by Randall Chapman | May 17, 2020 | Homemade Gear
This is part two of this series, for part one go here. Once I picked this project up again and started putting it all together it took me about a month and a half to get it to where I could sleep on it. I had a couple of learning curve moments but everything came... 
by Randall Chapman | Apr 19, 2020 | Homemade Gear
First Ledge: I started putting together my first portaledge several years ago. It was long enough ago that I don’t really remember exactly when but the pictures I have say they were created in April of 09, I’m pretty sure I took them a while after it was built.... 
by Randall Chapman | Jan 18, 2020 | Homemade Gear
If I had to choose between the river and climbing, I don’t think I could. From time to time one becomes more important to me and I focus more energy on one than the other but that flips all the time. I’ve been climbing longer but since I started kayaking in 2009, I’ve... 
by Randall Chapman | Mar 10, 2019 | Homemade Gear
In the training portion of the blog I keep referring to the paint can apparatus and I thought I’d do a quick write up so people following would know what I’m talking about. The term “paint can” comes from when I used to own the climbing gym. I had built a training... 
by Randall Chapman | Feb 24, 2019 | Homemade Gear
One of the first things I built when I bought the local climbing gym was a low ropes course. I was the director of the Orange County Challenge Course for about 4 years when it first opened and wanted to have something more to offer kids during our summer camps. Camps... 
by Randall Chapman | Feb 10, 2019 | Homemade Gear
Several years ago I made a set of ice tools and a mountaineers axe, I can’t recall when exactly but it was around 2006 or 2007. I was working at the shop that had the water jet. The shop I worked at used to make sand blasting cabinets for a local company that...