Front	Rear	Top
Left	Right	Open for Rigging

Technical Details

I acquired this Omega Pacific Prototype from Marty Karabin in 2022.

This Omega Pacific Prototype is 94 mm. long, 122 mm. wide, 61 mm. high, and weighs 497 g.

The Prototype consists of a body, two bollard arms, and a control lever assembly. The body is made from a milled aluminum central rib, two milled aluminum alloy side plates and three stainless steel spacers bolted together with one cap and three round Allen-head screws per side. The side plates have inward projections on each end, forming a semi-closed housing. The resulting rope channel openings are 33.5 mm. long and 19.5 mm. wide. Milling marks appear on both the internal and external surfaces of the side plates. The central rib is 9.4 mm. thick. It has has a lower extension with a 15.8 mm. diameter attachment eye. The sides of the rib have curved recesses on each side to guide the bollard pawls discussed below. A central slot at one end allows mounting the control handle.

The two bollard arms are mirror images of each other. They appear to consist of bollards attached to a plate, but are actually milled from a single block. The plate portion is 3 mm. thick, while the bollards are truncated hollow cylinders with a 36 mm. diameter, 16 mm. length from the plate, and a 17 mm. long flat chord. The arms pivot on the spacer at the control arm end of the housing. Springs on these spacers pass through holes in pins set in the arms. These act to open the bollards. Small projections on the central-plate side of the arms allow the lower surface of the control lever cam arms (described below) to limit bollard closure and to open the bollards when the control lever is moved.

The control lever assembly consists of a control lever, a spring return assembly, and two cam arms (one for each bollard). The lever is mounted on the same spacers as the bollard arms, and rides in the central rib slot mentioned previously. A thin plunger pinned to the top of the control arm fits into a hole drilled into the edge of the central rip, and presses against a compression spring inserted into this hole. The cam arms are bolted to the lever about 25 mm. below the pivot axis. These arms are 3 mm. thick. They are initially only 5 mm. tall, but end at at 25 × 25 triangular cams that ride in the central plate recesses and press against the bollard arm projections. Raising the control lever moves the cam arms outward, which move the bollards downward with respect to the housing.

There are no markings on the Prototype.

Comments

Raising the control lever reduces rope friction. Although this may be more idiot-proof than the opposite, I find it to be counter-intuitive (not to mention that I have great faith in the Universe's ability to produce idiots that can overcome any idiot-proofing).

The control lever binds in its mounting slot, making the spring plunger ineffective. This is a clearance issue that would have been addressed before production. I would expect this mechanism to be susceptible to clogging by sand or mud, much like a normal carabiner plunger assembly is.

The rope runs against two of the spacers and not the aluminum housing extensions, so wear should not be the problem that it might appear at first glance.

This is a prototype that never went into production. I assume that if it had, the production model would have substituted forged parts for the milled ones used in the prototype. The aluminum parts would probably be anodized.

This prototype has some interesting concepts. In its present form, it is larger than I like, but the bulk could easily be reduced, resulting in a lighter and more convenient item. It leaves me wondering what this idea might have evolved into had Omega Pacific not ceased operations when they did.

The other prototype…

Marty acquired two prototypes from Omega Pacific after they made the decision to cease operations. He offered one to me, and gave me a choice of which one I would like to have. I chose the one described above, but what about the other one? Since I don't review devices that I don't own and haven't had a chance to test myself, I cannot provide the normal details for the second prototype, but I can show some images of it here:

As you can see, the second prototype has a more refined handle and incorporates plastic rope guides below the bollards. Marty and I noticed that with a thinner central rib shaped the way it is, the bollard arms would sometimes catch on the rib when closing. This problem would have been solved before production, had either device proceeded to that stage.