The Leatherman Clean Contact Carabiner is a multi-purpose antimicrobial tool that helps you “navigate your everyday.”
It is made copper alloyed 260 brass and basically helps you to “minimize your touches with shared surfaces.”
I first learned about the Clean Contact Carabiner back in February 2021. When I asked our PR contacts about it, they said that this was designed and launched in 2020 amid the COVID pandemic, and that they didn’t believe it would be manufactured again once it sold out.
Advertisement
Now, 16 months later, the tool is still available on Leatherman’s website. It has a healthy number of user reviews, and so I’m guessing it has proven popular enough to keep offering, unless of course they’re still selling through the initial production run.
The Clean Contact carabiner is a fairly simply designed tool. It features a finger loop, grabbing hook, poking nub – which Leatherman describes as a button pusher and stylus – keyring or lanyard hole, and a pocket clip that can be removable for a slimmer profile.
The carabiner part features a simple spring-action wire latch. Leatherman designed the carabiner hook to double as a bottle opener.
The EDC tool can be used to push buttons, such as on elevators or ticket vending machines. Despite being described as a “stylus,” it seems that this works best on physical buttons. Meaning, it’s probably not a good idea to use this on touchscreen ticket machines.
It can handle smaller buttons as well, such as those found on ATM machines.
The hook is large enough to grab commercial door handles, although I’m not convinced this will be easy on the hands,
Advertisement
Lastly, the hook is large enough to slide over table tops for use as an improvised bag holder. Public floors can be quite grimy.
Key Specs
- 3.5″ length
- 1.9″ width
- 0.22″ thickness
- Weighs 2.55 oz (72.3 g)
Price: $24.95
Discussion
I love the idea of this, although not quite the price. I’m also not sold on the antimicrobial “260 copper alloy,” which is a brass alloy.
As I understand it, 260 brass is an alloy that is composed of approximately 70% copper and 30% zinc, and some metal suppliers describe it as usually containing a small percentage of other elements, such as lead.
I’d be happy with anodized aluminum or stainless steel, but I can understand why Leatherman went with brass, with copper and copper alloys often being described as antimicrobial materials.
People sneeze and then touch elevator buttons, they use and then leave public bathrooms without washing their hands (why do commercial designers build restrooms where you have to pull a grab handle to exit, especially in restaurants?!), etc.
This seems like a reasonable idea.
If you want something for less, there are plenty of cheaper variations, although the Leatherman looks to be thicker and better featured, and made in the USA.
The cheapest one I found by a known brand is Swiss+Tech’s, which is $6 for one on Amazon, or $12 for a 3-pack, which actually also comes down to $6 as there’s an active “save 50%” clickable coupon code. With a 50% discount on the multi-pack, perhaps these reduced-contact tools aren’t selling very well after all.
Still, the Leatherman looks to be a nice implementation, with presumably machined surfaces compared to simply being stamped out of metal.
Hilton
Two years too late.
Stuart
People still sneeze onto elevator buttons and leave public bathrooms without washing their hands.
This came out in 2020, I never heard about it at the time and first saw it in 2021. Leatherman reps said they wouldn’t make more, but 16 months later it’s still around and so I figured it’s still worth a quick post.
Koko The Talking Ape
Well, it’s possible to contract COVID through contact with contaminated surfaces, but the risk is low. As Stuart suggests, this and similar tools can prevent other illnesses such as gastroenteritis or pinkeye, which are often spread through contaminated surfaces.
GAK
It was released back in 2020.
Nathan
I had no interest when I first saw it have no interest now. there are plastic versions that are much cheaper and as antimicrobal or even easier to clean (put in the dishwasher).
I’m not so sold on how well that works anyway – after you use it do you have to make sure to never touch the end? do you worry about your other things it touches in your pocket – like touching your keys.
etc etc.
It looks larger and I’ll say this as a leatherman item I’m sure it’s functional but it’s probably not necessary.
Jared
I think that’s fair, but it’s not a tool for scientific lab work. E.g. if you put it into a pocket, you might get some transfer when you stick your hand into the pocket later to use it again – but wouldn’t that still be better than directly touching something and risk immediate transfer when you scratch your itchy nose a few seconds later?
I realize covid can live on surfaces for awhile though. Maybe you need one of those pocket UV sanitizers for ultimate protection.
I don’t think this tool is for me though – it’s the sort of thing I would too-easily lose. I’d probably rather have a few cheap ones so I could find them when I need one. I’m not going to buy a half-dozen at $25 each.
Koko The Talking Ape
This thing is made of brass, and copper alloys like brass are pretty good at killing microbes. So you can touch the end, and it shouldn’t spread contamination to other things in your pockets, like keys. Also, the actual contact area on the hard, rounded tip is tiny, so the number of bugs on the end would be miniscule.
But I think there are other, easier ways to prevent contamination from touch surfaces.
Philip
Perfect for the stupid and paranoid.
Koko The Talking Ape
That’s a little harsh, I think. E. coli infections are easily spread through contaminated surfaces, for example.
Philip
Got any data that that happens in any significant numbers?
Stuart
You can contract norovirus in several ways, such as:
Touching contaminated surfaces and then putting your unwashed hands in your mouth
https://www.cdc.gov/norovirus/about/index.html
E.coli seems to be more transmitted via contaminated food, including food that’s contaminated during prep due to contact with unclean surfaces. https://www.cdc.gov/ecoli/general/index.html
Norovirus and others are less food-borne and more contact-transmitted via contaminated surfaces.
MM
The first volume of the book set Modernist Cuisine has a lot of data on how common infections are spread.
At least as far as foodborne illnesses go the one big big thing that is far more important than anything else is handwashing. It’s been a while since I’ve read the book so I don’t recall the exact statistic but something like 80% cases of foodborne illness can be traced back to someone–either the cook or the diner–failing to wash their hands.
JoeM
The crazy part? That book is almost $900 here in Canada, and has an “At Home” second edition with only one volume to it, and that one is $400… Yet despite the insane cost, I would kill to own a full set. I barely think that way about my Tools, let alone a Book. Sure, I have a few “Of course I’d spend over a thousand dollars on that!” kinds of tools… but almost no Books fall into that category.
Good reasoning? The exact thing you’re quoting. The whole set has volumes dedicated to precise data on such subjects… I’d kill for that kind of reference!
MM
@JoeM
Wow, I thought they were expensive in the US but that’s a whole new level! I received the main set as a gift but at the time they were around $500 a set here. I purchased the “At Home” version as a gift for someone else and I paid $120 for it. Now this was a few years ago so perhaps the prices have gone up but that’s what I recall.
Knowing what I know now I would not buy the “At Home” version unless it were much cheaper–as in under $50. And if you have the main set it’s completely redundant. However the main set is worth every penny of $500USD if you’re serious about cooking and want to learn the science behind it.
Now if you’re looking for a bargain: find a copy of “The Professional Chef” published by the Culinary Institute of America. It doesn’t have to be the most recent edition. This is a common textbook used by culinary schools, while not as detailed and not as well photographed as Modernist Cuisine it absolutely is a fantastic book. And the best part is that you can find used copies of earlier editions for fantastic prices. I’ve given many copies of the 7th edition as gifts, they cost around $20 a copy. The value for money is unbeatable.
Peter
Not sure how the ladies handle their bathrooms but as a male and having watched or more endured male bathroom habits for decades I can get very acrobatic even in my waning years not to touch any more surface in a public bathroom than I absolutely have to.
Koko The Talking Ape
This tool strikes me as uncomfortable and awkward. I do as doctors do, which is to wash my hands and then use a paper towel to grab the door handle, and use a knuckle or elbow to press buttons (you don’t usually rub your eyes or nose with a knuckle.)
But I think door handles, buttons, and hospital touch surfaces, could be made of copper alloys more often. I wonder if there’s a market for sand-cast brass doorknobs or handles, light switches, etc.
fred
I have old Baldwin brass lever handle door knobs and solid brass wall plates throughout my principal residence. But in Florida the builder used SS – and my summer home seems to be all “brushed nickel” If I were to move my main house to California, I suppose I would have to put Prop 65 warning label on all the door knobs and wall plates to warn about their hazards (presumably lead or other heavy metal trace contents)
Franck B.
If your house were in California, you’d be wise to also put a Prop 65 warning on your bags of coffee as well. (They were on the coffee shops for a while until an exemption was made.)
I’ll give you one guess how I know that, and it’s also the same reason I recently bought a house in a state that’s not California. It’s too bad, because my old Tudor is like your home and still has the original Baldwin door sets and mortise locks from 1929. I’d have to take them to the hazardous waste dump for disposal (with hefty fee) if I replaced them–luckily parts are still available.
MM
Brass and bronze cabinet hardware, doorknobs, etc, were common in the past but I think they’ve mostly fallen out of favor due to their high price (for solid brass), and the need to polish it to keep it looking nice and shiny. You can find brass hardware these days but most of it seems to have a coating meant to reduce the need to polish it, but of course that would be useless if the goal is to prevent microbes growing on it. A good place to look for old school solid brass is the wooden boat industry.
There are new antibacterial plastics in use, if they don’t exist already I’m sure they could be used for high-touch items like knobs and switches.
Koko The Talking Ape
Hm. Well if solid brass is too expensive, just a brass plating would do. It seems even a low percentage of copper is enough to kill microbes. I guess we could learn to live without the bright shine.
I’d forgotten about antimicrobial plastics, but I wonder if they will kill such a broad spectrum of microbes that copper will (like bacteria, viruses, fungi, even MRSA, etc.) And I believe microbes are unlikely to evolve resistance to copper (I don’t know details), and I’d wonder if that would be true of antimicrobial plastics as well.
I know things like hospital gurneys are being manufactured with copper-plated handles and grab bars. Hospitals would have the greatest need, since nosocomial infections are a huge problem, but I’d imagine the idea could spread.
Franck B.
The problem I’ve noted with some of the soft-touch plastics that are being used a lot now is that at about 20 years, they disintegrate into a gooey mess.
I guess if by high-touch items you really mean items that are touched a lot so also need to be long-wearing, they would probably be hard plastic rather than having a soft-touch coating, so that wouldn’t apply!
MM
I was assuming hard plastic, not the soft stuff.
JoeM
I can imagine such a market being started by the Steampunk movement, attempting to make more advanced/complex versions of old Victorian designs, but ending up with an anti-microbial device in higher demand.
But I do agree, more touch surfaces should be brass with high copper content. Believe it or not, Silver is even more anti-microbial. Plate any cheaper metal with a millimeter of Silver, and it’s even stronger in the anti-microbial attributes. It would be expensive, but if we really cared about health and safety, we’d do a great deal more with making touch surfaces anti-microbial, and would easily reduce all forms of outbreak in diseases.
Stuart
Silver is considerably more toxic. Copper can be suited for potable water applications, and I can’t say I have ever seen the same about silver.
JoeM
Copper works for potable water sources, Silver for touch-surfaces. You have a PhD in material sciences, don’t you? You’d be the expert in picking which metal for which situation, should this ever be implemented in your area. Would be a cool side-gig you could talk about on ToolGuyd as well! But, I would say Silver is only an example. It is definitely more potent at killing microbes than Brass or Copper, but you have to use it appropriately, not universally.
That would definitely be something I’d love to see you speak up on. On ToolGuyd, or perhaps even a scientific paper of some sort, an attempt to mandate certain metallic surfaces to be certain metals, in order to maintain public safety from the spread of microbes, viruses, and general public safety.
MM
I see two big problems with silver here.
First is that it tarnishes. Depending on the environment it can tarnish very quickly. My father, a petroleum engineer, made a habit of wearing a particular silver ring whenever he visited refineries because it was something of a gauge of the presence of hydrogen sulfide. That ring might start to tarnish in a matter of hours which was a “canary in the coal mine” sort of indicator that there were unsafe levels of H2S around. Chemical plants aside, anyone who has had silver flatware knows it requires constant polishing to keep it looking nice. While tarnished silver might still be very safe (I’m not sure what the anitmicrobial properties of silver oxide or silver sulfide are) it certainly doesn’t look very clean or sanitary so people may end up rejecting it purely for cosmetic reasons.
Second is that it’s soft. Old silver flatware is often worn noticeably thin or the artistic details and/or proofmarks end up being polished away. Thus a thin coating of silver over some other metal would be quickly worn off a doorknob, cover plate, etc. The plating needs to be very thick or the item needs to be solid silver…and now it’s become quite expensive, as well as a theft target.
Stuart
I prefer to touch more inert materials on the rare occasions that I cannot wash my hands before eating something on-the-go, or touching water bottle surfaces, etc.
Have you ever seen “wash your hands after handling” warnings on different materials? A lot of things can transfer to your skin, and from there your mouth.
I became seriously over-attentive to these things when my kids were smaller, because of how often I’d be handling things that go in their mouths (bottles, toys, etc).
Lots of materials have antimicrobial and disinfectant properties, but that doesn’t mean I want them in my pocket or engineered into frequently-handled personal accessories.
fred
During WWI silver was used in the place of copper for electrical bus bar. Copper had been diverted into the making of shell casings. By WWII – that no longer seemed to be the case. When the Hunt brothers were trying to corner the market for silver – they were reportedly looking around for old (built in say 1917) buildings and electrical facilities that still had silver bus bar.
We should have sold our silver flatware service back then – I don’t believe that it has ever come back up to that level when Bunker Hunt tried to corner the market in the early 1970’s.
Meanwhile my proverbial silver spoon will nearly burn your hand if retrieved from a freshly poured cup of hot tea. It will certainly tell you about silver’s superior heat conductivity.
Koko The Talking Ape
A millimeter of silver would be quite a coating! Maybe you meant micron?
And it seems you don’t need a super-high copper content. This says even an alloy of 55% copper was still effective against MRSA, which
the scary bug.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antimicrobial_properties_of_copper
But the higher the copper content, the faster it acted. So it seems best to plate metal surfaces with pure copper, and thickly enough that it won’t wear off in regular use.
Don Julio
I can use it to shoot a face mask into the trash!
JoeM
I saw this released in 2020, and never thought it would make it all the way to ToolGuyd. Being 100% honest here… I think this particular Leatherman attempt was a Pandemic Cash In. Some people benefit from war profiteering, some people from medical outbreaks. This little device is something that definitely came out of trying to cash in on Covid precautions. They didn’t even take the design seriously.
“Button Pushing Nub” “Handle Gripper Hook” and of course, because Everything needs one, even when the origin of the item would be completely undone by its presence, “Carabiner Doubles as a Bottle Opener” …Okay… Bottles of Beer and rarely-found Sodas (We have them up here in my area. “Popshoppe” brand sodas have a non-screw-on top.) were not only not recommended during the Pandemic, due to all the hands involved in the delivery process, they were also one of those items that were horded so they weren’t available… so… the bottle opener self-negates on this tool.
Now… I do wish they had gone with some different sizes, because that hook was also meant to grab subway, and public transit, grab bars. Some accessibility issues aside, those bars are different diameters, and one can’t tell which size one needs, until they’re in front of one. Sure, you can make the grabber part the size of the largest one you have access to measuring, but that’s not going to help if there’s one elsewhere that is larger. Yes, the grip would still work on smaller diameter grab spots, and door handles, simply by locking the tool at an angle so two edges bit into the surface for grip. But just stamping or machining this out is far from something truly useful.
Then… The pocket clip… Undoes all that anti-microbial talk because it’s made of one of the most microbe-friendly materials in the Leatherman stable of metals. So, the rest of the tool is clean, but the pocket clip? No, that’s filthy. And yeah, the bonus there is that you can remove it… so why did you buy the tool for so much, when it was already full of logical holes to start with?
I’ve been rolling my eyes at Leatherman releases for a few years now. This one was a full on head-desk moment for me. Leatherman could do so much better, for so much less. I’m actually sad this made it onto the radar for Stuart to review.
ca
Strange they include a bottle opener on a device explicitly intended to become contaminated.
Scott K
I can’t stand the idea of these- plenty came out amid Covid, and I remember being slightly disappointed to see the Leatherman version a while back. This basically just transfers whatever you don’t want to touch to your pocket/pant leg/bag.
I will say I like the bag holder feature, but this isn’t worth buying for that alone.
Pat
Doors on rest rooms open inward so they don’t swing out into a hallway were someone is walking past.
Stuart
That makes sense, but when there are end-of-hallway restrooms, 3 different malls near me have different restroom door styles near their food courts. One has no door, one has a grab handle, and another has a grab handle on the outside and push-to-open upon exit.
Franck B.
A few years ago I bought some “wave-to-activate” switches but didn’t have a use for them but they stayed in inventory.
I was pleasantly surprised when I saw that the spring 2019 opening of the Delta Sky Club in Austin included using those switches on the restroom main doors. They’ve expanded their use to other locations (or maybe already had them before I noticed). It’s like a perfect usage, and was pre-COVID.
But the building standard is that doors should always open into a room unless it is size constrained (like some closets), except for main entrances to retail. I’m not saying it is warranted or should be reexamined, but that’s how it is. Like standards for multi-gang light switches, and that the ground on a receptacle should be up (or to the left). Not everyone knows about them, or understands them, or can explain them… yet they’re there, and people get used to them sometimes without knowing or questioning.
Stuart
Many people leave restaurant and food court bathrooms without washing their hands, and a lot of times these bathrooms have air dryers – meaning no paper towels.
I understand about main corridor doors opening into rooms, but restrooms where there’s a high expectation of food handling afterwards.
Maybe due to COVID there are now more hand sanitizer stations outside public restrooms.
fred
One of the Seinfeld Show episodes centered on just this. The character Poppie – is seen kneading pizza dough after returning from the WC sans hand washing.