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An update on the grippers


Aleksandar Milosevic

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You guys remember that I asked you about advice for grippers, which ones to choose etc...

And that I used to struggle on my #2 to do singles. 

Well, the package arrived a week or two ago (1.5, 2.5, 3) and I only opened the #1.5 till today. I could do TNS reps with ease with both hands, at the moment it's 10+ for both hands without a set.

The mystery was, I was still struggling on my #2, and it feels like a brick. Well, the mystery was solved today, when I opened the #2.5 and closed it with ease without chalk and warm up with my right + closed it to about 1 mm with my left.

My #2 is insanely hard, I'd say harder than the #2.5 I have.

I feel the #3 is coming in the next couple of months, with a parallel set even faster.

P.S. I just tried it a couple more times, felt like nothing, it felt so easy I freaking checked if it's really a 2.5...

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2 hours ago, Aleksandar Milosevic said:

My #2 is insanely hard, I'd say harder than the #2.5 I have.

That’s crazy. :ohmy

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8 minutes ago, Aleksandar Milosevic said:

Could it be that the spring is dry and full of chalk etc.? 

Definitely. And/or rusty. 

Based on our ratings data, there is a 2 pound gap where the hardest #2 is 119 and the easiest #2.5 is 117. 

But you’ve got a #2.5 that you can close “easily” and a #2 that you cannot close at all. That is definitely more than a 2 pound difference. 

For whatever reason, your #2 is crazy. 

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I think I also have a very hard COC 2. When I first got it I couldn't close it but was able to close a 2 rated at 114.9lbs relatively easily. I have since closed mine but am contemplating getting it rated just to see what it is really at.

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6 hours ago, jchapman said:

Is it possible the #2 is mislabeled?  

Mic'ing the spring should give that answer. 

I hope so because having a two harder than a 2.5 seems like terrible quality control. 

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37 minutes ago, king crusher said:

Mic'ing the spring should give that answer. 

I hope so because having a two harder than a 2.5 seems like terrible quality control. 

It's actually a good thing tho. Makes it easier to close gaps.

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18 minutes ago, Fist of Fury said:

It's actually a good thing tho. Makes it easier to close gaps.

No it's not a good thing, there should be a half again jump from a 2 to a 3 when someone plops down their hard earned money on a 2.5.

If I bought a middle gripper and had it shipped to me and it was easier than the one below it, I would be looking to return it immediately.  

That's just my take on it.

 

It would be like buying some 45lb plates and having them weigh 35lbs lol

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1 hour ago, king crusher said:

No it's not a good thing, there should be a half again jump from a 2 to a 3 when someone plops down their hard earned money on a 2.5.

If I bought a middle gripper and had it shipped to me and it was easier than the one below it, I would be looking to return it immediately.  

That's just my take on it.

 

It would be like buying some 45lb plates and having them weigh 35lbs lol

It's good because grippers are not rated from factory like plates are, your comparison is not valid at all. You can easily sell a 118# gripper because they are very rare and hard to find. If every gripper was calibrated from factory like competition plates are it would be impossible to fill any gaps in your collection. Filling gaps with plates are easy, another reason why your comparison is irrelevant.

Good luck finding a manufacturer of grippers who will calibrate down to the pound like Matt does. It wont happen, not on a big scale.

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21 hours ago, Aleksandar Milosevic said:

I can close it, but the difference between them seems like 5% to me. Maybe I just felt really strong today :) 

Send it to Cannon my curiosity is extremely peaked, also grats on the 2.5# not a easy gripper at all! :rock

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5 hours ago, king crusher said:

No it's not a good thing, there should be a half again jump from a 2 to a 3 when someone plops down their hard earned money on a 2.5.

If I bought a middle gripper and had it shipped to me and it was easier than the one below it, I would be looking to return it immediately.  

That's just my take on it.

 

It would be like buying some 45lb plates and having them weigh 35lbs lol

I have 45s that weigh 42.3 and 48.6, there's very little quality control within the fitness industry

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Thank you Benjamin, I was surprised how easily I closed it.

It was always weird to me, that my strength on the adjustable is even higher than the #2.5 averages, and I'm struggling with a #2, it didn't make sense.

I opened my #2.5 with the intention of using it for SB holds, I thought it's gonna feel like a brick compared to #2. As soon as I take it out and feel out the sweep, it felt really easy. I said to myself, well I guess I'm just rested, I'll give it a try. Closed it with no chalk and no issues. I didn't believe it...

BUT, now thinking about it, I compared how the #2 feels after already doing a couple of singles with #2.5, and it was after a training session. Today I managed to do 2 reps on the #2, so it's definitely easier, just not by much. I feel when I clean and oil it it will feel even smoother. What's also interesting, that my used #2 has knurling that feels like razors tearing my skin, while the new #2.5 feels pleasant to train with. I just tore my pinky up with the #2 while typing this post... 

The biggest problem is that I'm training my grippers in a very fatigued state, since I'm pushing my thick bar, wrist wrench, rolling thunder and crush numbers up at the same time while doing a lot of wrist work. I will clean the #2, oil it, and try to get some reps in, if I ever rest...

I can't send it to get rated, since I live in Serbia, and the shipping and everything else would cost more than the gripper :) 

 

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7 hours ago, Fist of Fury said:

It's good because grippers are not rated from factory like plates are, your comparison is not valid at all. You can easily sell a 118# gripper because they are very rare and hard to find. If every gripper was calibrated from factory like competition plates are it would be impossible to fill any gaps in your collection. Filling gaps with plates are easy, another reason why your comparison is irrelevant.

Good luck finding a manufacturer of grippers who will calibrate down to the pound like Matt does. It wont happen, not on a big scale.

I dont expect them to be calibrated but they should fall in line with their intended levels. 

So back to the plate analogy.  If I was buying 45's and they were LIGHTER than my 35's that would be a complete joke. 

So the analogy works well when you look at it in those terms.

 

Climber,  see above for my reply to you as well. Your 45's were still in the ballpark.  If you told me you had a 45 that weighed less than a 35lb plate, I'd certainly say that is a joke too.

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14 hours ago, king crusher said:

I dont expect them to be calibrated but they should fall in line with their intended levels. 

So back to the plate analogy.  If I was buying 45's and they were LIGHTER than my 35's that would be a complete joke. 

So the analogy works well when you look at it in those terms.

 

Climber,  see above for my reply to you as well. Your 45's were still in the ballpark.  If you told me you had a 45 that weighed less than a 35lb plate, I'd certainly say that is a joke too.

Buying plates gives you the option of deciding how much resistance you want to train with. That's exactly my point, if every gripper would have the same resistance it would suck big time. The worst thing you can do is to train with the same resistance all the time and not being able to change.

If I got a #2 that was very hard I would be really happy because that is a very rare find. I would immediately buy another one because I would most likely get an easier one. Which would give me a much better set of grippers to train with.

 

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I would say “rate” though, not calibrate. CPW is taking a measurement, and always after manufacturing.  We’re not adjusting grippers to be in some tolerance.  

It’s also correct that it would be very time consuming for a company like IM to calibrate each one. Like, let’s say IM wanted all #2s to be 105 (or however they choose to measure the strength).  They could start with adjustable temporary handles, put some reps on the spring, find the mounting depth for the target number, then glue on the permanent handles at that depth. Grippers would probably double in cost.  And we’d lose all that desireable variability that makes training easier.   

Even what Alexsander is experiencing does not sound like a quality issue to me.  Unless there is a really uneven mount, everything about the gripper is probably within tolerance.  

Alexsander, can you measure the spread of the grippers?  I wouldn’t be surprised if the #2 was close to 76 mm and the #2.5 is close to 70 mm. 

I was doing a project and took measurements from ~50 IM grippers over about 6 months. The spread was the biggest variable. Mounting depth only varied by 5/32” between the high and low singular figures.  For the other 48 there was only a 3/32” variance. 

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That's huge variability on both spread and handle placement.  This isn't 1979, it's 2019.  Unless they are using slave labor in NorKo to bend the springs by hand (and mule power) and eyeball the handles, that's horrible.  Even with bad quality control, even the cheapest, somewhat modern automated processes should have no more variability than a mm on either of those measurements. And that's pretty bad.  Just saying.  

Maybe they put the handles on using manual labor if the volumes aren't there to justify automation, but the springs are turned by machine.  Even manual handle placement shouldn't be off by 5/32" if they cared.  

But kinda glad they don't since it gives us the whole spectrum of differences.  But man, a 10% difference on spread is a pretty crazy "tolerance" to accept in this day and age for an automated process.  

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5 hours ago, Cannon said:

I would say “rate” though, not calibrate. CPW is taking a measurement, and always after manufacturing.  We’re not adjusting grippers to be in some tolerance.  

It’s also correct that it would be very time consuming for a company like IM to calibrate each one. Like, let’s say IM wanted all #2s to be 105 (or however they choose to measure the strength).  They could start with adjustable temporary handles, put some reps on the spring, find the mounting depth for the target number, then glue on the permanent handles at that depth. Grippers would probably double in cost.  And we’d lose all that desireable variability that makes training easier.   

Even what Alexsander is experiencing does not sound like a quality issue to me.  Unless there is a really uneven mount, everything about the gripper is probably within tolerance.  

Alexsander, can you measure the spread of the grippers?  I wouldn’t be surprised if the #2 was close to 76 mm and the #2.5 is close to 70 mm. 

I was doing a project and took measurements from ~50 IM grippers over about 6 months. The spread was the biggest variable. Mounting depth only varied by 5/32” between the high and low singular figures.  For the other 48 there was only a 3/32” variance. 

Spread is exactly the same, to the millimeter. 

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Well, it's time for an update. After 2 days of rest, I decided to train on the grippers. I cleaned and oiled my #2.

The result: after singles on my #2.5 I closed the #2 for 7 reps with a wide set.

I have gotten significantly stronger in such a short period of time that it's insane.

I held the #2.5 for 22 seconds on my right and 13 seconds with my left with the Silver bullet, after all that.

It seems like the combination of fatigue, non-oiled and dirty spring, trying the #2 after doing the #2.5 and my thought that it's not possible that I'm that much stronger after a couple of weeks brought me to the wrong conclusion that my #2 is so strong. I guess that I'm the one who's strong :)

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