10 or 12 Point Crampons?

  • Creator
    Topic
  • #56602
    bryce
    Participant

    I’m an ice climber who would like to get into some mountaineering and a question about crampons occurred to me. If I’m doing a steeper snow/ice route is it advantageous to have 12 points? To me I think that only helps on flat/slightly inclined ground where I’d be using the French technique. So why not should I not just go for a 10 point crampon instead and save some weight?

    I own the Petzl Darts for ice climbing so I would most likely but the Irvis (10 point set up) or Vasak (12 point set up) front sections for my crampons which saves me some cash instead of buying a whole new set of crampons. The Irvis front section has 6 points and weighs 275g whereas the Vasak front piece has 8 points and weighs 375g. I haven’t compared them in a store yet but based on pictures the front and secondary points on both crampons seem to be the same.

    Any advice on this would be great thanks!

Posted In: Alpinism

  • Participant
    bryce on #56605

    Eventually I’d like to see if I can get the necessary skill and strength to do winter ascents of the north faces of Triglav, Eiger, and the Matterhorn if that changes the choice of 10 or 12 points. Although I’m not even certain if those would need vertical or horizontal front points yet.

    Keymaster
    Steve House on #56639

    Hi Bryce-
    I would stick with the 12-point crampon. If I was to own one crampon for the rest of my life that had to do everything it would be the Grivel G-12. A standard 12-point (horizontal) crampon. You can do everything with this one tool. Hope that helps. Steve

    Participant
    ste on #56920

    I own Darts and Irvis.
    I use Irvis on everything moderate with no issues. If I know that I will encounter lot of very steep terrain, ice or proper mixed (more than III UIAA/M3) I will use Darts that are quite lightweight too. They are a dream to use on rock in mono configuration.
    Far superior to standard dual horizontals in my opinion.
    Can’t find any real differences between 10 points and 12 as long as you are using proper technique.

    Participant
    101homevn on #58014

    thank

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