high_on_rock Posted January 9, 2004 Share Posted January 9, 2004 Again Colt, I can merely express how impressed I was by your beautiful little rope gun. She climbed with a lot of confidence, putting in basically one piece per pitch. Impressive. I take high school kids out often in the spring at vantage, if she would like to act as a role model for some young ladies, I would love to get her hooked up with them. Sure enjoyed the snow of Vegas! My best was solar slab up in 2 hours, including the 500 foot scramble at the top, and one hour down the rap route. We screamed down the rap route, and I don't know how it could be done any faster. (different trip.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chucK Posted January 10, 2004 Share Posted January 10, 2004 How do you Solar-Slab-soloers descend from the top (at less than 9.8 m/s/s presumably [Alpinfox note m/s/s is more correct notation than m/s*s ])? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lancegranite Posted January 10, 2004 Share Posted January 10, 2004 I used a 7.5 mil. to rap into the upper painted bowl. When you top out run to the NE and a ramp will take you down,down to a series of rap anchors. From there, run down the painted bowl to the wash. Savy teams can escape down over the Black Arch wall and run over to the base of Black Orpheus for a second lap to the top. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
colt45 Posted January 10, 2004 Author Share Posted January 10, 2004 Again Colt, I can merely express how impressed I was by your beautiful little rope gun. She climbed with a lot of confidence, putting in basically one piece per pitch. Impressive. I take high school kids out often in the spring at vantage, if she would like to act as a role model for some young ladies, I would love to get her hooked up with them. Sure enjoyed the snow of Vegas! My best was solar slab up in 2 hours, including the 500 foot scramble at the top, and one hour down the rap route. We screamed down the rap route, and I don't know how it could be done any faster. (different trip.) Yep, Yuko is a super confident leader (maybe TOO confident sometimes, given that she has only been consistently leading trad for about a year!). I am often impressed as well. She lives in San Francisco and has a pretty hectic job there, and as such probably couldn't get involved in your program right now (although it does sound pretty cool). Regarding your previous ascent--is that 2 hours from the base, via the gully, to the summit, then 1 hour rappelling the route back to the base including downclimbing from the summit to the upper terrace (3 hrs round trip)?? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
high_on_rock Posted January 16, 2004 Share Posted January 16, 2004 Three hours round trip, if you don't count the half hour to hour we spent enjoying the view up top. Two hours up, included the 500 foot scramble up top. Hold it, I don't remember though if I counted the return down the scramble portion in the one-hour rap back down to the bottom of the gully. Two years ago with a tremendous climber, we were a pretty efficient simul-rapping partnership. On the climb we did not rope up in the gully, roped the first pitch out of the gully, unroped the next two pitches to the top of the arch, then simul-climbed the remainder. It was a beautiful day. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
daler Posted April 14, 2004 Share Posted April 14, 2004 Just curious why you did not tie into the rope as the second? Its not very hard to accidently get your belay carabiner stuck over the Gri Gri and not allow it to lock. This would send you off of the end of the rope if you fell and leave your leader without a belay. I've use the Gri Gri many time for seconding while simul climbing but I just stayed tied in. you never have to move up or down the rock very far while climbing. This only creates a small amount of loop that is easily managed. dale Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lambone Posted April 14, 2004 Share Posted April 14, 2004 I agree with Dale here. I've used a gri-gri quite a bit while soloing aid routes, and I'll never trust it completely, I allways use some sort of back up knot to my harness. I've seen all kinds of weird things happen to it that would prevent it from locking, like having a fifi hook get wrapped around it. There was a story on RC.com a while back about a guy who took a huge fall while soloing with a gri-gri when the locking biner broke. Luckily he was tied into the end of the rope. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lancegranite Posted April 16, 2004 Share Posted April 16, 2004 A good team is flex-able! While simulclimbing, the second ( a fallacy since both people are leading) keeps the device on the rope and stays tied in. Granted, the Gri-Gri has a sharp load bearing surface ,the benifits outweigh the risks You see that your partner is approaching a crux...slam some gear in and presto! ...instant belay! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
colt45 Posted May 4, 2004 Author Share Posted May 4, 2004 Staying tied in is definitely a good idea, but the big loop of rope has a tendency to get stuck below you. Of course you can loop the slack rope over the shoulder and bring it with you...but then the gri-gri doesn't self-feed if the second is climbing faster than the leader. Plus, of course, it is annoying to have a bunch of rope over your shoulder. I stay tied in to the end with an eight on a bight to a locking biner until there is at least ~50 feet of slack. At this point, I will potentially untie from the end. I'm always super careful to keep all other gear away from the gri-gri so the locking mechanism doesn't get jammed open. Moreover since I'm using a DMM belaymaster carabiner, the plastic guard would not allow the biner to jam the grigri open. Also I use a well broken in 10.2 mil rope, which feeds through reasonably easily--but not TOO easily. I would NOT use this system with a slippery or skinny rope. Regarding the case of the broken locking biner for the soloist--my understanding was that he was NOT using a DMM belaymaster or similar biner, or steel biner with a high cross-load strength, and factor-2'd onto the belay with the biner cross-loaded (assuming this is the same case that was reported in Accidents in NA Mountaineering a year or two ago). This would (probably) not occur with an appropriate locking biner, and besides forces of this magnitude really will not be encountered while simuling. It would be safest to tie in and use a backup knot...but how many people tie in and use backup knots while using a grigri to belay a cragging pitch less than 150' in length? Moreover the weight of the 50+ feet of free rope has an effect "similar" to keeping your hand on the rope. Simuling is dangerous though, so make your own decisions... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thrutch Posted May 6, 2004 Share Posted May 6, 2004 Simuling is dangerous though, so make your own decisions... Climbing is dangerous so each person must accept and mitigate the hazards in the way they see fit. Simul climbing is no more dangerous if done properly but two or three competent people then leading climbing done by the same people. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lummox Posted May 6, 2004 Share Posted May 6, 2004 climbing doesnt kill climbers. climbers kill climbers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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