UKC

With some key improvements on the previous model, the new Dragons take DMM's dual axle cam offering to new heights, reckons Tim Neill

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In reply to UKC Gear:

Just picked up my new set yesterday, not placed any yet but they seem great and definitely look like an improvement on the already brilliant original version.

In reply to UKC Gear:

Still just a bit of an inferior copy of the Camalot though right?

In reply to Blake:

Isn't everything?

In reply to UKC Gear:

I get the impression that the Totems are still by far the best cams for less grippy rock

In reply to Blake:

Like a camalot only without the missing rivets

In reply to theomoore:

Second that about Totems! Awesome kit.

In reply to Blake:
I prefer them to the camalots (I owned both at one time and went soley for dragons and sold the camalots). I prefer the sling on the dragons and don't use the thumb loop on the camalots. Also when I bought the dragons they were a bit lighter with a better manufacturing process (camalots were cnc'ed) and a little narrower head width and ofcourse a more grippy camming angle.

In reply to Blake:

I'd much rather buy British where possible

In reply to UKC Gear:

Presumably the untreated aluminium surfaces are more prone to rust?

In reply to Blake:

I prefer the Camalot loop and don't like the extendable sling (as Tim pointed out, it can be faffy) but I'd be happier that the Dragons are less likely to fall apart.........

In reply to Mr. Lee:

Tbh its no different to what happens to your cams naturally after a bit of use. All my old Dragons are no longer anodised on the surface that makes contact with the rock. Aluminium doesn't really rust either?

In reply to Duncan Campbell:


It doesn't continue to rust beyond a few nanometres. It "passivates" (develops a protective oxide coating).

In reply to UKC Gear:

In reply to UKC Gear:

Is this the same chap who works at plas y brenin and states here that he has a good working relationship with DMM?

http://www.ukclimbing.com/articles/page.php?id=761

Perks and holidays/time off:
Holidays are plenty, I get 2 days off for every 5 worked, and if I need unpaid leave for expeditions or whatever, I can usually sort that if I let the boss know in time. Also we get well looked after by Mountain Equipment and Scarpa, and have a good relationship with DMM and Lyon Equipment.

These reviews are a joke, they are simply adverts and it should say so. Nothing personal Tim, not pointing the finger at you!

In reply to snoop6060:

Yeah I totally thought the same thing. I like DMM cams but this review might as well have been reviewed by DDM themselves. To quote a sentence in the conclusion for example:

'If you're weighing the merits of the various dual axle units currently available then they all have their pros and cons in terms of performance and price.'

It would be nice to actually see these pros and cons outlined rather than just assume we already know them? Almost every product review on UKC basically summarizes with 'a good product that is recommended' or similar wishy-washy statement without any proper comparison with what is already on the market. Granted some of the full-blown comparison reviews were good. The reason why the Cold Thistle reviews are so excellent is because they is almost obsessively based around comparison, which is what makes the reviews so useful.

Again, nothing personal meant to the reviewer. More a general (hopefully constructive) criticism of these type subliminal adverts.

In reply to Mr. Lee:

Agreed, this isn't a "review" in any proper sense, it is just an advertisement, loaded with speculation, for what might well be a very good cam, with a tiny caveat about the extendible slings to prevent it from being pure shill.

Surely the main question is whether all that texture on the cam lobes does anything. I'd also like to hear how a surface treatement meant to catch on rugousities can improve holding power in slick rock without such micro-features. It would be nice to see some pull-out testing in different rock types (not that anyone has done much of this with any cam). You'd think DMM, who have not been reticent about publishing other types of test results, would at least have something to back up their claims.

In reply to Duncan Campbell:


I should probably have used them more, but this wasn't true for my larger cams which obviously have a much larger surface of anodising to wear off. I just took a file to them.

In reply to UKC Gear:

Quick question - not particularly related to dragons, but any cam that has an extendable sling - quite often when climbing in the mountains, really extending gear etc. I quite often extend the sling on the cam and then put a quickdraw or runner on that as well to extend the placement even further.

I normally place the cam, unclipped the biner on the cam, use it to extend the sling, then clip in the quickdraw into that and then extend that. My friend when moving quickly together up long routes in the alpine sometimes just clips the quickdraw/runner to the sling on the cam and by pulling on that extends the sling, leaving the biner still attached to both loops of the sling - this has the effect of pinning the cams biner against the thumb point of the cam. Does any see anyone particular safety issue with doing this?

Loading the placement will make the sling go tight and effectively crush the cams biner against the thumb point, but does anyone see any issue with this, it is marginally quicker and does make it easier to clean too when you are moving fast.

Thoughts?

In reply to adie84:

can't see why it would be a problem.

In reply to rgold:

It's not a test which is easy to get meaningful results from - if you put a cam in a real rock placement you have to somehow compensate for texture, rock density, rock strength, the imperfectness of the placement, the precise angle at which the cam surfaces intersect with the rock - lots of uncontrollable variables. So what you would get at best is a trend rather than concrete numbers to say X,Y, or Z is definitively better. You are right in your assertion that grooves interlocking with rugosities will only play a larger role on rough rocks, just as a soft material deforming would.

In reply to beardy mike:
Even a "trend" would be better than mere speculation, which is all we have at present. (And by the way, what exactly is the difference between a "trend" and "concrete numbers," and why isn't information about "trends" useful?) In any case, if you are standing in front of a placement and put several cams in the same place and pull test them (multiple times each one would hope), I'm not convinced that the effects of "uncontrolled variables" are so daunting. My suspicion is that you won't be able to reject the null hypothesis, but I'd be happy to find out otherwise.

I'm guessing that at the very least the DMM cams do better in the standardized knurled jig used for testing. Whether such a jig represents anything about rock placements is itself a matter of speculation.

In reply to rgold:


This. A jig made of knurled metal is in no way representative of a real piece of rock. Unless you can test in a consistant way then you have no base line for comparison. Yes, you could just do the standard CE test, but that really doesn't tell you much as all cams will pass that, and often there is enough friction to prevent any pull through whatsoever so the cam breaks before you get a useful result.

Replace the metal cheeks with real rock and you end up with two thin slabs of rock which are likely to break from the force.

Replace the jig with a massive boulder you've cut a slot in and you get surfaces which are not consistent by the nature of cut stone, plus you won't get rugosities, and you can't ensure you place the cam in exactly the same way every time so again you won't get a consistent result.

That's what I meant by concrete numbers versus a trend - they can give you their impression of the results (which is most likely what they've done) but publishing something that says it's definitely better would just be putting spin on something they couldn't back up with undeniable evidence. The whole point about rugosities is that they are by their nature inconsistent so how are you going to design a standardised test? And then on top of that, would 99% of customers really be able to interpret the information - you might but there's plenty who can't. Just like 99% of people don't get 3 sigma either...

In reply to snoop6060:
Hmm, I did think that when I saw who did the review. It's a bit of a joke tbh.

Any comments on these concerns from the reviewer, DMM, and/or UKC?

BTW, I think Toby's reviews on here are by far and away the best on UKC.

In reply to Mr. Lee:

I agree that Dane's reviews are always fair as they are in most instances compared with something like for like and he actually goes out there and tests them.

Obsessive is definately the world for Dane!

In reply to Denni:

Or indeed outdoorgearlabs.com, who don't go into as much detail as Dane - and got into a massive fight with, among others, rgold for their poorly thought out dissing of Totem Cams - but they do at least make some attempt to point out that not everything is the greatest thing ever for every purpose.

I agree that in general, and with TobyA as a honourable exception, the reviews on ukc tend to be weak puff pieces by comparison.

In reply to UKC Gear:

I have just received a new set of these. I am looking forward to using them. They have a slightly cheaper feel to them than BD cams.
I also noticed the stem is identical to my WC ones. Are the stems for both made in the same factory I wonder?

In reply to JayPee630:

(swoons)
But then of course if you think the average is rubbish you might think mine are mainly rubbish still.

In reply to UKC Gear:

If DMM send me a double set of these, I'll take them for a couple of weeks in Squamish and write a review. I have C4s for comparison.

In reply to Climbpsyched:


No.

The problem we have here is that any review that says kit is good appears to be immediately judged by some people as being a 'puff piece'. To be honest I would have been amazed if these cams from DMM had been anything other than superb bits of kit. DMM have years of experience of producing cams, these are new versions of an established excellent model - they would have had to make a major cock-up to have produced something bad!

The people we work with tend to be the top brands, although in climbing no-one really makes 'budget' gear. The fact that we frequently rely on gear to keep us safe means that there really isn't room for a 'savers' range of ropes that are just strong enough not to break. This means that most of the gear is pretty good and if our reviews reflect this then that is just us doing our job. A quick glance through some of the recent reviews seems to agree with this - some good gear, some great gear, some okay gear that has caveats in the review.

That isn't to say that we don't do bad reviews - they are in there if you look, and we will have a couple going live in the next week or so that have distinctly critical points covered in them. We don't do rant jobs but they are usually just view-harvesters and don't really help anyone.

We aren't a site like OutdoorGearLab which reason for existing is its gear reviews. They don't work with brands and they buy all the gear they review at full price from retailers. We couldn't do this and then still do all the other things we do. We are a general outdoor site that is funded by advertising and we do have working relationships with the brands.

When we do get a really bad piece of gear then we will work with the brand and let them know. This has resulted in a number of items being withdrawn and replaced over the years. A couple of these reviews were published, some never get that far since the piece of gear was still drawing board at the time. We have never had a dispute with an advertiser threatening to pull advertising if we publish a review, in fact I can't recall ever being even close to that.

As regards who does the reviews: we work with reliable and experienced climbers like Tim and Toby. Tim is a guide who 8 years ago worked full time at Play y Brenin. I don't know what his relationship is with DMM now but it wouldn't concern me any more than DMM being an advertiser on our site concerns me. It isn't ideal but we aren't in a position to do it any other way and we don't let if affect what we write - you'll just have to take my word on that.

Alan

In reply to Alan James - Rockfax:


No doubt, but the fact that some people see puff pieces everywhere does not mean that you don't have puff pieces.

I think that, given that a statistically significant review is far beyond the technical and financial abilities of most reviewing entities, particular editorial care ought to be exercised about the nature of claims made, restricting them to things that have genuinely been confirmed by the reviewers, who then explain how they have confirmed their claims. Without such editorial oversight, the puff piece perception is never going to go away, and shouldn't.

To be more specific, one way to avoid the puff piece perception is to help reviewers understand the difference between actual experience and sheer speculation, especially when that sheer speculation parrots the manufacturer's advertising claims. The present DMM review has a lot of such speculation. For example,


Ok, this is a good start, but what "experience" bore this out? Weighting the gear? Falls on the gear? No mention of the "testing protocol." If either of these, how is it known that other gear wouldn't have been just as good?


How does the reviewer (or anyone else) know that the "extra metal" boosts strength and holding power? If the extra metal does boost either of these quantities, is the boost any any sense significant?


Glad to know it "feels better," but is it in fact any better, and better than what? And what exactly is the point of mentioning the precise cam angle?


The reviewer "suspects?" We are now in a realm that even the reviewer hasn't actually experienced. In this regard, it is hard not to notice that unsupported positive speculation is fair game, but there seems to be no place for unsupported negative speculation. For example, all that grooving creates a surface made of many individual raised portions, which might be subject to shear failures at lower loads than a more solid surface. Could this be a problem?

The obvious response to these observations is that neither the reviewer nor UKC has anything close to the ability to genuinely resolve any of the issues mentioned. Quite right, but then statements that appear to resolve such issues shouldn't be in the review. But it is also true that there are cases in which the reviewer might have tried to do something. For example, how about bounce-testing some actual placements, using the new cams and some other models?

One of the many problems of reviewing gear donated by manufacturers (a fact that should always be explicitly specified in the review, by the way), is that no one is donating equivalent gear from other sources for comparison purposes. So a reviewer might well be comparing the latest innovation to stuff he or she owns that is several years old---that is if they are doing any comparing at all. A typical current example is the Polartech Alpha pieces. Most reviews compare them to the less breathable types of insulation, which is certainly interesting, but there are a lot fewer reviews comparing different brands all using the newer breathable insulation materials.

A pervasive problem of gear reviews is that the reviewer takes the stuff out for a while and climbs with it. This might mean that the gear is never subjected to any kind of extremes, even though, as with safety gear like cams and belay devices, behavior in extreme situations is of critical interest. The reviews end up praising performance in very mild conditions without ever addressing what happens in much more severe cases. This isn't something the reviewing entities can really fix, but it certainly means that most reviews need to be taken with quite a few grains of salt.

In reply to rgold:

Not always true - when I reviewed the first gen Dragons BD specifically requested to send me a set of Camalots to test the Dragons against. http://www.ukclimbing.com/gear/review.php?id=3213

And we've done quite a few comparison tests as well where similar types of kit from different manufacturers is tried at the same time. I've done helmets, triple rated ropes and crag packs like that in the past.

Your point about not testing things to extremes is another interesting one. These are after all called "reviews" (I think always?) not "tests". When I was in Finland I did "test" a number of sleeping bags to their 'comfort limit' ratings in reasonably controlled environments of sleeping out but not too far from civilisation at the stated comfort levels (-20 something in one case!). Tim might have been in danger of taking a factor 2 or similar fall on those routes in which he is pictured climbing with the Dragons, but I don't think its fair to ask reviewers to do things like that on purpose for a review! I drew the line when reviewing helmets at the suggested idea that a friend dropped a brick on my head while I wore them in turn! I am though currently "testing" a water filter by filtering water, drinking it and seeing if I get eggy farts or worse. Touch wood, it seems to be working!

If you think consumers want test data on these sorts of things and are willing to pay for it, I reckon that would be a fascinating business to be in - but I'm not convinced people are willing to pay for it. Outdoor Gear Lab aren't charging readers and that perhaps as close as we get to something like Which? magazine (not sure what the US equivalent is possible "Consumer Report"? Sure I've heard of that on NPR anyway...) in the outdoor industry. Some years back the Finnish outdoor magazine Retki did "tests" on duvet jackets and used a thermal camera to take photos of all the ones they had for testing. Fascinating results, but that a magazine for sale in every supermarket in the country with a decent editorial budget I guess.

So, I know it will not change your opinion, but Tim wrote a review of the Dragons, from the point of view of a climber who has used them on lots of routes. He didn't write a test report on their relative holding power in comparison to other cams. The latter might be more useful, but it wasn't what the review was or claimed to be from what I can see.

In reply to Alan James - Rockfax:

Me too, good point. We all know DMM is an excellent company and the previous Dragons were already top flight cams, where the pluses and minuses versus other top flight cams pretty much came down to personal preference for thumb loop vs extendable sling and so on. But they were already so good that we're down to tiny incremental changes in the new version that may or may not actually be improvements and - as rgold has already addressed - your reviewer pretty much seems to take these at face value.

Otoh Black Diamond are also a reputable top flight cam manufacturer, but both they and Fixe seem to have managed some non-trivial quality control screw-ups lately so we clearly can't take everything for granted.

In reply to TobyA:


Good, I'm happy to be corrected on that, but I suspect it is far closer to the exception than the rule.


Right. Of course I never said comparisons were never made.


I was careful to explicitly state that extreme testing was beyond the scope of such reviews, so none of this is relevant to my comments, which however still hold.


The items I quoted and make it clear that the review commented on the relative holding power of the DMM cams, so your objection about that simply doesn't hold water. As I said, the review included a lot of positive speculation about things the reviewer had no way of testing. (The reviewer also chose not to do some easy comparative testing anyone could have tried.)

Most of your response has to do with the fact that we can't expect that type of testing, which I never contested and explicitly stated. I remarked that reviews that are unable to consider extreme cases need to be taken with a grain of salt, but I did not "blame" the reviewers or the reviewing entities for that state of affairs.

What I did say is that in the absence of real testing, either the reviewer and/or the editors ought to have the discipline to control speculation, or at the very least give some evidence from the reviewer's experience that justifies the speculation. Are you seriously objecting to this point?

In reply to AlanLittle:


The BD thing does seem huge but it seems most companies have recalls sooner or later. Remember quite a few of the first generation DMM Dragons were recalled to have parts replaced due some problem.

In reply to TobyA:

True, but there's recalls and then there's recalls.

For example Totem's recall because they decided anodised lobe faces weren't optimal in limestone - which DMM now appear to agree with - is a sign of highly commendable perfectionism, and rather different from a recall because of things being completely not riveted/sewn together.

Versus - to continue for a moment the Spanish cam manufacturers theme - also rather different from no sign whatsoever of a recall of Aliens from Fixe, despite rivets popping off axle ends left right & center if you believe what you read on the American forums.

In reply to AlanLittle:

DMM's dragon recall was not cosmetic - if I'm not much mistaken it had to do with the manufacturing process used to make the stem termination as they made it using an extrusion rather than a forging - the grain structure in the extrusion being longitudinal meant that once you cut through the extrusion you ended up with stress risers. Wild country had their nut recall. Edelrid had their via ferrata kit recalled. ABS recently had every single pack they've ever made recalled. These are not trivial things. The number of truly voluntary recalls like totems are by far the exception.

In reply to Alan James - Rockfax:


I think the problem is more often the lack of comparison with other available products that lets some reviews down for me. For me the main purpose of a review is to help decide which product to buy. In the case of cams they're all good as you say but they are not all the same. If the differences between models were better highlighted then it would make a review more useful. Camera reviews for example are obsessed with comparison and what is the best buy. Just comparing a cam to it's predecessor does make it look like a subliminal advert, whether intended or not, because it ignores what else is available on the marketplace. Instead focusing on improvements made verses the predecessor. I take your point though that it's not cost affective to buy in stock in order to review competitors so we can agree to disagree to some extent

In reply to Mr. Lee:


But surely the major players would be more than happy to provide kit free for a comparative, and objectively critical review rather than just the odd puff piece when they produce something new? Wouldn't they?

In reply to Mr. Lee:


Agreed. Nobody is wondering whether the DMM cams are good, or whether they improve on the older versions (yes and yes), we're all wondering how the DMM Dragons compare to the new WC Friends and the BD Ultralights.

I'm guessing it'll come down to things like whether one likes thumb loops and/or extendable slings, and the weight saving of the Ultralight.

In reply to Coel Hellier:

Having done the design of the wild country friends I can go almost as indepth as you like on the competition. It's got to be said having held all four (including old BD's) I'd say they are all quality products, (bar the BD recall!)... if you pressed me out of double axle cams, WC offer the widest variety of features, DMM is really high quality, BD's do just what they say with no reall frills and the ultralight are my least favourite as they feel like they were a rush job to me, the lobes are way skinny (which is definitely NOT a good thing on double axle cams) the stem is bulky as are the axle housings. JUst think they could have done a better job. They don't feel like their price. Having looked at the patent there are various aspects which concern me, like the springs inside which I fear will cause abrasion in the long term which will not be inspect-able.

DMM have more or less come to exactly the same conclusions as we did which is why our lobe designs are very similar, even down to similar webs across some of the openings. Sure we didn't do the extra grooves but I'm not convinced as I indicated above how verifiable the concept is in real world conditions. Only time will tell. For my money WC and DMM are now the clear leaders for double axle...

In reply to beardy mike:
Turns oot you're wrong!

In reply to UKC Gear:

I think the reason this review in particular is causing agro is that the changes vs old dragons are rather unverifiable.

DMM say they're more sticky in some placements. We don't know if this is a significant bonus or mostly marketing. It's not possible to scientifically test because we're talking about certain "real rock" placements that we can't reproduce in the lab. But this is what we care about with cams most of all - how likely are they to pull?

In reply to climbwhenready:

I don't agree that it isn't possible to scientifically test. The performance of two cam designs in specific real-rock placements is certainly testable, and with small-sample statistical methods one could do with, say, ten trials. The medical and biological folks are obliged to do this all the time and there is a substantial literature on how to do it and what mistakes to avoid. The European clubs, especially the DAV and the CAI, have both the money and expertise to do such testing. The results would only apply to the situations tested, but that's still information of use to potential buyers.

If one is speaking of some kind of universal standard that could be applied to all cams, that's probably not practical, not only for technical reasons, but also political ones. The UIAA's difficulty in creating standards comes to mind.

The idea of surface treatment significantly affecting holding power has only come to the fore with the DMM cams themselves, so it is very early in the game even for the big players who might have the resources to do some testing. But I suspect there would be general reticence, because the small-sample tests can only detect substantial differences, and my guess is the smart money is on only small differences for special rock types, so possibly a lot of inconclusive results for the investment of time and money.

In any case, the criticisms here have nothing to do with whether science is capable of obtaining conclusive data; rather they have to do with the present absence of such data. In such cases, it would be desirable if reviewers could stick to describing actual observations, without adding speculation that can't be explicitly justified by something that occurred during the review or by referring to explicit test results done elsewhere.

Of course, the review can include the manufacturer's claims, specifically identified as such. And there is a role for psychological reactions as well, like "the manufacturer's claims gave me more confidence," or "the way the cams slid in the placement gave a feeling of security," as long as such assertions are accompanied by the disclaimer, "but during the course of my usage, I found no way to determine the validity of these impressions."

A critical thing missing from the review is even a hint of how the cams were tested, and this has nothing to do with any of the technical impracticalities imposed on such reviews. "I went climbing with them in a lot of different places" is hardly such a description. Were the cams used for aid climbing? Were they bounce-tested? For free climbing? Were there any takes? Any short falls held? Any big falls held? Was there any situation in which a cam failed? Did a cam ever hold unexpectedly in a placement judged to be marginal? You can't just say, the cams "look like they'll be more effective in gripping the rock---and my experience to date bears this out." Give the reader some idea about the process leading to the review's content.

Is it too much to ask for such clarity? Apparently, but without it there will always be adverse reactions to unsupported claims, especially when the claims bolster the manufacturer's boilerplate and so give the impression of a puff piece. And the reviewer here is catching flak that is primarily about an editorial issue. It is the editors' job is to provide the reviewer with guidelines and then help them to achieve appropriate standards during the editing process. Raising a "haters gonna hate" defense, bolstered by "anyway we can't afford to do it right," neither recognizes nor addresses important issues that could lead to better and more appreciated reviews.

In reply to Climbpsyched:

Maybe you know something I don't but DMM and WC are no longer associated and haven't been for several years. That includes their parts and assembly. Previously Helium assembly occured at their plant in china. Parts may have been sourced from the same place for example the terminations, but that I'm not sure of. The current system though has nothing to do with DMM.

In reply to rgold:

I think we're fundamentally in agreement. However when talking about grooves on the cam lobes, we're out of the realms of "how well do they hold in cracks with different friction" and into how they hold in cracks with different shapes, crystal structure, strengths of grains, which all also have to be compromised placements or else any cam will hold. If we don't know exact placement features these are meant to work better in, I don't think that choosing ten random (compromised) placements and pull testing will necessarily tell us whether DMM's claims are correct or not. From this I don't think that publishing some results, any results, will lead to better information for the consumer - I think it will be limited to telling consumers how cams held in those particular placements and encourage them to over-generalise.

I'm assuming that a lot of the rest of your post wasn't in direct reply to me, because I don't think I raised a "haters gonna hate" defence etc.

In reply to climbwhenready:


I understand the argument, but I think it basically rejects acquiring any information because perfect information may be out of reach. Sure, it is possible to ask questions about "whether DMM's claims are correct or not," but one could also ask, "is there any special situation in which DMM cams perform better?" The former question is much harder to get data on then the latter question, the latter question is probably more adapted to reality anyway, and I think one can get answers to the latter question.

>From this I don't think that publishing some results, any results, will lead to better information for the consumer - I think it will be limited to telling consumers how cams held in those particular placements and encourage them to over-generalise.

Yikes! The fact that data and ideas are subject to misinterpretation should never be an argument for suppressing them! But this comes with the proviso that the presenter of the ideas/data does not themselves promote misinterpretation.


Quite so, I wasn't addressing anything you said but rather the post by Alan James. The "haters gonna hate" defense I was referring to is


My suggestion is that such a viewpoint makes possible improvements invisible by tarring serious and constructive criticism with a broadly dismissive brush.

In reply to UKC Gear:

I read 'Outdoor Gear Labs' reviews prior to purchasing gears.