UKC

yesterday BOTH the plastic krabs I use to rack my ice screws failed, one getting stuck with the gate inwards and the other flipped to the outer side of the lip. Result - 2 ice screws lost mid route. I wasnt doing anything unusual with them, they werent overloaded and unfortunately I didnt notice. I guess my twisting about knocked other gear onto them or something.

So if anyone was on IceFall Gully, Black Laddders after us on sunday 7/3 and found a couple of short-mid screws, please let me know!!
Beck

In reply to smartclimbing:

This happens all the time with the old school Charlet clips as well. Never had a problem with this method http://www.frozentime.se/climbing/iceclip.html and I've been using that sort of clip most winter weekends for about the last nine years.

In reply to smartclimbing:

Since you can also lose screws from them without any visual signs of 'failing', I've stopped using mine.

In reply to smartclimbing: This happens sometimes, petzl ones do it too,

Tobys homemade Simond version works well, especially as you cant get simond in the uk easily at the momment

In reply to Rebecca Williams: Same happened last weekend to climbing partner, fortunately the ice screw was retrieved, think they are pretty poor.

In reply to lamb: This happened to me, but luckily I was low down-I caught it in a chimmney and ripped it off. I replaced them with BD Ovals but still use the black rubber-thingy to attach it to the webbing, so it isn't bomb-proof, but better.

In reply to Rebecca Williams:

I suspect the recent badmouthing of these devices on here is more due to misuse rather than failure.

Clippers are cheap, effective and made of plastic. If they are overloaded with too many screws they may fall open or reverse their gate on removal of a screw. If you use them when struggling up a chimney, they may deform. If you have a monster mixed rack on your harness next to them... All of these and a whole list of other circumstances may lead to you dropping a screw. However for climbing unrestricted icefalls (what they are actually designed for) and loaded up correctly these clippers are excellent. IMO you will drop less screws climbing icefalls with clippers than you would attaching screws using a crab and fiddling around trying to remove said screw without it sticking to your tongue/lips etc.

The bottom line is to think! Screws can also be made to "walk out" of those rubber condom things too. In these situations it is often the user that is atr fault, not the gear.

In reply to 3leggeddog:

And I'm prepared to state categorically that mine were not misused. So where does that leave us?

In reply to petestack:

Unlucky?

I have used the same BD clippers for several years and think they work fine.

In reply to petestack:

40 quid down and sulking?

I suppose its a risk we take everytime we do a route, we may drop a piece of gear. Clippers along with leashless tools, monopoints, modern screws etc take a grade off climbing as it was 15 years ago but with this convenience comes a different risk (dropped tool, screw).

Bottom line is clippers make climbing ice safer and I am not sure we would drop any less using old fashioned fumble methods to rack them.

In reply to TobyA:

this is very good : )

In reply to gear boy:

For what it's worth I've had no issues with either the BD or Petzl versions but I don't overload them. I've used them on both UK mixed and Alpine icefalls.

However, I agree about the homemade rack; a brilliant idea. But if you prefer the 'real deal' - Simond racks are available by mail order from Up and Under in Cardiff:
http://www.upandunder.co.uk/eshop/catalogue/testbs.asp?Manufacturer_ID=190&...

In reply to Dave Williams:


I also had the BD plastic things fail on me in Rjukan, luckily on short route so could retrieve screws, now use the Simmond double crab rack and they great never had problem with it