Dion Snowshoes is a Vermont-based firm that’s gaining traction (and flotation) with their light-weight and modular backcountry and racing snowshoes. Whereas you should purchase their snowshoes totally assembled, you can too customise and swap between completely different frames bindings, and cleats, relying on the kind of climbing/operating, footwear, or floor circumstances you’re prone to encounter. When totally assembled, all of their snowshoes are additionally significantly lighter weight than extra mainstream snowshoes from MSR, Atlas, or Tubbs, they fold flat in opposition to a backpack making them straightforward to hold, they usually’re simply as sturdy, particularly since you may substitute the parts in the event that they put on out reasonably than shopping for a wholly new snowshoe.
On this overview, I consider the Dion 164 Body supposed for climbing, Dion’s Quickfit Binding, and two of their cleats, the stainless-steel Ice Cleat supposed for ice and rocky terrain, and the aluminum Deep Cleat supposed for powdery snow.
The 164 Body
The Dion I64 Body is an easy 8″ x 24.7″ aluminum body with pre-attached decking and an aluminum heel cleat. The 164 body has light-weight plastic decking which is securely riveted to the aluminum body with redundant rivets and has a pre-installed cross-piece for mounting a cleat or what I’d known as a snowshoe crampon. It’s a lot quieter to snowshoe with than the plastic snowshoes made by well-liked producers.
The aluminum body is kind of stiff when snowshoeing, however nonetheless comparatively light-weight at 2 lbs 5.8 oz/pair and appropriate for hundreds as much as 280 lbs (together with a backpack). It doesn’t include a televator which is a bit of wire that may be flipped up off the decking to boost your heel and make it simpler to climb slopes whereas relieving calf fatigue. The shortage of a televator made me hesitate to guage Dion’s snowshoes since it’s thought of by many to be essential for mountain climbing in winter.
Anecdotally, I’ve been experiencing ache in my quads when utilizing televators this winter, most likely attributable to muscle tightness, however I can’t say I’ve missed them that a lot when snowshoeing up large peaks. Good traction within the type of aggressive cleats goes a protracted solution to mitigating their absence.
QuickFit Binding
The Dion QuickFit binding (3.2 oz) has two webbing prime straps and a heel strap secured with Velcro. I’m undecided how they did it, however the Velcro nonetheless works even when coated by snow. The binding straps can be found in a number of sizes and replaceable, in small, medium, and huge lengths equivalent to completely different boot sizes as much as a measurement 14. This implies you could possibly use the QuickFit binding with 400-gram winter climbing boots, higher-volume mountaineering boots, and even higher-volume pack boots, just by changing the binding straps. The various-length straps additionally allow you to remove further slack in your straps, which might be annoying, by choosing the suitable size in your footwear.
The QuickFit binding and all of Dion’s bindings fold flat which makes them straightforward to lash to the perimeters of your backpack because you usually have to hold snowshoes on hikes once you don’t know what path circumstances forward might be like (even if you happen to don’t use them). I favor fold-flat bindings however fewer and fewer snowshoes include them, choosing a lot bulkier Boa or ratchet-based bindings. The draw back of these bulkier bindings is that your pack’s compression straps aren’t lengthy sufficient to strap snowshoes to the perimeters of your pack, which is essentially the most handy and environment friendly solution to carry them.
In apply, the QuickFit binding could be very straightforward to placed on and take off whereas carrying gloves. It’s very secure and doesn’t create any strain factors inside your boots. It’s threaded by plastic ladder lock buckles, so that you simply need to be sure to don’t pull the ends out when taking off the snowshoes, as you will want to take your gloves off to rethread them, and that sucks in chilly climate.
Cleats (Crampons)
I’ve used the Dion 164 Body/QuickFit Binding with two of Dion’s cleats – their stainless-steel Ice Cleat (3.0 oz/every) and their aluminum Deep Cleat (2.4 oz/every). The stainless-steel Ice Cleat is the extra sturdy of the 2 and is designed for climbing on combined ice and rock, making it best for mountain climbing within the Northeastern United States.
Whereas the aluminum Deep Cleat is lighter weight, it’s designed for powdery dry snow and is far much less sturdy. In use, I didn’t discover all that a lot distinction between the 2 cleats: I attribute that to the truth that we are likely to have principally crusty snow in New Hampshire and never a lot powder, the results of intermittent thaws, rainfall, and snow within the mountain maritime local weather.
However if you’d like a cleat that’s going to take abuse, I’d go along with the stainless-steel Ice Cleat. I’ve used aluminum mountaineering crampons fairly extensively they usually get worn down rapidly after a season or two of average use. You’ll be able to’t sharpen them successfully they usually have to be changed after they get worn down. Chrome steel is the way in which to go and the load distinction is negligible.
The cleats connect to the 164 body with two locking screws that match by pre-drilled holes within the cleat meeting. It’s fairly intuitive to assemble the body, binding, and cleats however it helps to have a preassembled snowshoe for example for simple reference.
The draw back of Dion’s cleats is that they don’t present the side-hilling traction that many heavier snowshoes just like the MSR Lightning Ascent or MSR Evo Ascent present. That traction within the type of a serrated body or aspect rails, along with a entrance crampon, might be fairly helpful when crossing slopes or strolling above deep chasms the place an uncontrolled slide can be very unhealthy. The Dion 164 is a way more standard old-school snowshoe, and whereas lighter weight, it’s simply not in the identical league as a snowshoe that has a number of completely different crampon orientations.
Suggestion
Dion makes modular snowshoes with three parts: a body, a binding, and a cleat which you can combine and match for various snow/ice circumstances, footwear selections, and equipment weight necessities. In addition to being lighter weight than hottest snowshoes, the benefit is which you can tailor their snowshoes to your actual wants or substitute parts in the event that they break or put on out, with out having to purchase fully new snowshoes. Dion’s bindings additionally fold flat in opposition to the perimeters of a backpack, making them straightforward to hold utilizing the pack’s compression straps.
Nonetheless, Dion’s snowshoes lack televators which many individuals really feel is a crucial support when climbing mountains on steep trails. Additionally they lack cleats which can be particularly designed for side-hilling. However if you happen to’re keen to forgo these capabilities, they’re fairly practical snowshoes and fairly light-weight topping out at 3 lb 2 oz/pair which is a big weight discount over different mainstream snowshoes designed for mountain climbing.
In the event you don’t care concerning the modularity of Dion’s snowshoes and simply need a full snowshoe for mountain climbing that you simply by no means want to change, I’d suggest getting their preassembled 164 Quickfit Binding/Ice Cleat mannequin, which is kind of moderately priced, however can nonetheless be modified or simply repaired down the street.
Disclosure: Dion donated snowshoes for overview.
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