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The cold world of skimo & alpine climbing

The cold world of skimo & alpine climbing

Monday, February 3, 2014

Grivel Machine 3.0, a first look


Grivel was kind enough to loan me a Machine 3.0 recently. Fun to speculate on this one.

I'll let these two pictures from today tease you just as they have me.  Give me a few days yet and I'll have something written up about them.  To date I only bothered to write up a very few loaners.  This will be the first tool in that category.   

I've not been a big fan of any of the Grivel's ice tools.  And admittedly I may have been missing more than I was willing to admit.   A number of knowledgeable friends are BIG Grivel fans.   I was curious enough about this particular tool that I was willing to buy a pair from a photo  over 6 months ago now.  Sad, because at the moment you can't buy a single tool, let alone a a pair, yet.
Disappointing, as this one will go back to Courmayeur this week.



Shown are the resulting hand/grip angles pulling from vertical to a horizontal terrain so commonly the crux on steep ice.  Left to right, original Quark, original Nomic and the new Grivel, Machine 3.0

16 comments:

Unknown said...

What in particular disappointed you? Or will we see a full right up soon? In any case its kind of hard to go wrong with any of the modern choices on the market...

Dane said...

"What in particular disappointed you?"

That I don't own a pair myself to climb on. Tools are all about personal preference. But why have a blog if you are not willing to voice an opinion. Lots of very good tools these days by comparison. Just some better than others.

Morgan74 said...

I'm liking the I-beam construction. Reminds me of my DMM Rebels. The handle doesn't look as grippy as the nomics.

Anonymous said...

What happened to the Avatar? I guess this (Machine 3.0) is what it turned into. Three years ago it caused quite some excitement but then vanished into oblivion.

Francois said...

Have you tried any of the Reparto Corse tools? No good on ice?

copper said...

Have you provided your opinion on the Grivel Quantum Tech yet? If so, can you provide me with a link? Thanks.

Anonymous said...

I love my matrix techs, bet you would like those Dane. I had a pair of the x-monsters... definitely not a fan of the handle on those...maybe if you added all kinds of tape and such and kept them for dry tooling. Definitely can't beat the price though.

Unknown said...

After seeing them at OR in the flesh I am very interested in more info. Great construction, good features, and hey, they look awesome.

Eric Sundberg said...

Hi Dane, what is the weight of this ice axe? Looks light.

Dane said...

My old Nomic with pick weights and a *full rubber wrap* is 672g.

No wrap it is 574g.

Current 3rd genration Nomic with pick weight is 570g.

New Machine 3.0 is 660g and very well balanced IMO.

Iceman said...

How was it on ice? Looks awsome!

Joseph said...

where's the write up you mentioned Dane, I'm intrigued about this one! Will you be able to fit adze's and hammers to it?

Dane said...

No hammer or adze for this one...

Joseph said...

pity, could of been an awesome alpine tool!

Anonymous said...

Has anybody climbed with the Grivel Machine 3.0? What is the verdict?

Unknown said...

There is the mixed pick with a hammer. But then that would throw it off balance.