Comments on aliens...

[Ishmael]

yeah, but they are saying 11 ish kn of force for the cam... when you place a nut rated at 2-4 kn that is what you figure on... not a cam rated at 11 kn failing at 5 kn. Maybe stay away from aliens for the first couple of placements, thus dropping the fall factor/force?

[mkporwit]

I believe the RC.com user 'adatesman', the OP of the latest Alien thread over there, would be happy to test them for you for a small fee.

 

Thanks Joseph, I sent him an e-mail and we'll see what he comes back with.

Checked with adatesman, and he's not willing to do any more independent testing for now -- didn't want to be seen as having posted the failures to drum up business or anything like that.

So I'm off to investigate other venues... but I think in the meantime the Aliens are coming off the rack.

[RuMR]

yeah, but they are saying 11 ish kn of force for the cam... when you place a nut rated at 2-4 kn that is what you figure on... not a cam rated at 11 kn failing at 5 kn. Maybe stay away from aliens for the first couple of placements, thus dropping the fall factor/force?

or maybe leave them on the ground...

 

i can't imagine a company doing this???? Seriously poor judgement...

[alexbaker]

Metolius will be producing mastercam offsets soon. It's too bad that mastercams suck tough. They do have the distinct advantage of not breaking however.

 

Alex

[AR_Guy]

This level of failure in my line of work (aerospace) would result in immediate grounding of the suspect piece of equipment, no ifs, ands or butts. One need not be a metalurgist to realize that.

 

These pieces of equipment, cams in this case, but it applies to all the gear used in climbing, are life safety critical. That this bunch at CCH have put out suspect life safety critical equipment in the past, and apparently, based on the seperated piece above, still are....sheese. Again, in my line of work, the FAA would have shut down a supplier with a record like this a LONG time ago. Climbing has enough objective hazzards when the gear is all top notch. To play Russian Roulette (good or not) with your pro.....

 

Being relatively new to this sport, I saw the earlier incarnations of this topic when I was deciding to buy my trad rack. I bought all BD - C4s, C3s, stoppers and hexes. At least when I leave the deck, I don't worry if my equipment has manufacturing defects. Placed properly, I have every reason to believe they'll hold their full rated strength.

 

CCH should just sell the design to a competent manufacturer and collect the royalities.

[Choada_Boy]

It's pretty clear that CCH has either never heard of 6 sigma quality control or they have and they don't give a shit, or can't give a shit, because they don't know what they are doing. The problem is that they have a nice design that keeps people using them despite the clearly demonstrated risk to life and limb.

 

And to the fool that thinks a cam rated to 12kn is OK if it breaks at 5kn: are you fucking retarded????? It should break at 24kn or even 48kn if it's rated to 12kn. That's called a "Factor of Safety". If you're OK with an FoS on a piece of safety equipment of less than .5, you're a blithering idiot.

[John Frieh]

If you think aliens are sketchy wait till you whinners start ice climbing! :laf:

[RuMR]

It's pretty clear that CCH has either never heard of 6 sigma quality control or they have and they don't give a shit, or can't give a shit, because they don't know what they are doing. The problem is that they have a nice design that keeps people using them despite the clearly demonstrated risk to life and limb.

 

And to the fool that thinks a cam rated to 12kn is OK if it breaks at 5kn: are you fucking retarded????? It should break at 24kn or even 48kn if it's rated to 12kn. That's called a "Factor of Safety". If you're OK with an FoS on a piece of safety equipment of less than .5, you're a blithering idiot.

BAWHAHAHAHA....

[eldiente]

Anyone that think their Aliens are unsafe can send them my way.

[catbirdseat]

How is it that failure of a single device leads to decking from 75 feet? How many of you would trust your life to a single placement at that distance from the ground.

 

Having said that, I imagine there are a fair number of bold routes that just don't protect that well, but then safety is ensured by not falling.

 

BTW, eldiente, you are so lame.

[RuMR]

How is it that failure of a single device leads to decking from 75 feet?

 

you don't climb much, do you?????

[111]

It's too bad that mastercams suck tough.

 

Alex

and why's that? they are starting to look pretty good right now...

[alexbaker]

They simply don't place as well as an alien. Maybe they're too stiff, maybe the metal is too hard, I'm not really sure why. Climb pin scars with aliens then with those and the choice is clear. I shouldn't say they suck though, because they don't. They are just not as good as aliens, assuming aliens don't break, haha.

[eldiente]

BTW, eldiente, you are so lame.

 

Oddly enough the people doing the most complaining don't actually use Aliens or have stopped using them.If you don't like them, don't use them. My offer still stands, send them my way.

 

Clearly only idiots and morons use Aliens. Look at this asshole here. He's a long along way out above a Black Alien pulling the crux on a 5.14 pitch. Someone needs to let this guy know how unsafe that Alien is.

[img:left]http://www.alpinist.com/media/ALP20/trotter_path.jpg[/img]

[Gary_Yngve]

It should break at 24kn or even 48kn if it's rated to 12kn. That's called a "Factor of Safety". If you're OK with an FoS on a piece of safety equipment of less than .5, you're a blithering idiot.

 

If it breaks at 48kN, it's too damn heavy.

 

If it is rated at 12kN, I would want 99.99% of models to break at above 12kN. If they broke at 13kN, it's no less safe than breaking at 48kN, assuming my requirements were that they are rated at 12kN.

 

[hemp22]

looks like that picture was taken on the same route as the infamous "mirco cam" video.

Another fine example of quality control

[Aric Datesman]

Hey Guys,

 

I'm the one who did the testing and don't normally follow CC, but figured I'd check to make sure there's no bad info going around. My only issue is that my testing shows that there are faulty pieces out in the wild and I would strongly recommend that anyone who uses Aliens have them proof tested to whatever load they're comfortable climbing above. I couldn't care less whether CCH stays in business or not and personally don't use their gear due to concerns over their process control (spent over a decade in manufacturing and what I've seen disturbs me).

 

Climb safe people.

 

-aric.

[hafilax]

Anyone that think their Aliens are unsafe can send them my way.

Nobody is saying that all Aliens are unsafe but that there are a statistically significant number that are and that there have been accidents as a result of Aliens failing. I still think that a quick inspection of the braze will differentiate the good from the not so good. What is clear is that CCH has sub standard quality control and they, so far, have been unable to rectify that glaring shortcoming.

[counterfeitfake]

I still think that a quick inspection of the braze will differentiate the good from the not so good.

 

Why do you think that?

 

 

Here is the RC.com thread, which has a lot of good info.

 

Those who are saying "It failed at X, that is still pretty strong" are desperately missing the point. The point is this company told you it was rated to Y. Their manufacturing process is inconsistent enough that there is no way to know what you're getting.

 

Pull testing is a joke, especially under these circumstances. Having a consistent process and testing a representative sample to failure is the only way to be trustworthy. When pieces fail they should fail considerably above their rated strength, and with a consistent failure mode. Multiple failure modes at well below rated strength... how can anyone argue that this is not a huge problem?

 

It is a shame, because Aliens are so nice to use, but they plainly can't be trusted. If you are so in love with them that you want to continue using them, that is your business, and I do not criticize you for it. But stop spouting horrible faulty stupid logic.

[AR_Guy]

Gary hits the nail on the head on strength ratings - it's similar to how strength / stress allowables in raw materials (for aerospace) are determined. Break a bunch of samples, set the strength rating such that 99.xx% are at or above said rating.

 

If your process control is so poor that you get a wide variation in actual breaking strengths, you'll end up knocking down your allowable / rated strength so that you have confidence that any one item you pick up will meet that rating.

 

If CCH just tagged them at being good for only 3kn, problem "solved".

[AR_Guy]

CCF - Wow.... Scary.

[Choada_Boy]

Hey eldumbass: it doesn't matter what you think about your gear, or how hard you climb, or who uses Aliens or how willing they are to run it out on the smallest cam, or your brand loyalty. What matters is the fact that these things have been shown to fail repeatedly and catastrophically below their rated strength both in testing and in use. You're still cool with climbing on them? Good for you. I wish I were that dumb. I'd be saving myself some cash by not having to replace gear that has been shown that it cannot be trusted to work as it should or as claimed.

 

Gary: I see your point but I would hope that a piece of climbing gear could be expected to consistently fail above it's rated strength by some factor of safety.

[billcoe]

Thanks for doing the work Aric.

 

Interesting in that this is at least the 3rd time since they've been stamping "tensile tested" on the units that I've seen a failure test which shows that some Aliens shockingly fail way below the rating.

 

Always followed by the exact same posts we are seeing here. I'm just glad that there are not more fatalities in the wild.

 

ps: thanks again to Paul Fish of Mountain Gear for stepping up to the plate and having some of his stock destructively tested so that CCH would believe there was an issue and the dot recall could start. I am convinced this act saved some lives. One giant reason to support that company.

 

http://www.mountaingear.com/pages/product/Search_Results_Endeca_New.asp?Ntt=sale&Nu=p_rollup&Ntx=mode+matchallpartial&Ns=p_popular|0||p_name|0&Ntk=s_search&N=1014

[Choada_Boy]

Anyone that think their Aliens are unsafe can send them my way.

Nobody is saying that all Aliens are unsafe

 

I am saying that all Aliens are unsafe.

[hafilax]

The top one clearly looks like it has a good braze and the middle one clearly has a terrible braze. You can tell by the fillet of brazing material outside of the sleeve.

 

The bottom one is a little fuzzier and I can't recall what it pulled to. The braze isn't as good as the top one but better than the middle as there is some brazing material outside of the sleeve but the fillet isn't as nice as it should be.

 

The axle bending issue is an entirely different beast.