Hangboard design

[jwi]

I'm going to move pretty soon and will change my hangboard setup. As such I am probably also getting or making a new hangboard. This has made me think of how different designs of edges and hangboards.

On one hand there are the ‘Beastmaker’ type with slots. I can only guess at the advantage of slots, but maybe they give lateral stability which could be useful at high loads, at least when you hang from 1, 2 or 3 fingers? I don't have much experience with this type of board, but I have tried to one-arm the bigger slots from time to time and I find that if I put the hand so that the index touch the side of the slot the extra friction help me to hang a bit longer. Some designs with tight slots makes it really easy to jam the fingers on both side, taking off substantial load. I don't know if this make a difference for training or not, but I could imagine that by learning to use compression I could improve my two-arm hangs quite a bit without getting stronger fingers.

On the other hand there are the long, flat edge type like e.g. the Trangression board. I guess that lack of lateral stability makes it more risky to do 1 or 2 finger hangs. For two armed hangs maybe the total load I could hang is also quite dependent on where on the board I grab it?

Which design is better? My current fingerboard is a home made contraption with a single adjustable flat edge (0-45 mm) that I only hang one-armed (with counterweight of course, I am not strong!) as it hangs too low to admit hangs with added weigh.

 

[Paul B]

If you're talking about the actual Transgression then the fact it appears to be made out of broken glass mixed with resin with a specifically unfriendly edge profile counts against it in my book!

When people were trying to convince Moon (Chris says hi etc) to add a BM2000 to the new school he made the very valid point that you can do the vast majority of hangs on a handful of campus rungs.

I think the design that's better is the one that you actually use, consistently and with progressive overload in whatever form that might be?

 

[remus]

I suspect there's not much in it in terms of how effective it is for training, regularity and consistency are more important.

Having said that, I've got a few boards at home and I usually end up on the lattice rung (other edges are available). A little less knack to it which means more consistent hangs for me, and when I've spent more time on the bm boards I've found I usually end up on the same couple of holds.

 

[jwi]

If you're talking about the actual Transgression then the fact it appears to be made out of broken glass mixed with resin with a specifically unfriendly edge profile counts against it in my book!

No, just talked about the design of flat edges in general.

Having said that, I've got a few boards at home and I usually end up on the lattice rung (other edges are available). A little less knack to it which means more consistent hangs for me, and when I've spent more time on the bm boards I've found I usually end up on the same couple of holds.

The Lattice rung is a 20 mm deep rung with 10 mm radius? (I have never actually seen one).

 

[spidermonkey09]

If you're talking about the actual Transgression then the fact it appears to be made out of broken glass mixed with resin with a specifically unfriendly edge profile counts against it in my book!

It shouldn't have been possible to design such a dreadful and incredibly painful fingerboard. Its almost impressive how bad it is.

I think Beastmakers still win the day for variety and comfort but as Remus suggests in practice I only actually use a few holds on it regularly. You're right that opportunities for compression based cheating exist but its not hard to avoid these. You may find that a 1000 is preferable to a 2000 in terms of the edges on it.

Would agree the Lattice rung has less potential for cheating but it is literally one hold so you lose a bit of potential variety. also I think it is a bit conditionsy cause its slightly sloping (the wrong way)

 

[remus]

Having said that, I've got a few boards at home and I usually end up on the lattice rung (other edges are available). A little less knack to it which means more consistent hangs for me, and when I've spent more time on the bm boards I've found I usually end up on the same couple of holds.

The Lattice rung is a 20 mm deep rung with 10 mm radius? (I have never actually seen one).

That sounds right. I forget what the radius at the back of the edge is.

 

[Duma]

I dislike the lattice rung, radius is too large so there's not enough actual flat. That said my opinion is irrelevant since both a lattice rung and a bm2000 and use neither.

 

[Adam Lincoln]

Dont like beastmaker, never have. Too much pointless bumf.

Lattice too rounded.

Transgression. Ouch.

Just use a 20mm positive campus rung now. Along with some 10mm edge and an 8.

 

[Liamhutch89]

Dont like beastmaker, never have. Too much pointless bumf.

Lattice too rounded.

Transgression. Ouch.

Just use a 20mm positive campus rung now. Along with some 10mm edge and an 8.

Agree with the first 3 points but I also dislike a campus rung due to their width (measured from the hanging edge to the underside of the rung). I find that my thumb rests against the surface offering varying levels of assistance. Getting my thumb to drag is something I do all the time on rock, but it's not desirable when trying to isolate the finger flexors. This issue only occurs on larger edges for me (20mm+) and not on micros due to differences in crimp form. Others may have no issue at any edge depth.

The edges on dedicated fingerboards are usually only a few millimeters wide, so there's no thumb drag unless i'm consciously trying to. Despite all the superfluous stuff on the Beastmakers, they have my favourite edges, particularly the centre bottom edge on the BM2K and the outside bottom edges on the BM1K.

Having said all this, I haven't done any hanging* from any fingerboard for 6 months and feel to have gone from finger strength being a significant weakness (with poor scores to back it up), to now subjectively feeling like finger strength isn't a concern, but having no idea what my actual hang scores look like.

*Instead have been doing the weird active tension stuff Tyler Nelson preaches and I rate it highly.

 

[Fiend]

I've been using this a bit recently: https://moonclimbing.com/moon-armstrong-fingerboard.html

And really quite like it. Seems to have more of what it useful and less of what is superfluous. I know the depth-marked edges, find it as ergonomic as a BM2k, and also I find the layered wood grain to give slightly more friction - not enough to be sore on the skin (I've been using it at the end of a session), but slightly better than BM2k to give a bit of of a focus on hanging rather than sliding.

(Disclaimer: Viewpoint of overweight perma-broken 6C punter, YMMV etc also I wouldn't be paying that price for it)

 

[duncan]

My board is home-made of recycled teak from an old front door. It matches the style of the house and furniture so is acceptable to the non-climbers. I don't have a shed or cellar so this is by far the most important factor in the design. It lives above the door of the front/music room, the coolest and pleasantest in the flat, which means it gets used fairly regularly.

I like being able to use different grip widths on the same edge which is where this style of board wins over the slot type. Edges are 45mm, 19mm and 14mm deep which feel about right for a punter like me but depths can be adjusted with spacers (ice lolly sticks). The edges are radiused similarly to the Beastmaker I had previously; I also find the lattice rung too rounded, not much like the holds I'm usually trying to pull on.

 

[abarro81]

I think whether you want pockets or not might depend on 1. how much you want to train pockets and 2. how tweaky your collateral ligaments and joints are. For me I am very tweaky trying to hang 2 fingers on an edge, hence why my view on this:

When people were trying to convince Moon (Chris says hi etc) to add a BM2000 to the new school he made the very valid point that you can do the vast majority of hangs on a handful of campus rungs.

was that Ben was being an idiot. "Wolfgang didn't need pockets".. well maybe not, but my joints are emphatically not Wolfgangs(!), and I do need them unless I fancy hurting myself.

Hence I like BM2k, but I have a beam that has that, a lattice edge (more conditions dependent but nicer on skin for 1-arm hangs), an old moon one (not used much), a campus rung, and some micros for full variety. If I could only have one it would be BM2k (or 1k, if the hold selection suits better).

I've also used the new moon one, which is much better than the old versions but still notably less nice than BM in my opinion - I find lots of things that get in the way of my wrist, thumb etc on some of the holds, whereas the more offset nature of the BM's upper and lower rows avoids this issue. Oh, the Moon version Fiend linked (made of ply) is not very nice - there's a version made of hard wood at the School which is much nicer, I guess it will be out soon??

 

[Dexter]

I have to say I personally really prefer the beastmaker 1k to the 2k. Maybe this is just me but the bottom 4 finger edges on the 1k are really nice to use, and it still has the same bottom 4 finger edges as the 2k. I can't think of a hold on the 2k that I regularly use that can't be substituted from the 1k. That being said, as stated by people a few campus rungs would also do a very similar job.