In Australia they’d call cleats boots.
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The radical names provided on the site fit the mnemonics provided on the site. One of the reasons I use WK is all of that work is done for me, and I can use WK radical names to trigger WK mnemonics when I have trouble recognizing a kanji, its meaning, or its reading. A complete chain to follow from total lack of recognition of an old SRS item, to full recollection. And, I don’t have to build all of the mnemonics and relationships myself. People better than me already have.
I’ve found the proper radical names make no difference to me in practice. When I encounter a kanji I’ve never seen before (which can’t be copy/pasted) and need to look it up by radical in a dictionary, the radical names don’t matter. My preferred dictionary doesn’t even list their names during lookup.
I think your points about radical names are good if you are studying for a class. For being successful in using WK to learn kanji, I think they are off the mark. I only say this in case new users read all of this and miss the value of WK’s radical names.
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Edited:
Removing original post because not really helpful.
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Just scrolling and thought YURT and CLEAT were new hip words like YEET and [insert modern jargon here]. Can they be? What would they mean?
YURT - (verb) to slip on something but barely catch yourself without falling
CLEAT- (verb) to complete something in a timely manner without sacrificing the integrity of the work
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I’d just add… don’t feel too bad if you’ve never heard the word “yurt” before. It’s basically a term for a type of temporary housing used by a bunch of traditional Central Asian nomadic groups, and isn’t really an English word per se. It’s kind of been adopted into pop culture in some circles, but I wouldn’t call it a particularly common word.
“Cleat” might be an uncommon word too if you don’t pay attention to sports. I only know it myself because the soccer team at my high school used to talk about their cleats in class all the time.
I’d also point out in reference to @Sutho81’s point that the full-size “claw” radical 爪 is indeed named as such in WaniKani; it’s a level 34 radical. The 爫 radical that WaniKani calls “cleat” is considered an abbreviated form of “claw.” But one thing WaniKani does is give unique names to the full and abbreviated forms of each radical; the earliest example is the way it distinguishes “person” and “leader.” You can make a case that’s somewhat helpful, for learning purposes.
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Yurt actually made me laugh, because my hometown is Ufa and tl;dr it’s something I’ve seen a few times irl 
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Yeet and clurt.
He tried to be civil this time, at least…
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The reason I totally ignore the wanikani names is because they are of no help to me personally and never have been. They have been a major detriment.
From my understanding of Kanji is that it tells a story and if you know the correct names of the radicals then in some Kanji it makes it a lot more easier to understand.
The other reason I totally ignore their radicals is because some of them are deliberately given incorrect meanings when in fact they are a condensed version of a radical.
From my own personal perspective of learning, the wanikani ideas are a major detriment and set back.
If others are having the same issues as me then perhaps if they followed along with how I do things then their lessons may improve.
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And this is a pretty fair and rational statement. Not everything about WK is perfect and works for everyone’s learning style. 
It’s just like how not all of WK’s mnemonics work for everyone so in those cases it’s just better to make your own.
You know, you’d have had less people pushing back if you would always just posted like this rather than being antagonistic with guns blazing. For example, we had the same view that writing kanji is beneficial for learning, but in the different ways we phrased the same opinion we got completely different responses.
We’re all here to learn so we should be helping not fighting amongst ourselves. So I’ll give apologies to you for comments I made last night and the one above that I will edit.
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To be honest my very first reply on this was very fair and honest and not antagonistic to anyone. The reason it flared up is because there are people who are still hung up on the writing Kanji thread that attacked it immediately.
changing the synonyms of the radicals is an option available on this site so even changing them to “fake” if they are or another word that people might recognise easier is not unreasonable if they can recognise it.
It is impossible to run an autocratic way of learning because not everyone will learn in the same way.
I thought about this myself when I started with WK.
I did part of Remembering the Kaji before bumping with WK, and the alterations to radicals also was something that put me a bit off. After weighting the benefits and lacking a better and more well constructed website that allowed me to digest kanji in the same way I sitll went with it.
If you have decided on taking this approach from the beginning I would suggest using Kanjipedia and the radical index there. Is what I’m currently using as quick reference
The name on the radicals (and all the website) is in japanese, but if you prefer english you can always use yomichan and get the correct translated names of the radicals too.
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You said, without qualification, that WK’s method of mnemonics is not useful at all. That’s just objectively false, when you look around at the progress users here make. The mnemonics are a temporary scaffolding you build progress on and then don’t use again.
You weren’t attacked at all, but just told that you were derailing the thread.
BTW, just to be clear, I love writing kanji. I spend several hours practicing writing kanji every day. I have a thread where I document my writing practice and experience with the Kanji Kentei. I’m not mad about people writing kanji.
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Yes and I stand by that 100% and to further qualify it the mnemonics are of no use to ME AT ALL. It would appear the person who started this thread is having the same problem so by changing things to suit their needs is probably more appropriate if the mnemonics are doing them no good either which appears to be the case in regards to the above two (one incorrectly named and the other fake) radicals.
I cannot be held accountable for what people decide to assume or presume I mean. That is their problem not mine.
That is why I add synonyms to my radicals like the correct name for them if wrong or fake if it is fictitious.
They’re basically complete opposites in terms of how they come across, saying it’s not useful at all, and just saying it’s not useful to you.
The same issue of applying your own standards to other users is what caused the kanji writing thread issue. No one thinks writing is detrimental, but when you discount the knowledge of other users then you are picking a fight.
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No to me it was very clear. I find the mnemonics useless for my learning. It appears in relation to this question that was originally posted at least this person above finds them of no use for these particular radicals.
I said what I did, gave justification for is so they would not feel like they were cheating the system or doing something wrong.
Changing the synonyms for the above radicals is not going to hurt anyone learning them at all if they recognise them. For all I know the radical for claw they could think resembles a coppers hat and change the synonym to that if they liked. They did not necessarily have to use claw or cleat or whatever else.
@Lids hope you don’t mind, but I moved this topic to #wanikani:requesting-help so that if anything else arises, the mods can better get here, and also just for forum organization.
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So just to be clear, you are completely okay with the way WK does things, since they give users the ability to modify it to their own preferences? You don’t think the site is detrimental and useless? You don’t think that WK is “stealing” the work of others and passing it off as their own (another one of your claims from before) by teaching the mnemonics instead of only teaching kangxi radicals?
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No, they had a temporary confusion that was cleared up by people explaining the terms and then they posted:
That hardly seems to back up your claims of them finding the radicals useless. Seriously, the hyperbole isn’t helping you.
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As this thread keeps diverting to a different topic and seeing as the question in this thread (What the meaning of the ‘Yurt’ and ‘Cleat’ radicals is) have been answered, I am closing this thread.
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