Girth theory: Pumping vs. clamping

Just chipping in here from my own experience. For me, to get the maximum potential out of your penis when it comes to girth, clamping is the way to go. Back in the day when I first started PE I was using like sneaker laces or basketball short strings to basically tie them off at the base of my penis and trap blood flow. The result was a really engorged penis and then I’d slowly stimulate more and do some light jelquing with lube. Over the years my girth increased pretty dramatically. I started maybe a shade under 6.4 EG and on my best days I’m now anything ranging from 7.2-7.3 EG. I measure with a string usually 1-2x a month.

Nowadays I use a cock ring (silicone) to do my clamping. I think I’ve just about reached my peak girth. So I’ve added almost a full inch of girth over I would say 3-4 years.

I think it’s worth mentioning though, a large part of your ability to add girth is going to come down to your cocks structure. For me, I have an incredibly pronounced Corpus Spongiosum and Urethra vein. Because of that my penis is very round. I see some guys who don’t have such pronounced Corpus Spongiosums and it’s almost like a flatter looking penis shaft. I don’t know if there’s really anything that can be done about that outside of surgery so that’s why I say part of it is just about the structure of your penis and your personal anatomy. For me I kind of lucked out having those parts of my penis already fairly pronounced.

Edema is interstitial fluid buildup, or fluid bulldup in the tissues. A donut is when edema collects around the shaft just under the glans. It looks like a donut because the fluid has collected and swollen up that area. The body will naturally re absorb the fluid in a few hours. It can result from clamping, pumping or other activity which restricts the body’s normal blood flow. Wrap a rubber band around a finger will generate the same thing on a smaller scale.

Some guys like to have a little edema build up as it is a temporary girth increase for sex.

A very small group of guys pursue very large edema buildup in their dicks. This group will pump for hours, even all day in this pursuit. The result is a penis which looks like a water filled ballon. Not sure why they do this- it can’t be used for sex, but ultimately the body will reabsorb all this fluid.

@32quarters

Here is my images attached, I can’t seem to get a seal on this thing and kind of annoyed because I just bought it. I know it’s cheap but still, I would like to at least use it a bit.

Pumping provides the least-permanent gains of any form of PE; followed next by clamping. Both tend to bring little more than fluid buildup and/or swelling via tissue trauma. I still believe, however, that clamping can be used effectively as an accesory (do a good PE workout, then clamp at moderate intensity afterwards to: 1) minimize the turtling and, 2) to maintain higher-than-usual pressure against the tunica for a much longer time than the actual PE workout (sort of a low-level, time-intensive process).

Well that was a heck of a read… a lot of great ideas were thrown in the mix, even if the majority of this thread wandered off the titular subject. A number of concepts sound brilliant, but I noticed a few conclusions based on misconceptions and faulty logic.

I’m not going to appeal to my education or knowledge; if anyone has a grasp of mathematics and physics, my take should make some sense. My numbers may not be perfectly accurate, but the argument is relative. I just want to show how pressure works. To be honest, pudendum’s conclusions were fairly close, but the take away probably should have been "proper jelqs are better than either clamping or pumping", which may be somewhat ironic.

PRESSURE
The first thing that needs to be cleared up is how little difference there is between the two mechanisms (and please catch me if I overlook something here). The tunica is a membrane which is always subject to pressures… on both sides. The atmosphere is about 30 inHg. Human blood pressure is 120/80; in inches that’s 4.7/3.15 inHg. That means (in a healthy human at rest) there is always around 33-35 inHg on the inside of the penis and 30 inHg on the outside. This is just enough to maintain a flaccid hang of what is a fairly sturdy but flexible organ.

Now, when pumping, there’s no "pulling" involved, the only thing that changes is that air pressure drops from baseline atmospheric (29.9 inHg). I think the most common pumping amount I’ve heard is ~3 inHg, so if we were pumping flaccid at this level, it would look like this:

33-35 inHg >|< 27 inHg

If we introduce an erection, the internal pressure will increase as well, creating a greater differential pressure. I couldn’t find an absolute answer for this, but according to this thread - Erectile Pressure - an erection is about 6 inHg. Since the erection is mainly isolated (the CC no longer has a pulse) we have this:

36 inHg >|< 27 inHg

Now we kegel! According to the Lavoisier study quoted earlier, from "Journal of Urology 136 (1986)", the kegel was measured to increase pressure between 4-22.6 inHg. Therefore, suppose our incredible athlete can produce this:

58 inHg >|< 27 inHg

If we replace the pump with a clamp, there are only two changes. The easy one is external pressure, which is neutral again (atmospheric pressure). The "hard" one is the function of the clamp as a fulcrum, which I don’t have the math for, but from experience we know is quite significant. In this case:

58+? inHg >|< 30 inHg

Again, the numbers are not critical. The point I want to drive home is whether you clamp or pump, you are simply tipping the balance of pressure, which exerts directional force on the tunica. It’s irrelevant whether you are "pulling" or "pushing" the compliance of the tunica only effects how much it expands (and thins and tightens etc.), not how much force it is subject to. pudendum also made mention of the pressure dropping inside the CC because of this volume increase, but this is also irrelevant. The pressure created inside is limited by the strength of your ICS muscle, which is the same whether your girth is 4" or 7".

FLUID - Though it’s been mentioned and I think most will say it’s a lesser issue, it bears summary. I believe that fluid is inevitable and variable depending on your methods. Some people get more with pumping and some more with clamping. I get it at the base near the clamp, but I think it’s because I’m always edging and accidentally pushing it downward! Others probably get a lot less clamping because the clamp isolates the penis from the body more so than the pump… with the pump it just leaks in from more directions. The bottom line is both clamping and pumping produce a pressure differential from the circulatory system to the extra-cellular spaces, so both can produce edema.

COMPLIANCE
The second misconception that must be addressed is the notion of working on the tunica while it is compliant, i.e. "pumping with a semi" etc. I think pudendum hit on something critical here, but he seemed to have misinterpreted it.

The penis has fibers that run lengthwise and fibers that run circumferentially. Sure, they are coiled up when flaccid, but to gain erect length and girth, they must stretch or grow longer, there is no other mechanism unless somehow your elastic fibers are so strong you never actually have 100% erection (which would technically be a genetic defect if it is even possible). Whether lengthwise or girthwise, we must apply tension to those fibers. Just like stretching a spring with a given amount of force- the spring extends and compliance drops until a balance is achieved or the spring breaks (please god no). Now pudendum’s conclusion that we must aim to over-stretch our girth without stretching lengthwise is probably very good insight, but this cannot be achieved in a cylinder unless there is something mashing down our glans (like the dishrag analogy… the pump is that other guy pulling the mesh lengthwise), forcing all expansion in a radial direction. Therefore I’m not sure I see the benefit of pumping semi… the tunica can still be pumped to an over-extended dimension (like the spring), but the only difference is the internal pressure will be lower, since you are trying to create a pressure differential with the entire circulatory system rather than a closed tunica (not to mention kegelpower…).

I think our biggest takeaway should be that jelqing is still technically a better mechanism for growth, and clamping and pumping are only more effective because most of us have weak hands. When we jelq, and draw that wave of pressure is along the tunica, we are not only stretching those fibers in both axes, but possibly "de-tangling" or "limbering them up" in a way. This may not sound very scientific, but I suspect it is what’s going on in there. Also, I would suggest that jelqs stimulate growth much like the ellipse action under a clamp… only the force is applied from base to glans.

In other words, my take is the majority of the thread went off-topic to reinforce the usefulness of jelqing skill, and the difference between clamping and pumping is small. Do whichever is easier or effective for you. Personally, after a year of clamping I’m going to shift back to jelqing… as much as I have the strength for.

Replying so that I can easily locate this comment (wish you could favorite them). Thank you for the great info.

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