Carabiners for Alpine Draws

What type of carabiners do you use on your alpine draws? Why? I'll sit bsck and take my answers of the air.

Thanks for the thoughtful answers. To the rest of you, thanks for the entertainment.

Camp Photons for racking biners and alpine draws. They handle well, are super light, large and cheap. I'd probably go with some DMM biners if I had the funds, but their high end stuff is almost twice the price of the Photons.

I'm currently in the same position, looking for a new set of draws. I was thinking going with the WC Nitro carabiner to clip to pro because I like the feel and the ease of use. For the rope end I think I'm going to go with the CAMP orbit (or photon I can't remember which) wire because its pretty massive and I think it will be a lot easier to clip with gloves on.

Still toying with the idea, keep in mind you can mix and match ends based on what your doing with each side.

OZ hoodwires on the bolt end and mad rock(these things are awesome) ultralight bentgates on the rope side. Best combo I have found yet. Also one of the lightest(full size) biner combos.

DMM Shield gear / bolt side, DMM Alpha Trad rope side

don't mess around with cheep crap like camp products. Go with quality high end light biners (under 35 grams) DMM alpha's, petzl ange, ect. I personally don't care for black diamonds carabeinners, and camp is china crap! I owed 50 photons all had sharp edges on the poorly made pin that holds the gate to body, I returned all 50 to REI. The sharp edge was creating frays on all of my soft goods, (rope, slings, cam slings).

Sagar Gondalia wrote:DMM Shield gear / bolt side, DMM Alpha Trad rope side

Damn that is one expensive trad draw!!

Camp biners work just fine in my experience. I understand others have had issues but all my photons and nanos have worked flawlessly. YMMV.

Either way get whatever's lightweight, easy to handle, in your price range, and most importantly looks good.

I use DMM Alpha Pro on 1 end and Black Diamond Positron on the other. I LOVE the DMM carabiners....light, smooth, easy to open. One thing to consider is if you ever want to use the alpine draw in a sport environment, it helps to have 2 different carabiners on the ends. At least for me it helps remind me that I clip the BD to the bolt and the DMM always to the rope!

Well my 2 cents:

If you mean alpine in terms of alpine rock... Camp Nano 23s, or DMM phantoms are good

If you mean alpine ice or wearing gloves the bigger biners mentioned, do like DMM Alpha trads myself tho the alpha lites (compact) look good

DMM Spectre and Petzl Ange Large

Thanks for the responses. They will be used for rock.

Max Forbes wrote:I'm currently in the same position, looking for a new set of draws. I was thinking going with the WC Nitro carabiner to clip to pro because I like the feel and the ease of use. For the rope end I think I'm going to go with the CAMP orbit (or photon I can't remember which) wire because its pretty massive and I think it will be a lot easier to clip with gloves on. Still toying with the idea, keep in mind you can mix and match ends based on what your doing with each side.

The WC Nitros are the same size as Photons but have a partially shielded nose (not hooded like the WC Helium, but with a raised section). They are less likely to snag on gear loops than the Photons. I like Camp products and Photons - one of my climbing partners has Photons on all his QDs and alpine draws. However, the Wild Country biners are simply nicer quality. If you want a smaller biner for the pro side, get some WC Astros, which are just like Nitros but smaller. Honestly, I think that Astros are a great size for the rope end too, but if you plan to climb in winter or with gloves, the full size Nitro is a nice option. I have 10 draws with Nitros but would prob get Astros if I had to do it again.

These: backcountry.com/mad-rock-ul…

Cheaper than most other ultralight biners, and nearly identical to the WC Helium in practice. I wouldn't buy anything else for trad.

If I have 5 astro draws, would you buy 10 solid gate biners (positrons are on STP for ~$5) and swap out the bolt ends plus make 5 alpine draws with the leftovers? It'll definitely add weight. The astros are color coded for bolt/rope but it could be nice to have more of a feel difference between the two ends. Used for rock, ice and sport when extras are needed.

Rob Selter wrote:don't mess around with cheep crap like camp products. Go with quality high end light biners (under 35 grams) DMM alpha's, petzl ange, ect. I personally don't care for black diamonds carabeinners, and camp is china crap! I owed 50 photons all had sharp edges on the poorly made pin that holds the gate to body, I returned all 50 to REI. The sharp edge was creating frays on all of my soft goods, (rope, slings, cam slings).

Re: the CAMPS, were they the solid gate biners?

I use CAMP Orbit and Photon wire gates, they have been just fine and have never shredded attached nylon. Only problem ever was one that developed a sticky gate... if clipped gently would sometimes stick open. However I have had this happen with other brands of wire gates as well. Cleaning and lubing takes care of it.

The camp photons I had were wire gates, nice design, but poor workmanship and materials. Also I don't really care for the nose on the photons. I went with petzl ange large on all go my alpine draws and DMM specters 2 on all of my cams.

I have Photons and have beat the crap out of them and they still seem fine to me.

another vote for photons. Haven't had an issue yet, and I have them on trad draws as well as dogbones. Light, inexpensive, large size, and easily manipulated with gloves.

I have kind of a mishmash of biners on my alpine draws including the ones mentioned here. So for a side-by-side comparison:

Camp Photons
+ ridiculously light
+ big enough to use easily, even with gloves
+ cheap
- no hooded nose
- big to the point of sometimes seeming kind of bulky (admittedly a minor problem)

BD OZ
+ light
+ small enough not to be bulky but still big enough to be usable, especially for alpine rock where you aren't wearing gloves
+ hooded nose
- expensive

WC Astros
+ light
+ small
+ relatively cheap
- small enough that sometimes it is an issue (not so much for handle but just space like multiple clove hitches on a single biner or other shenanigans)
- not durable (one of mine has got a stuck gate after minor use)

Random Biners (hotwires, etc.)

• don't do this. You may save a bit of money up front but that weight/bulk adds up and eventually you will be looking at replacing them with lighter biners. I'm currently in this spot right now. Some of these I got for free / really cheap so I don't regret using those, but I really wish I hadn't bought stuff like neutrinos just because they were marginally cheaper.

I primarily climb multi pitch trad climbs, mostly "low land" stuff with shorter approaches so weight isn't that much of a concern for me. (Think Red Rocks the Valley or Squamish). I have larger hands/fingers and find the "alpine size" biners too small to work with. They're doubly small for me when tripling up sling in them. I use a 10mm dyneema sling in my trad draws. 8mm or less tent to wear too quickly and be a bit "Tangly" and the larger 12mm+ slings tend to be too bulky when tripled.

For the Bolt/Gear/Piton biner I prefer a Keylock Solid gate biner. Right now I'm using DMM Shadows (43g, 10kN Open Gate). I really like the grip of the gate itself and it's a really nice biner. I prefer the narrow, solid gate key lock nose as it can wiggle into narrow bolt hangers, chain and tat filled piton eye better than the broader wire gate noses. The Shadow also has a well designed "minor basket". The end of the biner near the hinge is a bit wider and flatter than most so it accommodates the extra bulk of tripled slings really well. If I were looking today I would also look at the new Petzl Spirit (39g, 9kN Open Gate).

For the rope side I'm using WC Nitros at the moment. They're a great value for the rope side clip essentially being a Helium without the notch less design. My only complaint is the minor basket (hinge side end) is narrow ala a Helium. It's really nice on a QD doggone but just a bit crowded for tripled slings. This does help the biner resist flipping on you but not too much. At some point, I'll likely migrate the Nitros to other duties and add in DMM Spectre 2s - They're basically a wire gate shadow but even nicer.