Is that all you get for $500? Yup. The rack, courtesy my mad Photoshop skills because I don't know where my camera is...
What trad gear should I get? That question might get asked more than any other on climbing forums. Here’s my very opinionated answer. The brands on everything here are pretty flexible; that is, I don’t think it matters a whole lot what brand of biners or slings you buy. The Camalots are the exception. Buy these. You won’t regret it. Remember my tip from last week–buy the best gear you can afford.
Black Diamond Camalots .5–3
You can get this set of 5 cams for $260 on Backcountry.com right now. Yes, there are cheaper cams out there, but none are better than Camalots, IMO. Buy the right thing the first time. Get Camalots. These 5 sizes are good from fingers to fist.
Set of nuts #4–#13
Sizes 1-3 are pretty small and not super useful if you’re just starting out. Black Diamond sells a 4-13 Stopper set that you can get for $72 on MammothGear.com right now. ABC offers a similar set of their Huevo nuts for $63. I’ve got a couple of these nuts mixed in with my Stoppers and they’re pretty much the same thing.
6 24” slings
You can either triple these into a trad draw (more on this in tomorrow’s tip) or wear them over your shoulder. These will cost you $27 at about $4.50 each. You can spend more and get the super sexy skinny ones. I would NOT recommend getting any made out of 1″ webbing. It’s just too fat. You could make your own slings and save some money (I did that for several years) but I think sewn runners are worth it.
19 carabiners
The classic offset d-shaped carabiner is the best overall biner. You’re going to want twelve of these for the slings (two biners on each sling), one for each of your cams, and two for the set of nuts (the small nuts on one biner, the larger ones on the other). At roughly $6.50 each, 19 of these puppies will set you back $123.50. You might as well make it an even 20 biners; you can always use more.
Nut tool
If I were to get a new nut tool, I’d probably get the Wild Country Pro-Key. It has a carabiner clip built in, plus it comes with a wire leash so you can’t drop the thing. It’ll set you back about $15.
And all of that adds up to about $498. Sweet! So what do you think, guys? Anything you’d add or take away?
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
I will just add all these things to the hundreds and hundreds of dollars worth of gear I need. That is a good set of gear for 500 bucks though.
Looks pretty good for a starter rack. One thing though about the nuts: for the traditionally shaped ones, I find the DMM Wallnuts more versatile and easier to place than the BD stoppers, and am thinking about switching to those (if I can find someone to buy my stoppers back). And then, there are the offset nuts, which are pure magic. I have the DMM alloys and they will fit in roughly the same spots than traditional nuts, plus in many, many other cracks and pockets. I don’t know anyone who has tried them and not loved them.
If I were to build a new rack now, I would get the DMM alloy offsets + a full set of wallnuts or, if on a budget, half a set of wallnuts to complement the offsets.
love the wallnuts, I got my set for 78 bucks…. I pretty much have this rack and now I am trying to double up. Would you suggest just getting that Black Diamond package of .5-3 or the link cams .5-2?
Alex, get the BD for sure! link cams are way more expensive and have sweet range yes but it’s hard to really stitch up a crack with em and it needs to be a deep crack. I’d for sure go with BD or look into Metolius master cams or DMM 4CUs