The original camming devices were Wild Country Friends. I have used these & they were relatively good. At the time that I started Trad climbing Friends were available as solid stems & flexi stems - the solid ones of those days were stemmed with aluminium bars & came with a host of warnings about tying them off short or snapping them. A while later the solid stems were made as forged units & these seem perfectly reasonable in the right application.
The obvious alternative though was the Camalot. This became the present of choice for many of my birthdays & Christmas'. It was all about getting the right gear for the job. Sure there were alternatives available; Czech models about which there was much discussion surrounding rating & safety standards, HB, home made alternative US brands. As I said it was about getting the right stuff for the job.
Off course I paid attention to the safety methods employed by Black Diamond & the testing that they showed they had done on the Camalots. The greater range allowed by the double axle design appealed not only to my engineering mind but also to the fact that it meant I was more likely to actually make a placement, something that really counts in the fevered mind of a novice traditional rock climber desperate to protect oneself from the imminent fall if one does not get a placement in the next few seconds. Many times I have been truly grateful of my choice of camming device only seconds after making that necessary placement.
Its not that I have fallen onto my gear that often though. Often the act of getting a safe & secure placement in is enough to enable one to not only stay on, but to push upward into the next difficult move. The cams themselves as a reliable part of the system give one the confidence to move on.
Sure even Camalots have evolved, my originals are of a ladder type, with a different arrangement to the single stem units of today, but they still have the same working capacity & functional use as the latest C3's. Even as the modifications to the design have taken place the original solid reliability of each unit has remained the same & this is why this piece of gear will remain around as the climbers staple piece of reliable protection for years to come!
I will find a picture of my own later.
An interesting observation made by many US climbers is that they will be reluctant in future to buy new Camalots since the manufacture of these items has been moved to China. I sympathise with this view as even though I am sure that Black Diamond will go through all the necessary processes to ensure the gear is just as safe, I also have an innate distrust of Chinese manufacturing standards brought on through my own experiences. More to the point though is that this was probably an unnecessary move considering that a quality product like this is bought largely on its merits with due consideration given to the price. I am sure that almost all US climbers would prefer to buy a slightly more expensive, guaranteed safe, quality product made in the US than something made in China with all the associated downsides.
Having said that I am fairly convinced, as a non US user of Black Diamond goods that they will uphold their standards & quality of the product. Certainly from my side the true test will be in the quality of the product in use & their demonstration of the safety of their product. Lets see how they do!
So coming soon---DMM Dragons---the wave of the future & QUALITY GUARANTEED!
