I dropped $200 on a fancy stilts setup and wish I'd bought the cheap ones instead

Last spring I decided I was tired of borrowing my buddy's old metal stilts and bought a pair of those lightweight carbon fiber ones from a tool store by the highway. They cost me $200 and I figured they'd last forever. But after about a month the straps started slipping and I nearly ate it off a 12 foot ladder in a half-finished basement in Akron. The foam pads also wore down way faster than I expected. I ended up going back to a $60 aluminum pair from the big box store and they've been solid for 7 months now. Anyone else find that the expensive gear is sometimes more trouble than it's worth?

2 comments

2 Comments

the_evan1d agoProlific Poster

Did you ever try just tightening the straps or replacing the foam pads yourself?

-1

lisa_brown22h ago

Funny you mention that. I tried to fix a similar issue on an old backpack once and ended up making it worse. Spent an hour wrestling with the straps and finally just duct-taped the whole thing together. It worked, but I looked like a hiker who got attacked by a hardware store.