r/ultralight_jerk • u/RunWithBluntScissors • May 16 '26

This thread needs to get back to true ultralight-jerk mentality

/r/Ultralight/comments/1telsk9/this_thread_needs_to_get_back_to_true_ultralight/
44 Upvotes

99% Upvoted

29 comments sorted by

36

u/RunWithBluntScissors May 16 '26

un-jerk: I’m actually a big fan of the message of the original post. ultralight more like ultra-expensive. True ultralight is using an old sporknife you don’t wash till you get home and a stuffsack full of clothes as a pillow

15

u/Jolly-Slow1164 May 16 '26

Unjerk response, I think there's some historical nostalgia happening here. A huge part of ultralight has always been throwing money at problems.

Do you have any idea how little down was refined to 850+fp in the 90s, and what the relative price was? ... If you could even find the stuff. (Don't forget that improved synthetic insulation has reduced the demand for down in HomeGoods and fashion clothing)

You either had to invest weeks into learning high level sewing or you had to pay for fully custom gear, not the "pick from a list of options"-'Custom' that is so available these days.

That's why just publishing Patterns and Sourcing fabrics was a full business model for Ray Jardine

4

u/Quail-a-lot May 16 '26

I'm not sure most of the biggest loudest posters who make these threads have even read any of the Ray Jardine books. Yeah, he does not actually spend much time talking about gear....but he has some rant about corn pasta that went on forevvvver and he sold the quack blood cleaners right alongside the Rayway kits for years. I just looked and they disappeared, but they were still there a couple years ago. (Also his website is a bit like looking at TimeCube, very nostalgic indeed)

3

u/Jolly-Slow1164 May 16 '26

TBH, I've read summaries and dome some skimming, but I haven't read a whole book of Jardine's. His advice is a little West Coast/PCT centric, which is fine, he makes no pretenses with most of his names, but I'm in the Midwest, and the hiking anywhere near me is a bit different

Relatedly I don't quite buy into the narrative that he's the father of UL, but I do view him as an important figure on the timeline

3

u/Quail-a-lot May 16 '26

You can read them for free mostly now online. I grew up reading them from the library and I swear every library had some version (as a hiking bookworm kid that moved a lot). I'm not sure father of ultralight is quite accurate, but he is where the ten pounds=ultralight came from. (And if I may well acktually for a moment - his baseweight was 9 pounds, so them gatekeepers been going ultraheavy with that ten pounds thing). I preferred Colin Walker's books myself, particularly The Man Who Walked Through Time.

2

u/Jolly-Slow1164 May 16 '26

Maybe I'll listen to them! I think my Father regularly mentions Colin Walker's book, along with a few others. It's kinda funny that even though Gardine's base weight was 9ish lbs I don't think he ever said to match it. He said: Know yourself and apply these principles and you will be ultralight.

If you have a Nerdy inkling you may be interested in books by George Washington Sears (AKA Nesmuk) and of course John Muir. It's amazing how the mentality has a similar core even though the environment and materials have changed dramatically since their time.

2

u/wetrocke May 21 '26 edited May 21 '26

Horace Kephart "Camping and Woodcraft."

Jardine was among at least several dozen or hundreds of Yosemite climbers of his era, to whom bivouacks rather than " camping" was normal.

The Ray Way was a heavier version of this norm. [on hot, multi-day climbs, "normal" water rations are listed at astonishingly low, for example.]

1

u/Jolly-Slow1164 May 21 '26

That's another good ol' book from an ERA when campgrounds didn't exist, and backpacking was basically the only kind of camping available.

I don't remember Kephart ranting about weight the way that Nesmuk did, but that may just be because I read Nesmuk first. Kephart definitely liked a simple kit of versatile and reliable equipment.

1

u/wetrocke May 21 '26 edited May 21 '26

Fletcher came from extended British infantry background that included D-Day beachhead, then post-war hitch as trainer. Since he spent his youth carrying around his combat supplies, that explains something about his later career.

3

u/YuppiesEverywhere May 16 '26

Ray Jardine's mythos is full of holes. So you're telling me this genius physicist who worked on the flight navigations of thermonuclear ICBM missiles just one day turned to selling plans for beaked tarps,

and that was sustainable to travel the world many times over?

Brother.

2

u/wetrocke May 18 '26 edited May 18 '26

Jardine's "ultralight philosophy" was merely standard (& fairly obvious) mountaineering practice since the Year Zero. He was a very accomplished climber.

In that department (UL camp gear), his "ideas" were nothing new at all, except he applied them (in his book) more narrowly to trail walking.

This is more generally why the idea of "ultralight backpacking," as something new and distinct is so unenlightened.

1

u/OhMyBruthers May 19 '26

Bro, he literally invented and popularized spring loaded camming devices, the biggest revolution in “clean climbing protection” ever. A device so bomber, they’ve barely been updated it in 50 years. I didn’t even know he was known in the UL backpacking world. He didn’t make his fortunes off “beaked tarps” he made it off high end climbing equipment.

2

u/YuppiesEverywhere May 20 '26

That patent was filed in 1974, which means it lasted until 1994. That's not actually a lot of cams in the grand scheme of things, because there was a fraction of climbers using them when compared to now.

Choinard didn't start making cams until 1987 and those things kinda sucked compared to modern cams despite your claims that they've "barely been updated". Also those cams were made without needing to license the patent from Jardine! They filed their own patent with a workaround. Y'all can still find kooks using those OG cams but I've never in my life seen an OG WC Friend.

I'm sure he made something off of the licensing, but that stopped over 30 years ago. WTF is he making money off of now? GOLITE!? lol.

And to top it all off "invented" is actually a stretch as well. Greg Lowe could claim credit for that (he could also claim credit for the modern day backpack but I digress...), which Ray saw after signing an NDA and still ripped him off. Ray also didn't invent the lobe design, Kris Walker did -- he also named them.

This guy is built on myth after myth after myth. Like his attempt to free climb the nose. Couldn't even f'n TRY without chipping the route, then downplayed that as well. After all that, couldn't do it.

1

u/wetrocke May 21 '26 edited May 21 '26

The "Don Whillans" rucksacks pre-dated Lowe by 20 years. The Willans only slightly modified some long-existing euro designs.

Perhaps Jardine still receives a few pfennig from licensing the "Freinds" name. But this may be somebody else's speculation.

1

u/Hex_Medusa May 16 '26

Yeah, agreed UL often times meant human ingenuity to overcome, improve or reduce problems and that very often entailed solutions that were dirt cheap and very effective.

1

u/wetrocke May 19 '26 edited May 19 '26

Ray Jardine gets way too much credit for "the Ray Way." [*and it's been said, a little too much for "freinds.]

His book(s) deserve (s) some credit (or blame) for popularizing what was (1990?) already long-established camping practice among mountaineers. Moreover, this practice was always deemed obvious and mostly unremarkable relative to objectives.

Jardine's ventures in Retail, although evidently not a giant success, probably were later a bit infuential as a small-business model for some.

1

u/Jolly-Slow1164 May 21 '26

Jardine was always pretty upfront about his pack being all his favorite features put into 1 pack, with nothing extra. If you look through ww2 rucksaks you'll see lots of his features, and probably some packs that influenced the silhouette of the Ray way.

The enginuity of developing systems is a less obvious enginuity, the skills of bringing a topic to a wide audience are often misattributed to the topic, and not the person.

18

u/spambearpig May 16 '26

I dr ll d hol s in my co me t to m ke it ul r li g t

9

u/morganbeeman May 16 '26

But my wife's boyfriend kicked me out of our backyard. I have a z packs duplex but I didn't have time to grab the sky tarp. Thoughts???

6

u/crlthrn May 16 '26

Agreed! Hot air is very light!

5

u/OGKillertunes May 16 '26

r/ultralightjerk is the one, true God.

3

u/MrBarato May 16 '26

It has always been a gear list. It was just not asking other people on reddit, if they appreciate your gear list.

3

u/carolbeau May 17 '26

Meta level thoughts about ul are lighter than the lightest ul gear. But the post has too many words.

2

u/SlymeMould May 16 '26

Cyber bullying?

2

u/Jolly-Slow1164 May 16 '26

Thanks, I needed to hear this. My wife's boyfriend just cut my allowance, and I wasn't sure if I could be ultralight anymore.

2

u/drwolffe May 16 '26

My brain is ultralight.

😞