What height have you got to play with? My board is 26 degrees (random angle I know, but was based on location of rafters) and is 2 1/2 sheets of ply high and 1 wide. I'm a similar height to you, and can easily do problems up to 10 moves with a bit of contrivance, and have some loops up to 16 moves which i can do fairly comfortably without feeling like I'm dragging my arse on the ground. PM me a number and I can show you some vids to get a feel for what's possible.
I am the proud owner of a 48 degree, 1.1m wide, 2m tall (equating to a length of ~2.8-3m climbing surface) board in the shed at the bottom of the garden. It's okay, but I consider it as a purely training tool, not somewhere I would spend a leisurely afternoon on, rather it is a 45 minute blast of high-octane falling off. If I had the space I would have it much wider because it allows a lot more use (e.g. backhand/gastons become a lot more usable because you typically need wider feet to make bigger moves off those).At 173cm myself, I can get between 2 "big" moves and five moves from bottom to top, but that's obviously much steeper than your intended board. At least if yours is wide you're may be more inclined to make more use of the space and as you say, circuits.From what others have said on the forum, don't bother with a kickboard, you'll be able to reach the top with feet on the kicker and it is a real difficulty to force yourself to not do so.
Is that vertical height?Mine is 1.7m wide, 3.2m climbing height, 30 degrees. its vert height is 2.77m ish?width for me is ok, dont feel restricted in wide moves, and having the height for several upward moves is really nice. have to be careful keeping the footholds small enough to still need tension - I have three sets of footholds of varying difficultykickboard on my angle or less is pointless I'd say, and prob even anything less than 40 degrees tbh.
Go as wide as you can get away with, and maximise climbing length (so as steep as you can get away with). Depending where you order your ply from, you can get it cut to size which helps if tools or time are limited. This is not from board building experience but canvasing opinions during the design of one. If only the roofer had fixed the garage leak ....
I have a 25 degree board for circuits. Ignoring the top 20cm or so which is vert and has fingerboards on, dimensions are3m wide2.3m board surface2.1m actual height0.97m actual depthNo kickboard (I don't even have one on the 45 opposite). I'm about 180cm tall, so can reach from footholds at the bottom to the top. It's great for circuits, but the width makes all the difference on that front. If it was only 2m I think with the limited vertical height it would feel very restricted. I haven't actually tried setting any non-circuit problems on it yet but imagine it'll be okay when I do get round to it. Will just use some really tiny little grifters
I'd give up width down to well under 2m long before I gave up even an inch of climbing length - I'm much more motivated by being able to set more upward movements, and I still have a few circuits set on mine with only 1.7m width that work fine. Up and down is better than side to side too imo.
Quote from: Duma on January 19, 2021, 12:25:20 pmI'd give up width down to well under 2m long before I gave up even an inch of climbing length - I'm much more motivated by being able to set more upward movements, and I still have a few circuits set on mine with only 1.7m width that work fine. Up and down is better than side to side too imo.For sure. Anecdotally, even with 1.1m width, I can still manage "circuits" by just going straight up and straight back down. Tedium, but it does the job.
Do you think you'd still get decent circuits if you sacrificed 0.5m width for 0.5m length, maintaining the same angle? That's about what I could get at 25 degrees...
It's all just different variants of tedium at this kind of scale really isn't it. Whether you're going up and down or round in circles is kind of neither here nor there.
It's all just different variants of tedium at this kind of scale really isn't it.
Ideally I'm probably aiming for something that's not too steep (approx 25-30 degrees - which I think is similar to the easier pudsey depot board?) as I'm keen to use it in part to rehab my wrist and I think anything steeper would be too much for it for a while. It would be good to set some circuits and just use smaller holds for setting harder problems.
Quote from: Bradders on January 19, 2021, 12:59:24 pmIt's all just different variants of tedium at this kind of scale really isn't it. Whether you're going up and down or round in circles is kind of neither here nor there.I disagree with this (though not the tedium bit!) Up and down is better than side to side imo for training circuits especially if your feet aren't moving much. And unless you're going narrower than 1.5m there's no need to go down the same part of the board you came up.
Quote from: James Malloch on January 19, 2021, 11:24:37 amIdeally I'm probably aiming for something that's not too steep (approx 25-30 degrees - which I think is similar to the easier pudsey depot board?) as I'm keen to use it in part to rehab my wrist and I think anything steeper would be too much for it for a while. It would be good to set some circuits and just use smaller holds for setting harder problems.Why don't you build it as steep as you would like to train on when healthy, and maximise the height, but install a big kickboard until you've rehabbed your wrist.That way it'll feel like a less steep board when you need it to, but then you can just remove the kickboard when you are back at full strength.
James. Do not take the advice of a man who posts a video of himself using a heel on a board.
Quote from: csl on January 19, 2021, 02:34:49 pmQuote from: James Malloch on January 19, 2021, 11:24:37 amIdeally I'm probably aiming for something that's not too steep (approx 25-30 degrees - which I think is similar to the easier pudsey depot board?) as I'm keen to use it in part to rehab my wrist and I think anything steeper would be too much for it for a while. It would be good to set some circuits and just use smaller holds for setting harder problems.Why don't you build it as steep as you would like to train on when healthy, and maximise the height, but install a big kickboard until you've rehabbed your wrist.That way it'll feel like a less steep board when you need it to, but then you can just remove the kickboard when you are back at full strength.James. Do not take the advice of a man who posts a video of himself using a heel on a board.There is only one answer to the question of how big should a board be and that answer is as big as possible. Build it as wide as you can and build it as tall and steep as you can. You've got a decent height (more than I have) so it's possible that a 30 would work but for goodness' sake don't go less steep than that. Personally I wouldn't go less than 40 with the height you've got (you've about 20cm more height than me and if my board was a 30 it'd be shit). If you do a 30 board either don't have a kickboard or just a very small one. You'll need to move that light but it's not that big a job compared to the additional benefit you'll get from a deeper board.
There is only one answer to the question of how big should a board be and that answer is as big as possible. Build it as wide as you can and build it as tall and steep as you can. You've got a decent height (more than I have) so it's possible that a 30 would work but for goodness' sake don't go less steep than that. Personally I wouldn't go less than 40 with the height you've got (you've about 20cm more height than me and if my board was a 30 it'd be shit). If you do a 30 board either don't have a kickboard or just a very small one. You'll need to move that light but it's not that big a job compared to the additional benefit you'll get from a deeper board.