Zenolith Posted May 16, 2001 Share Posted May 16, 2001 Anyone have experience with these? I can think of more crack climbs with flared cracks than paralell so I imagine they might be rather useful, especially in the larger sizes. Black Dome is having a big sale on these $32 apeice, and also on rigid stems and 1.5 tech friends. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dru Posted May 16, 2001 Share Posted May 16, 2001 borrowed a friends once and i would say they are most useful for aid, or in particular sizes for particular routes. in 10 yrs. of climbing at squamish i can only think of one place on one route where they would work where nothing else will (for free routes anyways). pretty much a specialist piece IMHO. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
forrest_m Posted May 17, 2001 Share Posted May 17, 2001 Dunno if they're "specialist piece", more depends on where you climb. I have a couple of small offset aliens and I use them a lot. Plugging them into pin scars, which you do a lot at old-school granite areas (index, squamish, etc.) you can often get a half size bigger than if you have an even sized cam, ie. the blue-green alien instead of the blue tcu. One or two in the smaller sizes, anyway, is pretty useful. I've also found that they often can be placed well even if a non-offset cam would also work, so they make a good alternative to doubles in certain sizes.(They're also considered more or less essential for a modern aid rack.) $.02 I do think any offset piece bigger than the yellow tcu would probably not be that useful. [This message has been edited by forrest_m (edited 05-16-2001).] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dru Posted May 17, 2001 Share Posted May 17, 2001 pin scars are for tri-cams. for the narrow scars that's where you need home made 0.2s and 0.3's on wire Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Retrosaurus Posted May 18, 2001 Share Posted May 18, 2001 I use the HB offset nuts and truly love'em. They often degrade a R/X route into the realm of sanity. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
erik Posted May 18, 2001 Share Posted May 18, 2001 a consideration of the wild country line, the stem length. if have been climbing long you probably notice how many wc cams are fixed. these cams might have a "patented" cam angle offering unparalled strength, but if this bad boy walks even a bit you are screwed! granted you should probably place the cam tight, to alleve this issue. but in a non-perfect world we can't always do it. plus aleins just for some reason seem for superior. later zeno. p.s. no shit talkin here ole boy! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zenolith Posted May 24, 2001 Author Share Posted May 24, 2001 Thx for the info Erik. I have never noticed that about friends since I don't know anyone who uses them (I use some rigid stems but have never had a problem like you describe). I don't aid climb (yet) so I dont really have much use for offset cams. I do think they may be handy for a lot of columnar basalt climbs where the larger cracks are more weathered on the outside and thus don't take a regular #10 Metolius as well as I'd like. That inspires me to start a new thread... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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