Friggan pickets

[sweatinoutliquor]

Okay, as of now I haven't found a good way to carry these things. Hanging on my gear loops, and yup, they are in the way. Hanging from a sling over my shoulder, yup, they are in the way. A double length runner clipped at both ends of the thing, slung over my shoulder, yup, in the way, or perhaps choking me, or perhaps stuck somehow to my pack. I watched a party climbing with the giant 3 foot ones the other day! Now that just looked like a tangled mess! Okay, suggestions? anybody? These things are me out there!

[Dru]

pickets suck, just solo

[OlympicMtnBoy]

Yep, I put my pack on, and then slide the picket up from the bottom so it goes under the compression straps on the side of my pack. Then I clip the top hole of my picket (which is on the bottom cause I slid it up upside down) to a gear loop on my harness (or to my pack strap where it attaches to the pack at the bottom). This way when I need the picket, I just unclip it and slide it down and out. This can be done relatively easily with some practice. If you clip it to your harness, you have to deal with it when you take your pack off, but on one of my packs this is more convenient then the pack strap.

 

Of course, sometime when cleaning during a running belay I still hang it over my shoulder with a runner in front of me cause it's more convenient. Just put your pack on and experiement and find out what works for you. Make sure you clip the damn thing somewhere good though, or you'll loose it on a glissade somewhere and not notice (of course I've never done that before. ;-) ).

[tlinn]

Yeah, pickets do suck.

 

On the weekend I did some experimenting you might find interesting. We've all heard that pickets placed sideways in soft snow is the way to go. But in practice does everyone take the time to dig out a pit and place them that way?

 

On the weekend on some super soft snow I placed a picket sideways and me and my climbing partner were putting all of our weight on it and pulling on it as hard as possible and we couldn't get it to go. We placed it vertically and it could barely hold the weight of one of us. T-axe anchors as expected kicked ass.

 

Just something to think about. Something I had wanted to try but hadn't really gotten around to it. I usually just carry the short ones on my harness or on a sling and just avoid the long ones all together.

[Dru]

So then it takes you 8 hours to lead your pitch cause you have to stop and dig all those T-slots?

[iain]

Just sling them over your shoulder. With short enough webbing they are not that bad.

 

And they are next-to-bomber placed vertically in most cascade snow.

[Alpinfox]

 

Jingle Jangle

[sweatinoutliquor]

Yes, that jingle jangle is what I hate most. It's like an accident waiting to happen when they all descide to get crossed in front of you, then they scrape the snow surface if you posthole and finally you're like "crap!" as you launch yourself face first into a tree.

Anyway, I like the clip it to your harness and then run it through your pack idea . I will have to try that. Iain, thanks for pointing out that maybe I just need to mess around more rather than to the newbie forum for help. As for placing them sideways as deadman, yes, this does work quite well. I have found this style of placement to be useful if you can't get the whole picket in vertically because maybe you only have 12 inches of snow ontop of frozen scree... Digging those little T trenches goes pretty quick unless the snow is super hard (and if it is you should be placing them vertically anyway!). Just make sure that you have a long enough runner to distrubute the force in the right direction, without any upward pull on the picket. Okay, thanks everyone for your insight... Any other ideas would be useful. Last time I was on the snow I was thinking about making a quiver or something, and carrying a bow to shoot them into the snow... At least it would be good for a few funny looks.

[Divot]

I slide the between my pack and the ack uper portion so I can just reach with any hand when in self arrest.

[Divot]

I dunno if that made any sense, but Ill provide a photo to show the value of it.

[Divot]

For now, just remember, if you set them up in any way....they must be reachable with any hand, and FROM ANY ANGLE IF IN SELF ARREST !

[sweatinoutliquor]

ack uper portion

I'm not exactly sure what you are saying here, but I think you might be going for horizontally somewhere behind your neck, but on the outside of the pack? That's a pretty sweet idea... I will have to check my pack and see if I can get them there somehow. Thanks!

[sweatinoutliquor]

Probably hard to put them back there (if that is what you are saying) if you are cleaning them though.

[fern]

I have slid them up into my gear loops from below and then clipped the sling to the loop, they then point up and back along the side of the pack. You can nest them together to get several pickets per loop, though 3-4 per side is probably about the maximum.

[sweatinoutliquor]

Yeah, I think that is the same idea that OlympicMtnBoy was going for? Thanks for the feedback though. Pretty easy to clean and get them back into that position?

[fern]

no. OMB tucks the pickets into the compression straps of his pack. I put them through the gear loops on my harness, the pickets aren't attached to the pack at all.

[sweatinoutliquor]

Ah ha! I see. Cool! I will have to try that... I am not sure how it will work for me, the harness I use has those "easy clip" solid plastic (highly breakable) gear loops on my harness... I already popped one off by stepping on an aider. Anyway, I will give it a try and see how it goes. Thanks fern!

[Bill_Simpkins]

When I'm not using them they are in the compressionstraps on my pack. A water bottole pounch on the bottom helps too. Some packs have a little pocket for pickets at the bottom of the compression straps. I also do this for glacier travel.

When I need them for climbing, I just clip them to my harness, usually the right-rear loop. They have never gotten in the way. I am tall, so maybe that helps a little.

[tomtom]

Pickets are aid

[selkirk]

So are boots. So what's your excuse?