Gear mods

aikibujin wrote: Inspired by this thread, I watched a bunch of Youtube videos on how to sew, then cut a section of my Buff which I never used and sewed it to a hoodie. I'm pretty happy with the result, only two things I wish I had done better:
1. cut the Buff a little longer.
2. sewed the Buff higher on the hood.

Oh, nice. Glad that worked out for you. So how is it holding up?

Greg Shea wrote:

Oh, nice. Glad that worked out for you. So how is it holding up?

It's holding up great. I actually kind of enjoy sewing now that I know how to do it. I've been testing the hoodie out the last couple of days and really like it, I'll probably do this mod to a bunch of my hoodies now. But first I'll probably re-do this one to fix the two problems that I mentioned above.

Has anyone ever cut the elastic bit on the leg loops of an Arcteryx FL harness? I don’t like the way it squeezes my thighs but I’m worried the loops might end up a bit floppy and I won’t be able to reattach it. 

mtndan wrote:  I’m worried the loops might end up a bit floppy and I won’t be able to reattach it. 

yup, and not in a pretty way.

Caleb Schwarz wrote: Resurrecting one of my favorite threads.

My inflatable pillow always seemed to skid out from under my head as I slept, so I rigged this with tenacious tape and shock cord to keep it in place.
(Weighs a hair over 13g if anybody cares)

Genius lol!!!

mtndan wrote: Has anyone ever cut the elastic bit on the leg loops of an Arcteryx FL harness? I don’t like the way it squeezes my thighs but I’m worried the loops might end up a bit floppy and I won’t be able to reattach it. 

 yeah, i cut it off-- to make room for my cyclist legs. Worked out well for me. 

Thumb loop for old style camalot

cut a piece of 1 1/2” abs pipe 3/8” long. I ran that cross section of pipe around a 1/4” round over router bit, a file would work also. Cut that in half to make two thumb loops. May have to file down the one end of the piece to get it started into the hole but then it goes nicely and is very secure.

Greg R wrote:Thumb loop for old style camalot

Does this stay in place?

Caleb Schwarz wrote:

Does this stay in place?

See my edit. It’s a bit hard to get in and is very secure

I have a few of those cams, and this looks like an interesting mod.

As a carpenter, though, I’m highly curious about your router method. My fingers are retracting back into my palms while I imagine various potentially disasterous scenarios...

Andrew Rational wrote: I have a few of those cams, and this looks like an interesting mod.

As a carpenter, though, I’m highly curious about your router method. My fingers are retracting back into my palms while I imagine various potentially disasterous scenarios...

Do the first outside edge before cutting pipe to length. Use a router bit with a bearing and hold pipe with pliers for the second edge. Or use a file, the plastic is easy to shape, just need to bevel the edge where it hits the inside of the metal stem. 

Dredd wrote:

Petzl pick weights on the Camp Corsa 

 purposely making the lightest ISMF legal axe heavier...   

Added trigger keeper to DIY Thumb Loop

edit: the wire end where it goes through the trigger needs to be 1” longer than pictured. It needs to pass back up through the trigger and folded over and then is quite secure. A small notch in the top of ABS Loop catches the wire. 

Dig the idea Greg but those wire ends look like they'll hook on anything that comes near that cam :P

What about dremeling in a "nose" on the PVC like on the new BD cams (or the mods people did up thread). Then you cut up a plastic carabiner for the wire part, again like they did up thread.

Forthright wrote: Dig the idea Greg but those wire ends look like they'll hook on anything that comes near that cam :P

What about dremeling in a "nose" on the PVC like on the new BD cams (or the mods people did up thread). Then you cut up a plastic carabiner for the wire part, again like they did up thread.

Haven’t had these on a Climb yet but the wires are only loose when the cams in a crack. If it’s an issue and they get dislodged while racked, it will be very easy to shape a hook in the thumb loop and use a different wire configuration. Still a work in progress, thanks for the input. 

Andrew Rational wrote: I have a few of those cams, and this looks like an interesting mod.

As a carpenter, though, I’m highly curious about your router method. My fingers are retracting back into my palms while I imagine various potentially disasterous scenarios...

Yeah, but with a router table and a jig, you could do it safely w/out resortin to the old “hold with pliers” method.  It’dbe worth it if you were doing a bunch.

Could also prob use a sander...

Hamish Malin wrote:

Yeah, but with a router table and a jig, you could do it safely w/out resortin to the old “hold with pliers” method.  It’dbe worth it if you were doing a bunch.

Could also prob use a sander...

like he says, the first one is a cinch doing it *prior* to cutting it...but, as you say Hamish, low grit (60ish) sandpaper would be just fine for the second side, more than enough to keep it from bothering a person. I'm tempted to do it on my whopping two cams that could use it... at least I'd be using both pieces, haha.

Size large neoair x-lite (25" width, as opposed to the regular at 20"). This keeps my arms from falling off the pad and gives me more room to curl up. I'm 5'9", so I cut the pad down to 3/4 length so save weight and take less breaths (ends up using about as many breaths as the regular width regular length). Weighs 11.8 oz.

​How to​​​

Mark Berenblum wrote: Thank you for the correction. Clearly, this is news to me. This probably won't change anything in how I clip gear, but it's interesting to know nonetheless. 

When you clip in to the sling it allows the fall to be taken more dynamically, being at optimum strength. But when your clipped to the loop it’s more of a static load directly to the cam system, making it weaker. 

Buck Rio wrote: Back when I did some aid climbing, a put a piece of shock cord through a longer piece of webbing that my fifi attached to. The fifi would stay out of the way, but would stretch to the length of the webbing when I needed it to.  I can't say I invented that, someone in Wyoming told me about it.

I did this with a dog leash that I made out of some tubular webbing and a heavy elastic chord.  It worked great until the dog chewed a hole in the webbing and I haven't make another one.