I needed to follow up on this thread, as I inquired about the stability of the 20" sticks based on my experience with the 17" double-steps being downright awful.
I didn't want to start a back and forth because I had no experience with the 20" sticks and I have no real skin in the game. Just knowing one way or the other is good enough for me.
Anyways, I picked up a set of 20" doubles here off of this forum and they arrived yesterday. I didn't play with them too much as I ran short on daylight, but WOW. I'm pleasantly surprised and how much more solid the 20" double steps are compared to the 17". With the 17's, it seemed no matter how I secured them to the tree, whenever I put pressure on one side of the top step(as in not standing with both feet on it, the torque always brought one of the bottom standoff bolts off the tree. I didn't like that...very sketchy.
Now these 20" sticks, I don't know if the extra length down low below the mounting point distributes that torque better because of the increased leverage, and all standoff points continue to make contact throughout the climbing cycle, or what ever it is...but over all if felt like there was less twist/flex and the stick just felt overall way more stable compared to the 17". Not in the same realm as my beast sticks...but definitely stable enough to were I will be giving these a season run for 2022.