UKC

If you've not seen this video => vimeo.com/26642474 have a watch. Is this a trick? If so, false advertising?

If not, WOW i may be purchasing some new boreals!!

In reply to CharlieMack: Magnets in the shoes me think

In reply to CharlieMack: Just think about all the crud at the bottom of a climb they'll pick up if they are that sticky.

In reply to CharlieMack:

hmmm shame it's on vimeo. won't play on my pc

In reply to CharlieMack: I almost believed with some amazement the sole to sole stick but once he joined them toe to toe, no way!

In reply to CharlieMack:

hmmm magnets or witchcraft!

In reply to CharlieMack: They really are that sticky, i have seen it first hand. The new shoes look really funky too.

In reply to CharlieMack: I've been told that Evolv have a similar new shoe that you can do a similar thing with!

In reply to Frogger: Same here, Vimeo is rubbish on my old PB G4.

In reply to fireman_al:


Agreed. It is intuitively wrong.

In reply to jonny2vests:

People have been doing it with 5.10 rubber for years.

In reply to James_D:

Two shoes stuck together toe to toe using gravity defying friction? Have any evidence?

In reply to CharlieMack: So falling is now a thing of the past, even if your arms get knackered and you just can't hold on your feet will keep you right on route. Might be a bit problematic peeling your foot off the last hold and moving on if they are really that sticky!

In reply to CharlieMack:

Great stuff. All I need to do now is find a huge roof made entirely of magic Zenith rubber then I can front point my way across it!

In reply to The Ivanator:

They can really be that sticky because the shoes don't weigh a lot.

I wouldn't have thought there's any trickery about it.

Cheers
Tim

In reply to Timmd:

Seeing how stickiness and friction are completely different phenomenons, and that climbing rubber's qualities are purely those of friction with stickiness not imparting any benefits whatsoever, the question needs be asked as to why on earth would they design a rubber that 'sticks' like that. If it really does, that is.

In reply to Mr Lopez:

I'm not sure what you mean?

Wouldn't a stickier shoe conform to the surface of the rock more easily?

Tim

In reply to Timmd:

Sticky is just slang.

How can a smooth rubber surface (that isn't actually sticky), no matter how advanced, support real mass, in that configuration, through friction alone? Either it has some sort of tread near the toe (unlikely), or its bollux.

In reply to jonny2vests:

youtube.com/watch?v=tEmg1qszFPk&

But you have already shown that you are unwilling to accept video evidence, so I'm not sure what I can do?

In reply to James_D:

Maybe 5.10 possess a sense of humour and a pair of magnets as well?

In reply to James_D:

Ok, so two videos now (although the edit in the 5.10 video as he's doing it is suspect). So thats probably where Boreal got the idea.

But can anyone here claim to have done this? Did you have to 'prepare' the shoes somehow? Heat them up maybe? Any engineer will tell you friction alone won't do that, so if it is real, there must be something else coming into play.

Healthy skepticism is part of my job.

In reply to James_D:

yeah - i saw it demonstrated with a pair of 5.10's in 1989. It might have been the original X-Ray.

In reply to:

As someone has said, you can do this with fresh out of the box 5-10s depending on how clean the rubber is and what temperature it is. You can also sometimes do it with shoes fresh out of the washing machine.

Stickier however is not necessarily better. A stickier rubber is generally softer. Rock shoe rubber friction works by deforming around the rock so you need the right combination of hardness and softness for a rubber to work. Too hard and it won't deform enough to stick to the hold, too soft and it will deform too much and roll off the hold. Could you edge on tiny holds with a rubber as soft and sticky as Pritt Stick? No, it would just smear it's self down the rock

So the fact that the new Boreals stick together out of the box means very little. They might be great, or the rubber might be too soft.

In reply to CharlieMack: I remember doing pretty much this with a pair of Boreal Ace's when I was about 17. Which is 15 years ago... sticky rubber ain't new.

I remember Mark Vallance rubbing a pair of Fires together and bonding them, well over 20 years ago, when (I think) he worked for Wild Country.

In reply to adam11: I remember Ug rubbing together a pair of stickies and firing them, well over 2000 years ago, when (I think) he lived in the Wild Country.

Which is why the God Vesta gabbed a swan and invented matches. The smell of burning rubber is awful.

Looks Andi's reproduced thet rick w/o any magnets, AFAIK:

http://yfrog.com/kea5ajxj

In reply to CharlieMack: no trick, if you have two very polished surfaces they will stick together. Surface Tension-Vacuum Force-Casimir Effect

http://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=3691

but i dont know if this is the case here. you can do the same thing with weights for calibrating scales because they are so perfectly made

In reply to itsThere:
the toe to toe thing definately looks dodgey to me IMO, also a bit of a cheeky smile on the guys face.

In reply to CurlyStevo: true but could you do this with a straight face, also we did get to play with the weights to see for our self. so next time i see them in the shops, i will pick them up and try for my self. maybe some people will try them on because of it

In reply to itsThere:

I do. It's not. Other things that are not making the shoes stick together are: gravity; the strong nuclear force; magnetism; sexual attraction; monkey voodoo.

In reply to RupertD: so what force is it then, please explain

In reply to RupertD: So lets get this straight, you're absolutely sure it's not monkey voodoo.

In reply to mike kann:

The age of sticky rubber or your memory is not in question Mike.

There must be someone out there that could at least throw together some sort of half baked conjecture together as to why this might work?

The surface tension idea for toe to toe bonding is farcical.

In reply to jonny2vests:

Cohesion. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cohesion_%28chemistry%29

Which is also the explanation of why that party trick is useless in rock.

In reply to TheAvenger: Are you sure cohesion is that strong? Like-attracts-like works for a little bit, but holding a shoe weighing maybe 250g seems a bit much to me.