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adatesman
Trad climber
philadelphia, pa
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Topic Author's Original Post - Jan 8, 2009 - 11:02am PT
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Hey everybody,
Sorry for the plug, but I thought this might appeal to any engineering geeks that hang out here at the Taco Stand. I've put together a homemade cam competition over at RC, so if you're at all interested in giving cam building a try take a look. Trango is sponsoring it and there's some great prizes.
Link to the announcement
-aric.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
Monrovia, CA
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Cam I enter one of my 'certified original' (I'm not kidding) Abalakovs? I didn't get 'em from da man but one of his minions in '78 in the Pamirs. "But wait, there's more!" They came with the Russkiematic plus a boxed set of titanium tubulars. All I had to give up was two pairs of Levis and I got Sylvester to comp me an autographed shot of him skiing off the Cap'n to sweeten the deal! Since I could habla russkie and Rick couldn't I just told him the picture was for the minion's sick kid who always wanted to ski but couldn't 'cause there was no downhilling there. They really wanted my Vuarnets too but I told 'em they had to throw in two of the 1 kilo cans of beluga they had stashed but that wasn't happening.
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nutjob
Stoked OW climber
San Jose, CA
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I'm just imagining this blind dude running around on a glacier with no glasses with a grin on his face and little eggs dribbling from his chin...
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adatesman
Trad climber
philadelphia, pa
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Topic Author's Reply - Jan 9, 2009 - 09:15am PT
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Abalakovs? Aren't those the ones with circular lobes that fall out unless they're placed in just the right sized crack? I've only ever seen pictures, so cool to hear you actually have some.
I'm afraid you won't be able to enter them though.... We're requiring everything to be made by the person entering the competition. But if you were to make a copy of it, that would be just fine.
If it helps tempt you guys into entering, the grand prize is Big Bros #1 - #4....
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Reilly
Mountain climber
Monrovia, CA
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"Aren't those the ones with circular lobes that fall out unless they're placed in just the right sized crack?"
They can rotate out but since we were used to Moacs and Hexes these were a big improvement. Plus, since they were of a fairly soft aluminum, you could give 'em a little 'set' and then they were pretty solid. Even after Friends came out I didn't leave home without them. I've put them in places I couldn't get a Friend. Of course Friends were easier to place so I generally used the Abs for belay anchors. That way you didn't have to worry about them rotating. The main drawback to mine was that the grooves in the curve would only take a piece of 7mm but, hey, there ain't no free lunch!
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richross
Trad climber
gunks,ny
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Taken in the Gunks in 1975. From North American Climber magazine.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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To be clear on attribution.....Jello has stated that he showed Abalakov the Tricam design during the first American- Soviet climbing exchange back in 1974.
Abalakov's genius came in adapting the design to allow them to be made from salvaged titanium belt drive wheels.
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richross
Trad climber
gunks,ny
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A T-Bone made by Gunks hardman Jeff Gruenberg (AKA Jersey Jeff or Bones) in the 80's.Probably one of the first homemade camming units smaller than a #1 Friend.
Pardon my knot.
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Jan 10, 2009 - 02:28am PT
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Chuck Kroger picked up this set of Abalakov cams on the third Soviet climbing exchange around the same time.
Kathy Green donated these to the YCA this summer. The only full set that I have ever seen! Thanks again for your support, Kathy.
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Gene
climber
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Jan 10, 2009 - 02:40am PT
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Steve,
It appears that the SMC (I think) camlocks were direct descendants of the Abalakov cams. True?
gm
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Steve Grossman
Trad climber
Seattle, WA
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Jan 10, 2009 - 04:52pm PT
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They both cam but the problem with the SMC's is that nothing in the design served to keep them in place against gravity. The tricam design is much better served by gravity and sling tension in an average placement.
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richross
Trad climber
gunks,ny
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Jan 10, 2009 - 05:31pm PT
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Did somebody say Camlocks?
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noshoesnoshirt
climber
I don't even know anymore
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Jan 10, 2009 - 06:44pm PT
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So if I submit a novel and extremely functional cam design to this contest who gets the patent rights?
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adatesman
Trad climber
philadelphia, pa
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Topic Author's Reply - Jan 10, 2009 - 06:51pm PT
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Sorry, I forgot to add that part into the Rules.... (been busy writing a "how to build a cam with just a hacksaw, drill and file" article). There's a post about it in the discussion thread:
It looks like we forgot to put something rather important into the Fine Print of the competition announcement: Who owns the rights to the designs of the entries.
This was touched on in the original competition discussion thread, and I'll quote what j_ung had to say about it here:
>>Nobody's questioned this yet, but for what it's worth,
>>even with a sponsor, adatesman would determine the rules
>>with Lab input. A sponsor would just get their name and
>>logo in on it in exchange for prizes. If somebody came up
>>with something really special, that sponsor would have no
>>unique dibs on it or anything, so don't worry about that
>>either.
That said, most likely sending a design in for the competition would count as a public disclosure as far as patent rights go, so if that's an issue for you I'd suggest having a chat with someone familiar with how patent law works.
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noshoesnoshirt
climber
I don't even know anymore
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Jan 10, 2009 - 07:22pm PT
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Nah, I'm not sitting on any earth-shaking designs, just curious as to the motivation of the contest.
I've got a couple of sheets of Al in my shed and a spreadsheet to plot the profile, mebbe I should give it a go.
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adatesman
Trad climber
philadelphia, pa
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Topic Author's Reply - Jan 10, 2009 - 08:54pm PT
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The motivation was partly beer and partly me getting annoyed with someone on RC. An old thread about building cams got dredged up a couple months ago and someone chimed in with this:
>>Hey I know, let's re-invent the wheel. While we're at it,
>>let's make sure to get on rc.noob and ask all the other noobs
>>for their valuable input to a process I shouldn't be
>>undertaking to begin with. Then, after the Instron tests
>>convince me how smart I am, let's go out to the rocks and
>>try it.
>>
>>Just go climbing and leave this stuff to the folks who know
>>what in the hell they are doing.
I spend a lot of time building and breaking cams, so this totally rubbed me the wrong way (even more so when he continued interrupting the thread with even more of this crap).
So nothing terribly nefarious going on, just thought people would find it amusing and that it really makes the point that its not actually that hard to do.
-a.
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