Knee wraps - yea or nea

My interest is primary in gaining muscle size rather than being able to lift an “ulitmate weight”.
As I’m begining to accuire enough strength to perform 3 x 8 @ 80kg (160lbs)squats without a belt (bugger all compared to you squatasaurases),is there a “benchmark” or “rule of thumb” to apply to know when to or whether to even start using knee sleeves?
I use a power rack, set to avoid going below 90 deg. and injury territory, and tend to use squats, a hack machine and finally extensions to burn-out on, as a regular routine.
I’ve read the Ian King articles, though as I’m on Bodyopus nutrition pogram, my heavy trains are restricted to Monday & Tuesday, which for the record, are going extremely well!

Don’t use them except as practice for powerlifting comps. If you want to keep you knees warm, neoprene sleeves are good, but the additional weight lifted because of wraps is lifted by the wraps, and thus does you legs no good. They can also cause quite a bit of damage to the patella due to friction, from what I gather.

I just wanted to mention the point of keeping the knees warm as oneab mentioned. This might of sounded funny to me a few weeks ago, I probably would be picturing those pretty pink leg warmers all the aerobics girlies wore so long ago. But as Ian mentions (and I had recently read) it is for better joint lubrication.

No need to wrap unless you’re a competitive powerlifter, and then only for max singles and competition, of course. Wearing neophrene sleeves (not wraps) for warmth a la Ian King is cool, though.

The dudes are right on. And for the guy who said they cause damage due to the patalla wearing against the femur, I read in one of Staleys great columns, its called chondromalacia patellae, If I got the spelling right.

AMIR

Keeping the knees warm is good… As for “below 90 deg. and injury territory” - say what? Does anyone actually still believe this myth? Probably the lifters with the healthiest knees in the world are Olympic Lifters who go ass to the floor all the time. I used to have knee problems myself - until I started going deeper (having to lower the weight, of course - but my progress accelerated after this). Hack machines and leg extensions leads to your knees not being stabilized to the extent squats do, so they might not be the best choice…