First set of Nuts

Jared Chrysostom wrote:

Dragon II’s. Duh. 

Dragonflies. Duh.

Jaren Watson wrote: If the OP had asked about budget-friendly cams, would you DMM offset folks have suggested Totems?

All nuts are budget friendly. And I would’ve suggested BD cams. 

Trenton Allmon wrote: Hey Y'all, I'm a college student looking to begin building my trad rack and was wondering what a good set of nuts would be. Priorities are 1) Safe and will hold 2) Easy to place 3) a reasonable cost. Let me know what you think.

climbing friend,

if no one has suggested it, you would surely be needing the fattest and heaviest nuts around for your first trad lead vision quest up dirty bush and choss gully. Just be sure they are not so large, that you can still ascend up off of the ground. You shall not let them dangle too low, nor crash perilously against the rock!

Patrik wrote: It depends on what "type" of trad climber you will become. There's a group who praises DMM offsets above all else and I suspect their placements are more than 90% cams and only whenever they can't fiddle in a cam, that's when a nut goes in. For us who pick a nut first and use cams only when nuts don't go, we prefer something that is easy to remove, which means the standard Black Diamond (BD) or Wild Country (WC) shape.

Easy to place: (all are easy to place, but few are easy to place well, which means to maximize surface area contact with the rock)
1) BD/WC/OP Wedgie
2) DMM Wallnut
3) DMM peenut
4) DMM offset
5) Metolius curved

Easy to remove:
1) BD/WC/OP Wedgie
2) DMM Wallnut, DMM peenut
3) DMM offset
4) Metolius curved

Cost:
$10: BD/WC/OP/DMM Wallnut/Metolius curve/DMM peenut
$15: DMM Offset

As many suggest: Buy used, but check that the cable is not frayed (one strand is broken and will poke your skin).

My "qualifications" to give suggestions on nuts: I've bootied 100+ nuts over the last 20 years, more than half my placements at my local crag are nuts, and more than 95% of my nut placements can be taken out without a nut tool (which makes them nearly as quick to work with as cams). Among my 4 most reliable partners, we have 100+ years of climbing experience. Four of us have BD/WC, one of us has gone to a mix of WC and DMM offset/peenuts.

For my climbing style, the "Easy to remove" feature is as important as "Easy to place". If they are hard to remove, your follower will curse you and you'll just stop placing nuts. The testers in outdoorgearlab.com/topics/c… did not put as high importance on this aspect, so they got a different end result. They straightforwardly claim that they prefer to place cams instead. As a side note, I have occasionally followed "cam climbers" and their lack of seeing gorgeous nut placements have resulted in worse overall protection.  

This guy nuts!

Jaren Watson wrote: If the OP had asked about budget-friendly cams, would you DMM offset folks have suggested Totems?

yes, because you only need 5 totems instead of 15 C4's. (Remember, they're 300% better than regular cams...because, science).  ;)

Jaren Watson wrote: If the OP had asked about budget-friendly cams, would you DMM offset folks have suggested Totems?

Basically anyone that goes straight to the most expensive option for a newbie is often trying to convince themselves they made the right decision.

When you have more experience you recognize what in fact is more utilitarian for someone just starting out (reg nuts) even though you may yourself use something different.

Jaren Watson wrote: If the OP had asked about budget-friendly cams, would you DMM offset folks have suggested Totems?

You simply cannot beat the price of the old model C4 right now...If I didn't already have enough I would buy .5 - #4 right now. Bargain pricing on them.

Buck Rio wrote:

You simply cannot beat the price of the old model C4 right now...If I didn't already have enough I would buy .5 - #4 right now. Bargain pricing on them.

Sell me your old gear so you have a reaon to buy new gear

Jaren Watson wrote: If the OP had asked about budget-friendly cams, would you DMM offset folks have suggested Totems?

No actually...  i love totems but for the cost hard to go wrong with a C4

Sawyer W wrote:

Sell me your old gear so you have a reaon to buy new gear

All my cams are new    I do not have a cam older than 2016.  I set my nephew up for trad climbing with my older, but still usable, traddie gear.

12 Petzl Spirit draws
6 Blue Water slings
1 1/2 set of BD Stoppers
Full set of Metolius Ultralight cams, except they didn't used to call them Ultralight.
about 15 free biners and a couple of lockers
40 feet of 1" webbing

He already had a rope and crash pad and some sporto Brah's to hang with. He's in the Czech republic right now.

Jaren Watson wrote: If the OP had asked about budget-friendly cams, would you DMM offset folks have suggested Totems?

I don't think I've ever paid more than $55 for a set of  5 offsets. Aren't BDs something like $80 for the set of 4-11?

Budget friendly cams, definitely <2018 C4s. 

Just A set of nuts isn’t going to do you much good. Save up enough to buy a complete used rack. Plenty of people buy a whole rack, use it once of twice and realize trad leading is not for them. Buying a whole rack will save the most and almost always has a set of nuts. 

Hardware doesn’t go bad. It’s the most expensive gear but the stuff you can buy safely used.

I’d look for BD C4s in .75 to 3.
X4s, mastercams, or aliens in .2 to .5
Nuts whatever is included. 
Then double up on cams .4 to 2. 

Glowering wrote: I’d look for BD C4s in .75 to 3.
X4s, mastercams, or aliens in .2 to .5
Nuts whatever is included. 
Then double up on cams .4 to 2. 

If you want to get a cam rack that has covered me from MN to CA & in between, 

Smallest to largest:
Nuts & Torque Nuts, w/offsets
Dragonfly 00 - 2 (whenever they get here) right now using Mastercams & TCU's
.4  to #4 , Doubles from .5 to #3
You can use the Dragon 2 or BD- they are the same size

You can lead a horse to water...

I've helped a lot of beginners who have picked my brain about gear and getting into trad climbing.  

Some will listen and get what's cheap/used and buy basic cams and nuts that'll work.  Old metolius/used C4s or whatever.  
Then they'll actually climb and get addicted to gear climbing and slowly add gear or replace the old with what's new or what works for them as they get the money.

The second group asks lots of questions and I give them the same speech.  "Buy what's cheap, these cams and nuts will serve you well blah blah blah"   Then I see them posting on instagram or showing me a couple new ultralights they bought and a set of offsets or whatever.   Not enough to actually climb on their own they'll go out with some others maybe a couple times or just hang their shiny gear on their pegboard to post pictures of "i'm a trad climber"

I'm a little salty when I see this, however, we've got to keep the engine of the FS forum burning hot!!

Ultimately I think you should get both symmetric and offset nuts. Which to acquire first depends on where you climb, and if you have regular partners with gear (e.g. if your friend has symmetric, get offsets). A double set of nuts will let you sew up your early trad leads, while you get practice with the full range of nut options. Particular brand doesn't matter too much; though I would recommend full sets, not a frankenrack of whatever pieces are cheapest at the consignment shop.

Just wanted to say congrats on your first rack and set of nuts.  Exciting times in a young man's life.

I still remember the first day my nuts came in...I could barely keep my hands off em

The real answer is to climb on other people's racks until you can answer this question for yourself.

Aleks Zebastian wrote:

...trad lead vision quest up dirty bush and choss gully...

I need this on a shirt. 

Here in NZ I recommend BD stoppers as a first set because:

A - They are cheaper (in NZ at least) and available everywhere
B - They don't have any aggressive curvature or scalloping (see C)
C - If you're a beginner, you are likely to lose some or get them stuck
D - Replacing a single nut will be both cheaper and easier

When you are more experienced, you can start to look at more aggressive grabby nuts, or offsets, or whatever works best where you commonly climb.