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Topic Date User

Of Metolius Cams 15-Feb-2010 At 9:10:38 AM f_ladou

Message

On a recent trip to Tasmania, Martijn and Alex got onto "Stairway to Heaven" [12m, 19] at Lark's
Edge. Martijn lead this 12 meter climb and, to protect the "long reach finish", he used a Metolius
Cams. In fact, he protected the crux with a size 3 and decided, to be on the safe side, to put another
piece in, another cam (whose make I am not sure of). Anyway, the gods were on his side since, the
crux spat him out, and the fall ripped the Metolius cam out and Martijn ended up dangling on the rope
suspended by his second protection.

Now, a post-mortem showed that the cam got damaged in the process. The following pictures shows
two side views of the cam after the fall compared to a pristine one.

I can understand that a piece rips out for lack of friction, flaring or otherwise, but in this case, it seems
like mechanical failure. The cam was put into a horizontal break. Now someone described the Metolius
Cams as "like Aliens but better". Of course, this incident does not fill me with a lot of confidence... So,
my question to you guys is could this be the results of poor gear placement leading to torsion? shear?
Has anyone experience with Metolius Cams?

Cheers, François