MSR's New Snow Safety Gear

[LightRanger]

Anybody played with their new stuff yet? I see they have two probes, two shovels, and two snow saws (one focused on snow science and a longer folding saw for building snow shelters).

The standard saw looks interesting.

[John_B]

I fiddled with one of the probes at a gear store. I think it had a thicker bottom half of the probe and then it thinned a couple of mm in the upper half.

Seemed like a normal probe though, hard to reinvent the wheel enough for me to notice I'd guess.

[LightRanger]

Yeah, saw the taper from the description I was reading. Agree with the sentiment on reinventing. I like the carbon-aluminum hybrid idea, but a probe is a probe for the most part.

The shovels seem well-designed. Flatter top for banging on them with a boot without bending. That's the idea at least. And serrated blades.

Saw seems interesting. Reminds me a bit of the G3 Bonesaw, but the handle is tilted a bit (don't know why and doesn't seem ideal) and the blade has cutouts. The latter fact seems like it would save a little weight.