How to sharpen climbing crampons
MCS AlexClimbMCS AlexClimb Mountain Climbing School
High-quality sharpening of crampons is definitely a matter of your safety in the mountains and the effectiveness of your foot support on the slope during the ascent and descent. In addition, it is also a matter of energy consumption - with no doubts about your foot positioning, you can move more relaxed and spend less energy on extraneous coordination movements.
In this small article I will not touch on the nuances of sharpening equipment for iceclimbing - there are also some secrets in that. We will talk about this closer to the beginning of the iceclimbing season.
Now a few tips for sharpening crampons for alpine climbing.
The main rule for sharpening crampons: maintaining the factory geometry of the points. That is, during sharpening, you should not change the angle or change the thickness of the metal of your crampons.
After the wear of the crampons makes it impossible to maintain the factory geometry, all manufacturers and experts strongly recommend that the crampons should be replaced.
Reinforced front points (for technical models of crampons), having a significant thickness of mental, should be sharpened in three planes, the front part at 45 °, the angle of attack is 25 ° -40 °
The lateral, central, rear points of crampons, having the shape of a plate, should be sharpened only for convergence, in no case lessening the thickness of the metal. The same applies to the front points of firn (non-technical crampons). For any alpine climbing or technical ascents, all the points of the crampons must be sharpened.
Blunt crampons can be afforded only by those who fundamentally have no skill in the crampon use, or by those who climb the routes with a guaranteed absence of ice (steep rocky, grassy, firn slopes).
You can sharpen your crampons with a file or (carefully) on an emery wheel. The main thing is not to heat the metal when sharpening on a mechanical sharpener - after each touch of the grinding circle, the crampon point should be cooled in the cold water.
Otherwise, you can "weaken" the metal, and it will lose a significant part of its strength. For this reason, I would not advise giving your crampons to anyone for sharpening. This piece of equipment is extremely important for your personal safety, and any carelessness during repairs can lead to an unexpected failure of the crampons at the most critical moment of the climbing route.
Any sharpening crampons shortens the next period of use, so, the crampon sharpening skill never is superfluous and you definitely will need it more than once in the future.
The author of the text and photos - Alex Trubachev
Your professional technical mountain guide
MCS EDIT 2023