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Off White
climber
Tenino, WA
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Jul 17, 2018 - 06:41pm PT
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I had a Ny-Chock way back in the day. Black cylinder with tapered ends and a through slot with webbing in it, sort of a plastic version of a Peck Cracker. I think it only came in one size. Wasn't exactly worthless, there was a perfect place for it on The Stairs at Mission Gorge, pretty much everyone's first 5.3 lead at the scruffy local San Diego crag. Long gone the way of the zephyr, it's the thing in the top of this picture pilfered from teh internets.
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Da-Veed
Big Wall climber
Bigfork
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Jul 18, 2018 - 10:19am PT
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Yep, #7 Tricam!
Thought it would back up my "big cams" and at the time much cheaper, I think I place it a few time as a novelty. I guess if you found the right placement it would be bomber as passive. I used to use the pink through blue a lot and always loved getting the perfect placement with the smaller versions. This thing though is better used for a wind chime or a weapon!
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justthemaid
climber
Jim Henson's Basement
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Jul 18, 2018 - 12:37pm PT
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@ Daveed:
Although I've never used it climbing... Krull here makes an excellent home defense weapon.
Didn't pay for this either BTW... it was Bridwell's... so for sentimental reasons we keep it around to bludgeon any unfortunate intruders.
@ExCon: Steve haston swears by the one on the right
Does he by any chance have 6 fingers on his right hand?
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Spider Savage
Mountain climber
The shaggy fringe of Los Angeles
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Jul 18, 2018 - 01:04pm PT
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Little tiny brass nuts. Very specialized. Used one once and unnecessarily on Freak Bros. Dome, JT.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Jul 18, 2018 - 01:28pm PT
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Pterodactyls were pretty useless for waterfalls
Maybe if yer a knuckle dragger! What else was there at the time?
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Cragar
climber
MSLA - MT
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Jul 18, 2018 - 01:34pm PT
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slider nuts
wall hammock
bod harness
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Da-Veed
Big Wall climber
Bigfork
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Jul 18, 2018 - 01:49pm PT
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Nice justthemaid! I would keep that too.
Another item I have carried in mountaineering and big wall climbing and never used is the tri bloc...
Good for crevasse self rescue and dropped ascenders. I never complained about having these little guys on my harness!
Also a nice addition to the wind chimes!
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perswig
climber
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Jul 18, 2018 - 05:12pm PT
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Wookey Shovel Pack.
Construction is beautiful and it's rugged kit, but it's just ... weird.
Sits too high when you're skinning, rubs the back of your neck and kinda crowds the pole push (maybe mine is just sized too large).
If packed light, you might as well go with a lumbar pack; if packed heavy, it throws off your balance on the down and given the design you can't alter where it sits at all.
I keep trying to come up with a way to use it. Best I can come up with would be letting an 11C hump mortar rounds and the tube.
Or maybe bricks up a set of stairs.
Dale
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JMC
climber
the land of milk and honey
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Jul 18, 2018 - 09:12pm PT
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More than I can recall. Ebay was a good source for both b uying and selling sh*t that proved to be useless or at teh very least, not worth using or carrying around. Some winners(losers). By the early 2000s, I got a little wiser, so most useless crap I experienced was 20 years ago:
- a 5-in-1 or 6-in-1 fleece/nylon hood/balaclava. Bought at sport chalet in the early 90s, was on sale for a good reason. Too heavy, to hot, too bulky for So Cal winters. Maybe if I was a sled dog in the Yukon.
- most tricams. WTF was I thinking. Some propaganda about them fitting in pockets at Courtright. I only climbed at Courtright on one trip, so why the hell did I need these things? Saw a pink stuck at the start of the Whitney East Face Route, a good place to abandon one.
- Koflach Arctis Vario(?) boots. Neither skied nor climbed well. Just about every plastic boot for that matter. Thank god for the leather boot revolution.
- sliding nuts. In the late 90s. Totally unnecessary.
- boxes of condoms. After the first couple of times, neither of su would want to use them, so they would silently dessicate. I don't have any bastards or vermin in my jizz, so maybe all were useless?
- Nuts on cord. floppy, bulky. looked good, but other than that, sell them to some gear whore.
- TNF himalayan jacket for Sierra winters. It seems that the Palisades and Lee Vining inteh winter do not get cold enough. on to eBay.
There is more I am sure, that I have blocked from my memory in shame of havig bought it in the first place.
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Ksolem
Trad climber
Monrovia, California
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Jul 18, 2018 - 09:18pm PT
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Many of the items mentioned are specialized gear. Tricams, Ball Nuts, Sliders, small hexes...
Often such devices will be solid when no other gear is. The rest of the time they're junk.
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justthemaid
climber
Jim Henson's Basement
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Jul 19, 2018 - 05:21am PT
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OK- just remember one that was NOT a specialized piece of gear that I did pony up for and was totally disappointed.
Misty Mountain's Gorge Pack.
https://mistymountain.com/shop/climbing/climbing-packs/gorge-pack/
LOVE Misty Mountain harnesses, - I won't buy anything else so I was trying to support them, but that pack was the weirdest, most useless uncomfortable thing I've ever purchased in my life. It's a one-size deal so you need to be right size. The draw-string would never close correctly. It was top load only and a total PIA to get stuff in and out. Straps were sewn on in a way that made it unbalanced. I could go on.
Lesson learned- don't but without trying on in person. Sold it cheap to a noob after a few months.
To their credit- I see they have redesigned it with a zipper (it was top-load only before) added some gear loops and pocket. They also expanded their pack selection.
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Gunkie
Trad climber
Valles Marineris
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Jul 19, 2018 - 05:53am PT
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One example of many: 1st generation Fire' climbing shoes, circa summer of 1983. Bought them really really tight; gave them away a few months later after they stretched out about 4 sizes (well, it felt that way). Was wearing heavy wool socks at the end just to keep them on my feet.
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Mark Force
Trad climber
Ashland, Oregon
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Jul 19, 2018 - 06:35am PT
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Big Bros and hexes
Big bros work well once you left the feel of them. Hexes are a particularly elegant and nuanced tool - not so good for Indian Creek - otherwise a wonderful tool for the trained hand and eye. Like a fine axe, a pleasure to use.
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Moof
Big Wall climber
Orygun
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Jul 19, 2018 - 10:33am PT
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My Big Bros have been placed about a half dozen times total, mostly contrived placements.
Hexes are region specific, crappy in parallel cracks, great in funky v-slots and erratic cracks. I often racked the three biggest WC ones, which bailed me out a few times. The start of Double Cross in Jtree is a great example. You can get an iffy cam in the runnel, a shitty nut below that, or you can slot a slammer hex vertically (sling sticking straight out of the wall). Just slot your fist as a meat stopper above that and you can pull the opening move to slot a great cam above with no fear of ground fall.
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phylp
Trad climber
Upland, CA
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Jul 19, 2018 - 01:26pm PT
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I bought one of those gear slings with all the extra plastic loops on it. Theoretically it seemed like a good idea. In practice, I hated using the thing and stopped using it pretty quickly.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Jul 19, 2018 - 01:51pm PT
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Gunkie added:
One example of many: 1st generation Fire' climbing shoes, circa summer of 1983. Bought them really really tight; gave them away a few months later after they stretched out about 4 sizes (well, it felt that way). Was wearing heavy wool socks at the end just to keep them on my feet. Sacrilege! Ha ha!
They ushered in the sticky rubber revolution fer cryin' out loud!
My first pair were a size too big: so I put chunks of closed cell foam (think ensolite pad) behind my heels to shove my toes forward into the toe box.
They didn't edge very well, but were still a vast improvement over EBs.
And yes, they were un-lined, so the leather stretched ...
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ontheedgeandscaredtodeath
Social climber
Wilds of New Mexico
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Jul 19, 2018 - 02:51pm PT
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I bought a set of these thinking they would be the bees knees. Alas, they never seemed to work for me. Maybe in some other part of the world...
I actually have used the #7 tri-cam frequently derided on this thread! Back in the day it was a poor man's substitute for big cams for me. Looking up at some 5.10+ offwidth most of us would rather have a sketchy 7 than nuthin!
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Concerned citizen
Big Wall climber
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Jul 19, 2018 - 06:37pm PT
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I wish to defend Tricams; I understand that many people found them difficult to place, relegating them to "useless" status, but I want to offer my defense within a personal historical record that might be of broader interest on this forum. I started climbing in 1969, relying on pitons, and then went to university in England where I fumbled with nuts.
Clean climbing with nuts had taken hold in the US when I returned, and for many years I did my modest free climbing using nuts that were mostly wishful thinking. The idea of hanging from a nut was unthinkable, and I doubt that many of my placements could have held. Certainly there were experts active from the start of that era, but there were (and still are) many in our community whose passive placements do not provide serious protection. I am not proud to confess that ineptness, but I did not know better and I failed to do better for many years.
My long-time climbing partner had committed to Tricams and developed extraordinary skill in their placements. The experience when we next climbed together (in Yosemite and Tuolomne) was an epiphany. I was in awe of his passive placements. For the first time in my life I would look at a placement (one of his, not one of mine!) and say "you could hang a Volkswagen from this piece and there is no way that nut will move." It changed my outlook as a climber, and it was centered on the sublime placements that were possible, in his hands, with Tricams. (Of course, pink Tricams had already demonstrated their perfect fit for horizontal cracks in my home area, the Gunks.)
While my life-changing experience centered on Tricams, a few years later I learned that the greatest divide between "wishful-thinking" placements and "you-can-stake-your-life on it" placements is big-wall aid climbing with bounce testing. My 12-year old son and I signed up for the five-day YMS aid climbing course culminating in an ascent of the Washington Column. We were indoctrinated in the necessity of weighting placements and bounce testing them before moving our daisy. This was the second time (after the Tricam experience) that we felt, physically, that these were passive placements that were not going to move or drop or rattle around or pull out. It was a revelation, and became the basis for our subsequent big wall ascents and the standard we apply to protection for free climbing.
I mention this because a portion of our climbing population remain uncertain over their placements, both with passive pieces and with cams. People who have never tested their placements are groping their way blindly, as did I before the Tricam experience and the revelation of bounce testing.
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Tarbuster
climber
right here, right now
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Jul 19, 2018 - 06:57pm PT
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In my experience, using a tri-cam where a regular nut will do is the situation wherein they get stuck.
It's the horizontal placement scenario where they excel.
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