dec 2005 · Points: 1,145

Aliens don't kill, they just want the same opportunity to the pursuit of happyness as everyone else.

(I use purple, but then again, I am a retard)

Geir www.ToofastTopos.com · · Tucson/DMR · Joined Jun 2006 · Points: 2,751

andy-

what are the dates on these cams?

can you check the recall posting at aliencamsbycch.com and give us more detailed information/photos?

asmith · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Jun 2006 · Points: 0

Additionally, even after some of the cams have been recalled there have been issues with quality control-oops- there are lots of threads on this at rockclimbing.com

I have no idea if cch has fixed the problems they had. Hopefully they have
If you are like me and have some aliens that are from the recall time (i had 5 that were from the month prior to the recall), but don't trust cch to do it, and don't have a pull tester at home---here is a guy that is doing pull testing.
He tested some of my cams and took pics of them being tested so that i could verify they were tested. Having them tested have brought them back to my rack.

rockclimbing.com/cgi-bin/fo…;guest=29950476#1881032

Malcolm Daly · · Hailey, ID · Joined Jan 2001 · Points: 380

Hey Andy,
You didn't mention if you got hurt or not. Hope not....

Post up some pics of the broken Alien. I'd love to see the failure mode.

Mal

SAL · · broomdigiddy · Joined Mar 2007 · Points: 790
Sam Grenlie wrote:There's a lot of talk about independently testing the tensile strength... who does this? Is there somewhere to get them both reslung and tested?
yes,

CCH
Shawn Mitchell · · Broomfield · Joined Mar 2008 · Points: 250
Russ Walling wrote: You need to spend more time on the internet and less time climbing.
:) Clever, Russ...and funny.
Paul Hunnicutt · · Boulder, CO · Joined Sep 2006 · Points: 325

my aliens are over 10 years old and none have even failed. so i continue to use my purple alien and some other odd colored large ones. I love the look on peoples faces when you pull out the HUGE alien. Most have no idea anything other than black, blue, green, yellow, red exist. I have a grey, purple and orange also. wish they had a #6 camalot equivalent...now that would be something.

Luke to Zuke · · Anchorage · Joined Apr 2008 · Points: 220
Malcolm Daly wrote:Hey Andy, You didn't mention if you got hurt or not. Hope not.... Post up some pics of the broken Alien. I'd love to see the failure mode. Mal
ah ha! .. he is one of the alien manufacture-er-s. huh!? why you asken? ..

jk, but yea, lets see some pics
Kevin Sainio · · Durango, CO · Joined Nov 2006 · Points: 480
lucaskrajnik wrote: ah ha! .. he is one of the alien manufacture-er-s. huh!? why you asken? .. jk, but yea, lets see some pics
You obviously have no idea who Malcolm Daly is.
Josh Brown · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Apr 2008 · Points: 20
lucaskrajnik wrote: ah ha! .. he is one of the alien manufacture-er-s. huh!? why you asken? .. jk, but yea, lets see some pics
Yes, this is a hilarious post, Malcom is the man behind Trango Lucaskrajnik. You need to get out more, on second thought, don't go out more and sit at the computer reading RC.com and you would have known this.
Josh Audrey · · LAS VEGAS · Joined Jun 2006 · Points: 160

There is only one way to save yourself from Aliens! Let me have them and I will hide them on my gearsling. Please only send black through red, I will pay S&H.
josh

Aric Datesman · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Sep 2008 · Points: 145
Jed Pointer wrote:The failure mode on post dimple recall Aliens is also very disturbing - ie, what appears to me as overheating the fine wire they use (ie, high strand count cable overcooked in brazing process perhaps to compensate for the undercooking of prior failures).
For kicks and giggles a while back I threw a Red Alien onto the pull tester and pulled it to failure (I'm the guy over at RC mentioned in asmith's post above). It failed a bit below rated strength (11.3kN, rated for 12) by way of the cable separating from the head. There's a thread over on RC with all the specifics (video of the test, a datalog of the forces, more pics), but here's a closeup of the break:



Someone else on RC said they worked with a metalurgist who was willing to take a look at it, so off it went. He said the same thing as Jed- embrittlement of the cable wires due to overheating, evidenced by the distance the braze wicked up the wires.

Personally I don't understand why CCH doesn't switch to a swaged head and avoid the problem altogether. Or barring that switch from the brazing torch to some sort of induction heating fixture to better control the temperatures. But they seem rather set with their process and unlikely to change it. Oh well.

-a.
Larry DeAngelo · · Las Vegas, NV · Joined Nov 2002 · Points: 5,285

Aric-- let me be the first to welcome you to Mountain Project. Your posts have been welcome data points in a sea of speculation...

Aric Datesman · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Sep 2008 · Points: 145

Thanks Larry. I'd heard that the signal/noise ratio over here was much better, so finally got around to taking a look and stumbled upon this thread. So far I'm liking it here... :-)

Kat A · · Boulder, CO · Joined Jun 2006 · Points: 510
Aric Datesman wrote:I'd heard that the signal/noise ratio over here was much better...
That's funny - signal/noise :)
Guideline #1: Don't be a jerk.

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