Crack Training Device

I am designing a crack training apparatus and am looking for advice/critique. The whole thing will be 10' long and supported by a frame of 2x6's 3' wide and sitting 3.5' off the ground (about the minimum for me to straight arm and not be on the ground). The offwidth section will start at 6" and taper to 4" and be made of 2x12's(A), A  2x8(B) will be next to that starting at 1.25" and expanding to 2.5" for a hand crack. A 2x6(C) will be next to that running from 3" to 3.75" for a fist crack. The tapers of the fist and hand will cancel the opposite taper of the offwidth, making the outside boards parallel. spacers will be placed around a 1/3 of the way into the crack. Part of the frame has been omited in the picture for clarity. Couldn't get the image to upload to go so a link to the design is below.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-MzBdoFxoKV-pBFt2aQP2_Ly85EBHo-F/view?usp=sharing

I am unable to open the link, but from reading your description I have one question: why taper the cracks? For training value I would want the jams to be as repetitive as possible. The tapered setup would give you a different jam for every move, which would be great for novelty but not for getting any stronger in a particular jam position. 

Xan Calonne wrote:

The tapered setup would give you a different jam for every move, which would be great for novelty but not for getting any stronger in a particular jam position. 

I figured the taper would be gradual enough to work on the full range of hands and fists without changing too drastically and a cupped hand would only help for perfect hands and loose fists help good fists. Would it be better to work a size specifically for the full length of the crack and just add cracks for thin hands etc?

also link should work now?

I have essentially this exact same set up. It's a great design and I prefer it to my adjustable cracks. 

Do you have a height limitation for the area you are building it? 3.5' may be just barely high enough to climb for a hand crack, but it won't be very fun when you're hanging off your feet in the offwidth. My cracks are 5.5' high and allow for natural offwidth movement. 

Are you going to texture your cracks? I have mine textured with 10X restore deck paint. I attempted to climb mine untextured and the amount of pressure needed to double fist stack injured my hand for about a year. You can get away with untextured hand jams but be careful. 

You're going to need more spacers. My crack is 12' long and has spacers every 3 feet. For the offwidth you can get away with having every other spacer on the top of the crack and at least a full spacer every 6'. For my hand crack I have full spacers every 3' and still get plenty of flex in the wood. In the future I may rebuild mine with a closed top and spacers every 3' to see if that does the trick. 

Hope this helps! 

Tangential question: are folks really climbing such steep hand and offwidth cracks out in the wild?  Or is this just good training for normal vertical cracks?  I always feel like a near-vertical fingers or off-fingers crack would better replicate the kinds of climbs I want to do outside (and vertical hand cracks probably don't require much training once you've done it for a bit).

I’ve noticed that when I put a few solid sessions in on the roof crack I feel like a monster on outdoor slabbier cracks.  It is a fair point about transfer though as I’m not sure how well this translates to 200’ desert splitters.  But for training the jamming muscles...it’s awesome.

TS I would reconsider your setup for offwidth.  In my experience wider cracks with spacers are a pain...you really need to be able to get your whole body in there and shuffle for that #6 size and above.  I’ve seen a few setups that induce rigidity from the outside instead...this is way more preferable.  For butterflies and smaller spacers are fine.

JaredG wrote:

Tangential question: are folks really climbing such steep hand and offwidth cracks out in the wild? 

Yes. Here in Utah we have tons of roof cracks of every size. There's a 300 foot roof crack in Canyonlands called the Millennium Arch and many others close by nearing that length. 

Roof crack climbing does make you really strong for vertical cracks, however it doesn't teach you proper movement for vert climbing. 

Danny Parker wrote:

Do you have a height limitation for the area you are building it? 3.5' may be just barely high enough to climb for a hand crack, but it won't be very fun when you're hanging off your feet in the offwidth. My cracks are 5.5' high and allow for natural offwidth movement. 

Are you going to texture your cracks?

You're going to need more spacers. My crack is 12' long and has spacers every 3 feet. For the offwidth you can get away with having every other spacer on the top of the crack and at least a full spacer every 6'. For my hand crack I have full spacers every 3' and still get plenty of flex in the wood. In the future I may rebuild mine with a closed top and spacers every 3' to see if that does the trick.

I got tired of drawing before I finished the spacers. But 3' seems like a good number and I have some old wood I could strap over the top in-between. Got some old paint around that I added sand to for my woodie a while back and planned to use that for texture and protection (it'll be in a carport). Good idea on the height. I'll make it taller for sure. 

And about the roof crack thing yes. This is to train specifically for the t-wall triple crown.

Not to thread drift too much: people in this thread are saying 10'-12' is good for a crack machine - anyone wish theirs was longer? Or shorter? I assume most people have: hands, tight hands, fists, and some sort of stacking (hand/fist or fist/fist)?

Danny - what sort of workouts are you doing? Are you just doing back and forth laps and using that as a metric of improvement? Or treating it like a hangboard where you're adding weight or doing different types of workous on the crack machine?

Thanks. 

Always can be taller.  This might be helpful:

John Lombardi wrote:

Not to thread drift too much: people in this thread are saying 10'-12' is good for a crack machine - anyone wish theirs was longer? Or shorter? I assume most people have: hands, tight hands, fists, and some sort of stacking (hand/fist or fist/fist)?

Danny - what sort of workouts are you doing? Are you just doing back and forth laps and using that as a metric of improvement? Or treating it like a hangboard where you're adding weight or doing different types of workous on the crack machine?

Thanks. 

I think the longer the crack machine the better. I got to climb on Brad Jacksons machine once that was around 20', it was amazing. 

As for training it really depends on what goal I have in mind. When I was training for Century it was all about building pure endurance, a bulk of my workouts were minute on minute off climbing for 40 minutes. I would add weight to simulate a rack over time. 

Recently I've been building more bouldering style workouts. 

Bottom line is use the machine to simulate whatever climbing you'd like to do.

Ideas on how big to make the offwidth? I was thinking 5"?

I think the longer the crack machine the better. I got to climb on Brad Jacksons machine once that was around 20', it was amazing. 

As for training it really depends on what goal I have in mind. When I was training for Century it was all about building pure endurance, a bulk of my workouts were minute on minute off climbing for 40 minutes. I would add weight to simulate a rack over time. 

Recently I've been building more bouldering style workouts. 

Bottom line is use the machine to simulate whatever climbing you'd like to do.

Thanks dude that all makes sense. Trying to recreate some of the bouldery - rest - bouldery style at vedauwoo.

Ideas on how big to make the offwidth? I was thinking 5"?

I would measure your hand/fist stack. My hand/fist is about 4.5 inches. 

John Lombardi wrote:

I would measure your hand/fist stack. My hand/fist is about 4.5 inches. 

I would recommend either building the cracks so that they change sizes as you shuffle or for a slightly bad size. If you build it for what fits you most comfortably you'll likely sandbag yourself on real rock. 

Ended up with 1's, wide 2's, 4's, and 5's. No spacers on the offwidth and it's not flexing. Nothing came out to a perfect jam so it's pretty great. Psych is high.