Idily avoiding doing uni work and contemplating how much me knee hurts while caving and how much my stuff would be worth if the pain/pleasure ratio tipped a bit further and I ended up packing in

So I have a red ecrin-roc with duo fitted with a custom duo omni v2?  all in working order

What would it be worth do you reckon?

A lot less than you paid for it!

Might as well keep it and keep caving, you've got a spare knee after all 

I bought an 8 year old Vertex best with 14 led duo for ?50.

No pain no gain! Seriously though, is it painful enough to actually consider packing it in? That would be a shame. Even if you were considering it, I think the helmet/lamp should be the last thing to go, just in case you change your mind

When my knee went last year the doc gave me some physio exercises to do and I bought some glucosamine sulphate and some vitamins & calcium which all seemed to help.  Might be worth getting it checked out in case there's something else in order to head it off at the pass so to speak.
Keep the lid & light.

Take up mine exploration, a lot less of this undignified crawling nonsense. 

tamarmole said:

Take up mine exploration, a lot less of this undignified crawling nonsense. 

Click to expand...

That's almost funny

cavemanmike said:

tamarmole said:

Take up mine exploration, a lot less of this undignified crawling nonsense. 

Click to expand...

That's almost funny

Click to expand...

...but somewhat true.

After a decade caving without using knee pads I played rugby until I was almost forty and thought I had got away unscathed when I switched to mine exploration. Then in my sixties  my knees became largely useless as a result of earlier wear and tear.

My advice to young cavers - but good knee pads.

.

err,

"buy good knee pads"

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Definitely get good knee pads. It's well worth experimenting with the nailers or carpet fitters knee pads that are available from Screwfix and DIY stores. They may not be built for caving like the Warmtex ones, but they do offer a good deal more cushioning.

As for that "take up mine exploration" nonsense, Tamarmole obviously hasn't done much mine exploration in the Forest of Dean.
Take up slate mine exploration maybe.

Don't get rid of your hat and lamp, even if you do give up caving; unless you want to sell it to me for ?60.

I found an article by JW Puttrell on microfilm in Sheffield Library, describing a visit to the Lower Series of Bagshawe Cavern in about 1904 or something, and he wrote that by the end of the trip he would 'have given good money for a stout pair of kneepads'.

'Nailers' kneepads are the business, though they seem to have gone up a bit recently. I always wear shinpads underground too - so far they've saved me at least two broken legs, one from a football-sized rock a certain caver friend managed to send down a slope onto my shin, and it just bounced off. ?5 a pair from Decathlon

Crawling is fine, funnily enough.

I can do side track or henslers stupidly long boring crawl and not have a problem but a stroll in peaks upper gallery or that incline in cwmorthin then I'm creaking clicking and all sorts!

Last time I did cwmorthin I set off before everyone else back down to the hut and still arrived 20 minutes after everyone else 

Don't worry, I was thinking the same thoughts three years ago and I'm still heading underground

Carpet fitters knee pads made by snickers(thousands of small polystyrene balls) . I use them professionally and underground.
I have pockets sown into my undersuit

Knee clicking isn't a good sign.

Visit to quack called for.....

definitely get your knee looked at. Caving or no caving.. you're going to need them for a bloody long time yet.

Ive just had my knee pop in a big way whilst  climbing. Luckily Ive only torn the hamstring insertion at the knee and the prognosis is good for it to heal without recourse to keyhole etc.  Still two weeks later and I'm still limping along, barely able to break into a trot to  cross a busy road.  Now my other knee/ hip are aching as they have compensated.

My sister has just had keyhole on hers for some cartilage issues. She's worse than me and its been a much slower recovery.  We're both in our mid 40s!

Its really shocked me as to how debilitating its been .. Well at least I can do some mountain bik... oh. Well get back to some cav..  er.. concentrate on the orientee.. dang..  pub anyone?

So go get it looked at.. and start looking after them!  Use knee pads. use walking poles. 

I assume you likely to live into your 80s.. so how many more years is that!

On the bright side,  my dad went up his first 4000m alp last year.. he's 80 with two plastic hips and 1 plastic knee!

PS.. dont really expect much from your gp.. (sorry mrodoc).. they'll prescribe some ibuprofen and refer you on to a nhs physio. You might get seen in 2019 sometime.

Cut out the middle men and go straight to a physio.  Costs a bit but money well spent I reckon.

I got six free physio appointments when my (moderately) slipped disc had a bit of a move, and I ended up with a very fuzzy hand for a while, but they were definitely encouraging me to do my own exercises and to try and give up before the six appointments had been fulfilled. I got the message, but the exercises did/do help - when I told the guy I went caving he was very pleased, and said that it would probably do more good than anything he could do for me...