hafilax

Arc'teryx R320 is $123 at MEC. I need a new harness and if they truly are good enough to warrant the price I will consider one. So far I've heard that they don't breath well and that the Petzl Corax II is more comfortable. I'll just have to try them out. The gear loops are cool with the reversible former.

A lower price.

The equalette can be just as quick or quicker than the cordelette method with a fixed tie in point. You leave the limiting knots tied and clove hitch to each piece. It's not much different from clove hitching with the rope. Instead of messing with getting the center knot in the right place you adjust a few clove hitches. The advantage is that it actually achieves some equalization unlike the fixed point anchor which has been shown in pull tests to not equalize at all (unless every arm is the exact same length). Try it out, you might like it. It's one more trick and may save your life with a dicey anchor where equalization is important. Long's pull tests showed it to be far superior in strength to the traditional cordelette and rope anchors which essentially load one piece at a time. Tie two limiting knots in your cordelette et voila, une equalette! As for upward pull pieces, it seems to me that it would be a good idea to provide quite a bit of slack so that you can give the leader a soft catch therefore lowering the force on his pro? Just enough so you don't pull the anchor up.

I think you had the right idea with the anchors. The key to anchors is to have a large bag of tricks since each one is unique (unless they're all bolted). I do everything from sliding X's, to conventional cordelette and equalette depending on what's presented. The most important points really are good gear and not taking a factor 2 fall. 1st anchor: It looks like almost all of the force would hit the piece on the right so it had better be the best one! Make sure that block it's sitting behind isn't detached. The forces on the other two down pieces would be somewhat outward until the right one blows. If you lengthen the arms to the pieces on the left it would lower the tie in point and share the load a little better. 2nd anchor: Again most of the force would hit the piece on the right and the angle of the tie in of the higher pieces could be made more acute. You'd have to shorten the arm to the right piece and lengthen the ones on the left. I'm assuming the limiting knots are pre-tied. You may have better success if you tie them a little closer together. It's easy to get them centered and it's more important to keep the angles small. With the equalette remember that with 3 pieces, the side with 1 piece will take about half the load so it had better be good. The other 2 share the other half of the load. An upward pull piece isn't needed every time so build it in when necessary. You can always add an up piece before the leader takes off if it looks like you'll need it. It's low on the priority list for bringing up a second. I think the equalette works better with 2 biners clipped to the loops instead of sliding X's. The X has high friction under load defeating the equalization advantage.

Don't people usually butcher old neoprene wetsuits for that duty?

I know the feeling.

Sounds better than the TAship I get to look forward to this summer.

Fell off the peace wagon did you Bug?

Dennis Leroy Jenkins??????

The safety word is meaningless.

I could really use some of that helium-3 right now!

Bumblefoot anyone?

[]That's hilarious! The author states that some string theories predict black hole formation at the LHC but that Hawking radiation is unproven. Not one shred of new physics has come from string theory but more can be said of the work of Hawking. He then jumps to the assumption that the black holes will be formed and that they won't radiate. Some new physics had better come out of the LHC or some heads will roll. It's a multi billion dollar industry so there's some serious pressure to achieve some results. Down with the Standard Model! [/:nurd:]

You can't really compare them. That's why they have different grading systems. I don't even know what the accepted translation is. The endurance factor of route climbing only comes in on super high ball boulders. A lot of boulderers don't make it far up a sport route because they pump out on the second bolt. Now quit bringing up climbing grades. They're about as accurate and meaningful as figure skating scores. Plus it keeps reminding me about how weak I am.

I heard the story of a guy that was taking long slab falls on one of the Chief Apron horror shows/classics. He started tumbling and the rope went around his neck. He just managed to pull his head free when the rope came taught.

I like the Big Lebowski version: RqtgfjkB6Pg

Earth hour was a good reminder that we have artificially lengthened our winter days with the invention of the light bulb at the expense of increased power consumption. DST has really become a meaningless inconvenience to the urbanite. The utopian consumer model is all great but marketing has become too powerful. They convince millions to do crazy things. Bottled water comes to mind. How did they convince us that our tap water is so bad? How many resources are wasted basically selling us our own tap water with a little filtering? Plastic bottle waste is totally out of hand. Dosani by Coca-Cola is the same water as is in Coke and it costs the same?! A change in thinking is needed and things like Earth Day force people to face what they take for granted.

It's going to take a long time for this year's snow pack to melt. There are quite a few trip reports giving all the info you need if you do a quick search.

Nice save! Glad she has the right instincts and didn't look up. A friend randomly through a frisby; it started coming toward me so he yelled my name. I turned around just in time for it to nail me in the nose. I need to get a helmet fits comfortably.

Ya, my case sucks and SG's are fragile. Iverson did a good job repairing it though.

Do everything you can to carry it on. I checked my guitar flying to europe and the neck snapped at the headstock. I thought I had it packed pretty well but those baggage machines are brutal and they won't insure it.

wax->waxes goose->geese moose->meese In English the only rule is there are no rules. It's got to be the most frustrating language to learn pronunciation aside.

ha-fil-ax so 2 hafilaxes I still love that one from Halifax is called a Haligonian. Glasgow->Glaswegian

Rooster's a necrophiliac?

There was another person of the same name as me at school. It confused payroll. The changed my contact info to his and used my banking info. I got all the money and he got all the pay stubs. Too bad they figured it out. A similar thing happened to my supervisor when he was grad student only the professor he was mistaken for had a much larger salary.