Cold Beer Dirty Girls Chicken Dinner!
So I was at the red rock rendevous and got a close up look at the Metolius freaky cams.
The "cable" in the photo is Kevlar cord which wraps around one of the axles like a winch.
I'd be a little worried about durability. I've seen what happens to the trigger wires on my cams when they've been stuffed into my backpack one too many times.
I don't think I'd buy any of these until I had a chance talk to someone who's owned some for at least a few years.
Also the trango max cams: the two axles are closer together than they appear in the CGI simulation. Which places the fulcrum closer to the leverage axle. I asked them about the angle of degree in the logarithmic spiral but they didn't know jack about it.
Swag from RRR.
One bright shiny stainless steel nut tool.
One t-shirt (immediately given away).
2 coffee mugs (one of which I got from Petzl).
A handful of stickers.
One Metolius Haulbag frisbee (dogs love these).
A set of Trango Crampon straps (any takers?).
Latest issue of Rock and Ice.
One large tube of North Face sunscreen/chapstick.
One North Face Beer can Coozie.
Clif Bars.
Dinner(cheese burgers and hotdogs).
Breakfast(pancakes).
All the fat tire beer I could drink (and then some).
2 sore shoulders from trying to redpoint an 11b (rated 11d in guidebook) overhanging limestone sport route during a drizzly saturday afternoon.
8 achey fingers from climbing and crimping.

Lost one bright yellow plastic egg container and one fleece vest.

St. Patricks Day... Thursday... Goat?

A couple of weeks ago we went out to Queen Mountain and hiked into Walt's Rocks.
Man......nearly as long and hard of an approach hike as the Needles. There was a Rattlesnake (apparently a Mojave Green) firmly established in a crack M was leading. Everybody (except me) climbed the route but there was definitely one move everyone did that positioned the groin area right in front of the damned snakes head!
On the way back dehorned Jackalopes (aka rabbits) kept jumping out in front of the car and would dodge back and forth in the road before finally darting back into the desert. B finally clipped one that committed suicide by jumping onto the road right in front of the tire.

The Mighty Jackalope!
Jackalopes rule!

.

So I saw James "EPIC-SAGA" W. in the shop this morning. I didn't think he knew me, but as soon as he saw me his eyes hit the floor (coincidence?). He's talking to another employee while hanging from the ceiling testing a new harness (whatever, that's cool), but then a few minutes later I come around the bend and he's at the climbing counter asking all these noob questions about sport. Dude is odd bacon, I definitely get a wierd vibe off him.

wandering rock routes

on 12-31-04 Zac and I went on a little adventure. We "found" a rock that had no known routes. We looked at the rock and decided to climb it. here are some pics.

Huh turns out that Metolius has developed their own version of the asym cam.
so apparently the ones TB and I saw were actually Metolius prototypes.

DIVIDENDS ARE IN!!!! GONNA GO BUY SOME CHIT!!!

$102 AND CHANGE

posted by Malcom Daly (maldaly) of Trango on rc.com

Good eyes. There will be some shallow pockets where the main axle interferes with the placement. I don't know how many fo those types of shallow placements exist outside of the Gunks, though. As far as weight goes, they're listed on our website at www.trango.com/prod.php Click on the Cam Specs link. I think you'll find that few cams are lighter. As for horizontals, one of our tests is to pull the cam in directions other than perpendicular to the line between the contact points of the cam lobes on the rock which is the way the CE spec determines. We've pulled 25 degrees off perpendicular in both directions and the cams hold. You'd be surprised what cams DON"T pass this test. Most stable placements in horizontals is the same as any four cam; with the outer lobes down. As always, it's good to carry a selection of gear because nothing works everywhere.
Mal