Ice tool shape explanation

Hi all,

can anyone school me on the shape of modern ice tools? Or point me to some source? In particular I am curios about the handle shapes. 

I believe I understand the effects of different angles of the picks, e.g. a down-pointing pick is good to prevent the ice tool from coming off when pulling away from the ice. If the angle is too aggressive, it will be hard to place the tool with a nice swing. The bend shape of the shaft is good for clearance, e.g when climbing on cauliflower ice.

However, I don't understand why the handle of the specialist tools such as the Petzl Ergonomic is better than the handle of the all-round tools, e.g. the Quark? In my head, I imagine placing the tool on 90 deg ice. Too me it seems that ending up with the hand/handle in a vertical upright position at the end of the swing would be better than ending up with the hand/handle in diagonal position as it is the case with an Ergonomic?

One benefit of an off-set handle is certainly that the hands are further away from the ice. But that can't be the whole story?

Any explanation is appreciated.

--

Matze

Think about climbing a vertically hanging pipe vs having horizontal pipes for hand holds. Which do you think will make you more tired? On sustained, steep ice, the handle of an Ergonomic will likely be more comfortable. I split the difference and have Nomics, but a good tip is to go on youtube and watch the guy from Petzl explain the tools, released 2018, if it isn’t obvious to you already. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mPh8MLL82F4

Thanks for the explanation and pointing me to the videos. They indeed explaining a lot.. especially the part about natural hand/wrist position in vertical ice.

Maybe there is also more to the off-set handles when drytooling...

DeLa Cruce wrote:

Think about climbing a vertically hanging pipe vs having horizontal pipes for hand holds. Which do you think will make you more tired? On sustained, steep ice, the handle of an Ergonomic will likely be more comfortable. I split the difference and have Nomics, but a good tip is to go on youtube and watch the guy from Petzl explain the tools, released 2018, if it isn’t obvious to you already. 

Between the Nomic and Ergonomic, is there a bit difference in steep ice ?

Carey K wrote:

Between the Nomic and Ergonomic, is there a bit difference in steep ice ?

Yes. I don’t own ergonomics because I can’t afford them—but I would if I could. Feels like cheating, they are so good.