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The Pathfinder Sports rack was loosely based on the Superack design, but uses six round bars. The top bar has a turned rope-centering groove. The top two bars are solid, while the four bottom bars are tubular, to save weight. The spacers are held in place by set screws, so they can be set wherever the user desires. Since this rack has six bars, it can provide more friction than the original Superack, yet it weighs less (round bars are lighter than square ones of the same height).
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This is the original large-bar rack design based on Kyle Isenhart's article in Nylon Highway #1. This rack was designed for long drops. The large bars provide a larger mass for absorbing heat, and tend to run cooler that standard rack bars. He later published the results of temperature tests (Nylon Highway #4) that showed the Superack ran about 30 to 35 C (60 F) cooler than a standard rack for moderate rappelling speeds.
The Superack only has four bars (with spacers between the top two), and has less friction capability than a standard 6-bar rack. This generated some controversy in the caving press, with both sides having some valid points to make. Overall though, when used by an experienced caver, the Superack does what it was designed to do, but it is not a beginner's rack.
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©2007, Gary D. Storrick