New to caving - what to buy/loan list ??
- Thread starter Geoff R
- Start date
Peter Burgess
New member
Err, it was a piece of elastic I think?
Since my newbie trip I have visited a couple of caving emporia. I was impressed with the advice and local information given - do a few more trips underground before investing in gear etc. Unlike other activities I have been involved in, I wasn't bombarded with technical waffle or given the heavy sell to part with all my dosh on non-essential gubbins. 
M
MSD
Guest
Peter Burgess said:Here's me in 1979 (!) on an early underground trip into an easy mine - boilersuit, site helmet, walking boots and stinky!
Peter, if you are a "forum pendant" that implies you are some kind of decorative jewelery, usually worn hanging from a necklace....
cap n chris
Well-known member
Oh, MSD, the forum pendant will chastise you for spelling Jewellery incorrectly! Brace yourself!..... :doubt:
Peter Burgess
New member
Dingle dangle. Did anyone notice how shiny my lovely brand new stinky was in 1979?
cap n chris
Well-known member
Peter Burgess said:
No. However, now you come to mention it, it does look exceptionally brand new. My attention was drawn, however, to your unfeasibly long legs which appear to comprise four-fifths of your body.
W
Walrus
Guest
The person Darkplaces mentioned above was me! FYI here is the list of stuff I got:
Builders helmet (£5) from Homebase with sticky coat hooks (£2) stuck on it to hold a headlamp on - . Headlamp was a no-name jobby bought off eBay for £15. A boilersuit (£5) and wellies (£9) from B&Q and a cheap rucksack off the market for a fiver.
So all told I got all I needed including batteries (and spare batteries & torches) for under £40.
And I do like it so I've bought a proper helmet (£35, should be delivered tomorrow) and I'm looking for a better light - see seperate thread.
Builders helmet (£5) from Homebase with sticky coat hooks (£2) stuck on it to hold a headlamp on - . Headlamp was a no-name jobby bought off eBay for £15. A boilersuit (£5) and wellies (£9) from B&Q and a cheap rucksack off the market for a fiver.
So all told I got all I needed including batteries (and spare batteries & torches) for under £40.
And I do like it so I've bought a proper helmet (£35, should be delivered tomorrow) and I'm looking for a better light - see seperate thread.
M
MSD
Guest
cap 'n chris said:
OMG hoisted by my own petard, whilst hoisting someone else by his petard. This is ridiculous.
Peter Burgess
New member
It was! Bought a day or so earlier from a good little camping shop in Redhill which ended up being known by us as "Bona Camping", ( a name lost on anyone who doesn't remember "Round the Horn".)
This would have been a photo taken on its first trip.
I worry about you, Chris.
C
cucc Paul
Guest
Im with the good helmet people slipped on a rock last week and bumped my head with out my lid i think i would be seeing stars and i dint even fall over. The other thing to bare in mind a building site helmet wont protect your head much at all in a fall situation the internal harnesses are designed differently. You can get cheap ecrin rocks and Elios helmets of borrow... Head injuries also blead alot which most importantly makes a mess of conservation sites in caves which ruins them for ever oh and scares newbies
D
Dep
Guest
It really depends what sort of caving you start with.
I started in the local mines, undergound stone quarries - no fall potential apart from the shaft.
If someone had told me I needed to spend 200GBP on kit I would have laughed at them and found another hobby!
I used an old boiler suit I had, old wellies, a hard-hat I bought as I did not want to smack my head and a cheap head-torch. By far the greatest expense was 50m of sisal rope from the local DIY store to make a rope-ladder long enough to get down the shaft (No.3 - 17ft deep - same site as PB's picture from 1979)
Eventually I joined our club and as I met more people I gradually saw what others had, its benefits etc and quickly learnt the short-comings of my kit.
The one new item I bought fairly early on was a helmet - hard-hats have peaks which make crawling awkward as you cannot see where you are going.
Slowly over time I acquired a few second hand items such as oversuit and lamp - someone showed me how to cannibalise a flashlight to use the lead-acid cells inside.
By this time I was hooked on caving and sufficently experienced to understand what all the kit was for and what I really needed.
Only at this point was I ready to commit hard to come by cash for proper kit - my first trip to S.Wales involved an early morning stop-off at Dragon to get a furry and neoprene socks as I would be wet caving for the first time.
And then I got into SRT - no short-cuts there, my homemade battery pack proved too bulky and I treated myself to an FX Ion because of its tiny battery.
Now, a good few years later I have probably forked out around 500GBP for my full kit and various bits and bobs - none of this has been wasted and contrasts with the 30GBP or so it took me to get into the sport.
Only people with more money than sense (or extremely good fortune) would consider forking out that sort of money on a hobby they may not like.
Nowadays I have enough spare kit and others around me with the same that we can usually ensure that new people have all they need for reasonably comfortable and safe caving.
But despite the cost of the kit it lasts a long time, and overall caving is a remarkably cheap hobby.
Any old kit will do as long initially as you do not try to exceed its limitations - caving is all about the learning experience.
I started in the local mines, undergound stone quarries - no fall potential apart from the shaft.
If someone had told me I needed to spend 200GBP on kit I would have laughed at them and found another hobby!
I used an old boiler suit I had, old wellies, a hard-hat I bought as I did not want to smack my head and a cheap head-torch. By far the greatest expense was 50m of sisal rope from the local DIY store to make a rope-ladder long enough to get down the shaft (No.3 - 17ft deep - same site as PB's picture from 1979)
Eventually I joined our club and as I met more people I gradually saw what others had, its benefits etc and quickly learnt the short-comings of my kit.
The one new item I bought fairly early on was a helmet - hard-hats have peaks which make crawling awkward as you cannot see where you are going.
Slowly over time I acquired a few second hand items such as oversuit and lamp - someone showed me how to cannibalise a flashlight to use the lead-acid cells inside.
By this time I was hooked on caving and sufficently experienced to understand what all the kit was for and what I really needed.
Only at this point was I ready to commit hard to come by cash for proper kit - my first trip to S.Wales involved an early morning stop-off at Dragon to get a furry and neoprene socks as I would be wet caving for the first time.
And then I got into SRT - no short-cuts there, my homemade battery pack proved too bulky and I treated myself to an FX Ion because of its tiny battery.
Now, a good few years later I have probably forked out around 500GBP for my full kit and various bits and bobs - none of this has been wasted and contrasts with the 30GBP or so it took me to get into the sport.
Only people with more money than sense (or extremely good fortune) would consider forking out that sort of money on a hobby they may not like.
Nowadays I have enough spare kit and others around me with the same that we can usually ensure that new people have all they need for reasonably comfortable and safe caving.
But despite the cost of the kit it lasts a long time, and overall caving is a remarkably cheap hobby.
Any old kit will do as long initially as you do not try to exceed its limitations - caving is all about the learning experience.