?Bargain? Carabiners

[mikem]

Slightly dented gates are another frequent cause. Yes, nervous companions do tend to over tighten.

 

[andrewmcleod]

A lot of the times I see karabiners jammed its because people are still using ancient krabs that tighten up against the nose of the krab (there is no stop on the gate as there is in modern designs). Personally if I had any of those I would throw them away, rather than abusing spanners on them.

You sit your weight on the karabiner. The karabiner stretches slightly. You tighten up the gate against the nose. You unweight the karabiner. The karabiner unstretches, and now firmly jams against the nose. Only re-weighting the karabiner (thus re-stretching it) will allow you to undo the karabiner again...

It shouldn't happen with modern carabiner designs no matter how much you try and overtighten (although sometimes it still seems to; I suspect it's something to do with the gate jamming against grit instead of the nose).

(PS I realise most of the people on this thread already know this)

 

[mikem]

You can always remove all the weight saving advantages by carrying molegrips!

(BTW spanners won't work on standard gates, apart from to hit them with; & I probably have 50 ...)

 

[MJenkinson]

Personally I find skipping a couple of choccy digestives the previous day beats the weight saving of leaving out the krab gate locks.

True, on real lighweight trips, sometimes I only have beans on toast at Inglesport instead of a large cavers.

 

[Mike Hopley]

Camp make good stuff. That looks like a great rigging krab.

Just because you haven't seen it in Inglesport doesn't make it dodgy. Go browse the via ferrata (and climbing) kit in Cortina d'Ampezzo, you'll see lots of Camp gear.

 

[Fjell]

I am slightly more prejudiced against Kong, another Italian company. When we were teenagers we bought a Kong autolock bobbin descender because it was very very cheap and on very very special offer. It also turned out to be disturbingly bendy for something made of metal and had lots of hinges and lever bits. I think it went out of production about 5-10 years before the Web was invented, so is lost in the mists of time.

 

[pwhole]

The Camp Turbo chest ascender is a fantastic bit of kit that lasted over twice as long as the latest Croll, and I recently bought their tiny Solo 2 hand-jammer to try, though sadly only got one trip in before work and then the lockdown got in the way. But I wouldn't worry about them as a manufacturer, personally.

 

[mikem]

Fjell, I don't think you have to worry about that sort of thing nowadays: https://www.kong.it/

 

[Ian Ball]

Hi Mike Hopley, I don't buy from Inglesport, Bernies or Starless River because I think all else is dodgy, I buy from them so they don't disappear.  Not that a maillon every few months will make much difference but you know, there you go. 

 

[cavemanmike]

The Camp Turbo chest ascender is a fantastic bit of kit that lasted over twice as long as the latest Croll,

Totally agree, I've had a turbo chest ascender for a couple of years now and still work's a treat.

 

[Mike Hopley]

Hi Mike Hopley, I don't buy from Inglesport, Bernies or Starless River because I think all else is dodgy, I buy from them so they don't disappear.  Not that a maillon every few months will make much difference but you know, there you go. 

Sure, I'll buy from them out of preference too (default to Starless) -- provided they have (or can get) what I want, and at a somewhat competitive price.

 

[wellyjen]

I am slightly more prejudiced against Kong, another Italian company. When we were teenagers we bought a Kong autolock bobbin descender because it was very very cheap and on very very special offer. It also turned out to be disturbingly bendy for something made of metal and had lots of hinges and lever bits. I think it went out of production about 5-10 years before the Web was invented, so is lost in the mists of time.

Another Italian brand with a dodgy reputation back in the '80's was Bonatti, after the famous climber. Their krabs were known as Bendy Bonattis for a good reason! Very cheap though. I just did a web search on them and it came up with Kong as the first hit. Perhaps they took them over. We reckoned to pay around ?5 for a decent krab back then, so with inflation their cost has plummeted.
Jen

 

[Ed]

I am slightly more prejudiced against Kong, another Italian company. When we were teenagers we bought a Kong autolock bobbin descender because it was very very cheap and on very very special offer. It also turned out to be disturbingly bendy for something made of metal and had lots of hinges and lever bits. I think it went out of production about 5-10 years before the Web was invented, so is lost in the mists of time.

Another Italian brand with a dodgy reputation back in the '80's was Bonatti, after the famous climber. Their krabs were known as Bendy Bonattis for a good reason! Very cheap though. I just did a web search on them and it came up with Kong as the first hit. Perhaps they took them over. We reckoned to pay around ?5 for a decent krab back then, so with inflation their cost has plummeted.
Jen

I've some of the Bonatti krabs still going strong after 30 years or so

 

[langcliffe]

I see that Go Outdoors are calling in the administrators. I now understand why those carabiners were so cheap, and I'm patting myself on the back for buying some.

 

[mikem]

I suspect they are calling in the administrator as their margins were too tight to survive 3 months shut down.

 

[pwhole]

Hmmm - a shame for me as my local store is 100 metres from my flat. Though I was buying less and less there if I'm honest - not that they didn't have a good range, I just don't buy enough stuff!

 

[droid]

Used to have a shop in Hathersage, absolutely brilliant for bargains.....

 

[Mark Wright]

I?ve still got 6 months to run on my Sheffield Go Outdoors discount card!

The Sheffield shop is/was brilliant, I must have spent thousands in there over the past 30 years or so. It was CCC before Go Outdoors took it over. I used to run rope access courses in their climbing wall in the early/mid 1990?s. mind you that didn?t last long before it closed down.

 

[Wardy]

Not all is lost
It has not closed, it is just applying to go into administration so is still open for now.
If / when it goes into administration it could be sold off if someone wants it and get a new lease of life.
If not and it is liquidated then they will sell off what stock they can and the bargain karabiners are likely to become even cheaper.
So you may save a couple more quid on some biners, but unfortunately 2400 people are worried about something bigger than that.
As Mikem says if you sell too cheap it can catch uo with you

 

[pwhole]

Well given the proximity to my flat, I shall be in the socially-distanced queue if they decide to flog everything off. I need a new hat for one thing. I've got plenty of expensive carbiners as well as some cheap ones so I'll be OK there. The last couple of years they really started to pull out of stocking even vaguely caving-related kit in their climbing section. Once Crolls had gone it was pointless looking really. Bought a lot of accessory cord though, and always pissed off the assistants who had to breathe in all that lovely smoke while I stood a safe distance.

But as my loyalty is really to CCC it is a shame they're closing as they were pioneers back in the day - from this very shop