Sarken Replacement Front

[paborden]

Does anyone know if Petzl makes a front replacent for their Sarken crampon? I have another model that I'd like to trade out the front for the Sarken ($). Everyone I call about this, however, pleads ignorance. Petzl makes replacements for both the Dart and Darttwin, yet there's no mention of a Sarken replacement on their website or in their catalog. What's the deal?

[Jedi]

I talked to Petzl the other day. They do not. Last year, I heard they did but it is not true.

If enough people complain, they might start making they available.

I told them they need to re enforce the Sidelock pull thingy also. Just adding some heavy threading (like a car tire) to the rubber, might would make they more dependable.

 

Jedi

[paborden]

I'm a cheap bastard so I suppose my attempts to save a buck don't warrant any complaints...

 

But, seriously. If I owned a pair, they then wore out through heavy use, and I couldn't replace the front...I'd be pissed. The monster is one thing...but disposable crampons? Please.[/rant off]

[Ade]

I'm a cheap bastard so I suppose my attempts to save a buck don't warrant any complaints...

 

But, seriously. If I owned a pair, they then wore out through heavy use, and I couldn't replace the front...I'd be pissed. The monster is one thing...but disposable crampons? Please.[/rant off]

 

I don't really see what your issue is here. I'm with you on the Monster thing but alpine crampons have never been designed to have replacable points. If you make the front points replacable, like say a Grivel G-14 or C-M M10 then it adds to the weight making them unsuitable for alpine use. In this case replacing the whole front section of the crampon represents well over half of the whole item.

 

If you've been alpine climbing with them it seems odd that you've trashed the front points but nothing else. I have a pair of BD Sabretooths that I've pretty much worn out and the points are gone all round. In addition with that much use I'd start to worry about fatigue issues and replacing the whole unit would see prudent. Alpine crampons are designed to be light, not to last forever.

[paborden]

Yet, you can buy replacement fronts for both the dart and darttwin. Seems inconsistent...

[Ade]

They're aimed at different uses. The Dart is trying to be a lighter ice and mixed climbing crampon. If used for that you might well wear out the front point(s) without doing much damage to the rest of the crampon. The Sarken is a mountaineering crampon.

 

No other manufacturer is any different. They'll all sell you replacement points for their technical mixed/ice crampon and not for mountaineering crampons. There's no technical reason for this, someone in product planning looked at the likely demand for replacement parts and based their production runs on that.

[Jedi]

Depends on the routes you wear them out on. On routes that are mixed that you rap off off or there is a lot of snow on the descent, you will only wear the front plate out faster.

It doesn't seem like a big deal to make a few extra front plates to have available to customers (even if you have to special order them). But I don't know anything about their production either.

My opinion is that the Sarken is a crampon you kinda save for those routes where weight is a big issue. But it is not an all around crampon because the front points do wear quickly (more so than on my G14's) and are not replacable.

Being they are 14oz less than the G14 (with antibott plates), they are worth it, even though they are as Pabordon described, a "disposable crampon".

They do climb rock well. Must be the "softer" metal.

 

jedi