About Kilter Grips

Kilter Grips is a climbing hold company owned by Ian Powell and Jackie Hueftle. Ian is the art and design side, and Jackie is more marketing/management. Griffin Whiteside heads up accounting among other things. Kiel Mahar is our main guy in sales. There are some other helpful folks as well--read more about the team on the Setter Closet Team page.

Kilter is not a “normal” climbing grip company. Because this industry is so young there has never been a company started by people who have so much experience. We are a bit obsessed and have the years to prove it. We know climbing gyms, climbing grips, and what professional route setters demand.

Kilter's first sets were released in 2013 and now the line is one of the largest in the industry. Kilter has won the Climbing Business Journal Grips List 6 times: we took first in the inaugural list in 2014, then won again in 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, and 2020. In 2018, 2019 and 2020 we also won All Time Favorite Brand.

Starting in 2019 Kilter became a USA Climbing sponsor and an official IFSC Authorised Hold Brand, meaning Kilter Grips may be used in the 2021 Tokyo Olympics.

ABOUT THE HOLDS

Kilter Grips started out as four main styles with unique characteristics that compliment each other aesthetically and practically, so you can set full routes with any Kilter style (or a mix of Kilter styles) and know that they'll look good on the wall, feel good on the hands, and make your climbers and setters happy.

Haptic Grips are a sub-line of Kilter and include all Ian's shapes that are not in the 4 main Kilter styles as well as shapes and new styles from key setters, shapers, and climbers who are working closely with Ian to develop their own lines of grips. Haptic shapers include Jimmy Webb, Jeremy Ho, Peter Juhl, Keith Dickey, William Watkins, Will Anglin, and Alex Puccio.

Union are a sub-line of Kilter. Union are a set or a few sets shaped by experienced setters including Aroldo Silva, Anders Rasker, Morgan Young, and Roy Quanstrom.

We recommend using our filters when looking for holds to more easily find the styles and hold types you are looking for.

The Kilter, Haptic, and Union lines will be constantly expanding, so check back often to see our newest shapes. Want a specific shape or expansion of a style? Ian can make pretty much anything out of foam, so shoot us an email and we'll see what we can do for you.

Our holds are often larger for the size than people expect. If you have questions about the size of certain holds or would like recommendations, please ask.

 SIZING  
 

Our holds are often larger for the size than people expect. If you have questions about the size of certain holds or would like recommendations, please ask.

Most of our photos have either a small toy car or a New York Metro Card for reference. The Metro Card is the size of a credit card. The toy car is the size of standard toy cars across the world.

 
Kilter's largest holds, Kaiju (Japanese for Strange Beast), can be purchased individually or in sets of 2 or 3 at a discount. Daikaiju are the truly huge ones and are normally sold as singles.
Urban Plastix' largest size is 3XL. Classic 3XL shapes are sold in complete sets, though sometimes it's a set of 1 hold. Newer 3XL may be sold as singles or in a pack at a discount like the Kilter Kaiju are.
This temp photo has 1 Kaiju and 1 large hold.
 

2XL are often quite large and some overlap with smaller Kaiju. A few overlap on the bottom end as well with some of the biggest XL holds in the line.

 

Generally 2XL sets have 4 grips.

 
tk   Fiberglass are sized on their own scale so a Large Fiberglass hold might be the same as an XL or 2XL Urethane hold.
 
tk  
XL - Most XL Kilter sets have 5 grips but there are a few 4-packs. Urban Plastix' classic set hold counts vary, regardless of the hold size.
L have 5 grips (or sometimes 10), M and S have 10 grips, and XS have 20 grips.
XS sets are usually foot/crimp combo sets where at least 5 and often most of the grips in the set can be used as feet or challenging hands.
tk  
Jibs (screw ons), Mega-Jibs (big screw ons) and Complex blocking sets (bolt-ons plus jibs to modify them) may have any number of holds in the set and be a variety of sizes.
tk  
Smooth Tufa segments are usually 12", 18", 24" or 36" long and can be assembeled in many ways. 
If you have questions about the size of certain holds or would like recommendations, please ask. 

ABOUT OUR MATERIAL

Our grips are not poured from buckets in someone’s garage. Instead they are produced by some of the foremost climbing hold factories in the world in top quality Polyurethane.

Kilter and Urban Plastix US and Kilter and Urban Plastix Europe are unique sets of holds made to go together stylistically, so you can set by combining Kilter US and Kilter Europe holds or Urban Plastix US with Urban Plastix Europe and have lines that look and feel right together.

Kilter and Urban Plastix Fiberglass are designed to compliment and expand our PU lines.

Aragon   US - Kilter and Urban Plastix US are produced by Aragon Elastomers in Louisville, Colorado. They have been producing grips for many popular climbing grip brands since 2006, utilizing the most modern manufacturing techniques in the industry. Ian originally began working with Aragon to develop material for e-Grips in the 90s and now, almost 20 years later, we pour Kilter at Aragon because we believe it is hands down the best material for climbing holds. No other material combines feel, flexibility, and longevity the way that Aragon's mix does. Every Kilter and Urban Plastix US grip comes with a 5 year manufacturer warranty from Aragon. If they break in that time, we will replace them. But they won’t.
 
Compsite X   EUROPE - Kilter and Urban Plastix Europe are poured in Bulgaria at Composite-X. They are made of the proprietory Dannomond material which is a super strong and light polyurethane developed by chemist (and Comp-X owner) Daniel French. Dannomond is his best mix after years of development, and so far it has performed extremely well in testing. We are confident that Kilter and Urban Plastix Europe holds in Dannomond will deliver our customers the quality and longevity they expect.
 
  FIBERGLASS - Kilter and Urban Plastix Fiberglass are made in Bulgaria at Walltopia. We were impressed by their quality when we visited in 2019 and decided to finally launch our fiberglass line with them.

Search Kilter