50 meter Skinny Rope?

[Wallstein]

adding to the thread drift....

 

 

As far as the tag-line retrieval method goes I've had the best luck with the Esprit 6mm Alpine Personal Escape rope. Colin Haley turned me onto this rope and I have since used it numerous times. Colin and I used it on our traverse of the Devils Thumb this summer. The ropes aren't listed on esprit's website but if you call them they have them. 130 bucks or so. Well worth it.

 

I've used 5.5 tech cord, 6mm perlon, 7mm perlon, and samson tech 12 (non-sheathed braided tech cord) and hands down the Esprit rope is the BEST option I've found.

 

The 5.5 and 6mm ropes are just about as diffictult as keeping spaghetti untangled due to their lack of stiffness. The espirt rope is extremely stiff which makes it much easier to handle. You can also put it through your rappel device so their is no need for the carabiner. You still want to make sure the knot isn't going to pass through the rappel anchor though. A metolious mini carabiner is very useful here.

 

 

I've also used a system where I had a 70m lead line and a 30m tag line. When rappelling I'd tie the two ropes together like normal but then I find the middle of the combined two ropes, which is 50m. Then tie a stopper knot just like the skinny line retrieval method and rap off the 50m side of the lead line and pull the tag side. This also a good trick if you have two normal ropes but one has numerous core shots and has been tied back together.

 

 

[Coldfinger]

Is that Esprit rope dynamic?

 

Not thread drift at all y'all, definitely getting me thinking about what kind of system I'll eventually be using rope-wise. Thanks again!

 

At the very least you've helped me figure out what to do with the Rando, think I'll be finding a 25m to 30m piece of pull cord, probably pretty skinny. No point in wasting $$ on another Rando.

 

Thanks for the beta on the 6mm Wallstein. Seems like the Mammut Pro Cord might be a good but expensive option too, got the 6mm for a cordelette, it's definitely stiffer than perlon, had to do a short rap on one strand of it and it was just fine.

 

This might be drift but gotta say the DMM Bugette is pretty sweet on the super skinny threads.

Edited November 18, 2010 by Coldfinger

[Kletterhund]

I have used the DMM Bugette on Mammut Pro Cord... It is nice.

 

A great option for ultra light adventuring but that little Bug sure gets warm...

[Wallstein]

No the Esprit rope isn't dynamic. I sure wish it was. The largest falt of using the skinny rope retrieval system is when your ropes get stuck and all you are left with is the skinny rope. I've had this happen in Red Rocks while using a 5.5 tech cord and had to re-lead a pitch of 5.11 on the skinny stuff. Dam exciting to say the least.

 

Colin has done some self belayed climbing on the Esprit but I'm am sure that would be way against the recommendation of the manufacturer. Using this rope in that fashion is probably better than using nothing but my guess is not by much as it is hard to say would would happen in the even of a fall with a high fall factor.

 

I just went and weighed my 60m Esprit and it checked in at 3.6 lbs (about 1600 grams or 26.6g per meter)

 

Bluewater makes something that is similar but more expensive. You can find it here http://bit.ly/anj9rW

 

 

 

 

[denalidave]

I feel OK leading on a single 8mm line but I'd retire it after a whipper.

 

-Nate

 

I agree. I've taken whippers (25'-35'ish) on a single skinny cord. Just keep in mind that you have A LOT more rope stretch with the skinnier the rope...

[Coldfinger]

I've also used a system where I had a 70m lead line and a 30m tag line. When rappelling I'd tie the two ropes together like normal but then I find the middle of the combined two ropes, which is 50m. Then tie a stopper knot just like the skinny line retrieval method and rap off the 50m side of the lead line and pull the tag side. This also a good trick if you have two normal ropes but one has numerous core shots and has been tied back together.

 

Genius! Think I'll do a little experimenting before I whip out the sharpie and mark that spot......

 

Guess I'll get 30m of thin pull cord and either pair it with the old Rando or use that trick with the 50m Nano.

 

Thanks everyone!

[Mentat]

If you brought a malion rapied (hardware store quick links are cool too) for the anchor you could just take the pull side and tie a clove hitch on the spine of a carabiner. There would be less bulk for getting the block stuck in a crack or hung up on a horn.

 

Thread drift

 

@Wallstein you may already know but the blue water rope you mentioned has a technora sheath which is special because it has a very high melting point. I’ve seen valdotain’s made of the material so that you could rappel on a nylon rope with a valdotain tresse. They could be useful if you need to retreat off a route quickly since you could have two rappeling at the same time.

Edited November 24, 2010 by Atomic Libido

[Coldfinger]

Not really thread drift at all here's why:

 

All I had for ice/alpine was a 30m Beal Rando 7.7mm. I had found a very light 50m Sterling Nano 9.2mm for $130, and wanted to know could a 50m single rope work?

 

I wanted to test the "conventional wisdom" that the only way to go alpine/ice multipitch was to haul around 60m or 70m or longer ropes or sets of ropes. Plus I'm not sold on twins for CLIMBING (love for rapping), i.e. high impact forces, hard to handle/belay with two skinny ropes with gloves, freezing conditions etc.

 

Part of that was cost, i.e. Sterling Nano 9.2 60m=$205, 70m=$235, 70m bicolor $285 + Beal Ice Twin $189.95 60m/$219.95 70m, or a pair of Twins $379.90 60m, $439.90 70m.

 

Part was weight i.e. for every meter of rope a penalty.

 

Just seemed a little silly to spend some serious $$ on a titanium pot and count grams with every biner and piece of gear (and leave a lot of pro behind), and then haul around pounds of extra rope.

 

A nice upside of Wallstein's method is I'll have 10m marks on either end of the 50m rope thanks to my sharpie, which is always good info for both partners. That and I can use the Rando or a cheap 30m section of pullcord ($25) to get to 40m or pair the pullcord and Rando for a very light 30m rappel set up (1530g).

 

What folks here have offered are ways to get around that "conventional wisdom" at little cost and not too bad a penalty in rap length.

 

WELL DONE!

[RafalA]

Not to throw a wrench in your process, but one immediate and obvious downside for me with shorter ropes is shorter raps. Granted, in the Cascades you maybe don't have as many long, multi-pitch ice routes as we have in the Rockies, but I can tell you that I'd much rather carry and buy a slightly longer rope (60 - 70m) just to minimize the amount of raps. Also, having shorter raps means you miss all the pre-existing stations which are usually at the 60m mark, further slowing your descent.

 

And don't forget to add in all the extra cord you have to carry for shorter raps. On a long route like Polar Circus, you'll be putting in a lot more v-threads than other parties, probably nullifying any advantage of lower weight by carrying all that extra cord around.

 

FWIW, we typically climb on singles and carry a half-rope in case double-rope technique is required and for full length raps.

 

That said, I'm curious to hear how your system works out!

 

 

[Mentat]

Just curios if anyone ever uses what are called contingencies or releasable anchors. When confronted with a rappel of unknown length they are helpful because if the rappeler finds them self at the end of his rope he can lock off and be lowered from above at the anchor to make it to the ground or the next anchor. Usually this is accomplished with either a munter/mule or a figure eight block. While the climber is being lowered and the contingency block released the belayer holds his partners life in his hands. So it may be wise to throw a prussic in the system and mind it while lowering so there is less risk to be dropped. This saves the trouble of toying with multiple rope markings and the time spent guessing and second guessing rope length.

[genepires]

I know canyoneers use that sometimes usually in the case of rapping into running water, but how could this be used for climbing? You have three ropes, one used to to lower if 60 m is not enough? From what I have seen about releaseable anchors, people or going shorter than 50 m but use a full rope. They also are doing single rope rappels.

 

Seems like just knowing how to ascend the rap rope with prussiks is a better solution to using a releaseable anchor knot. (unless you are in a canyon torrent) But tools in the toolbox is a good thing.

Edited November 24, 2010 by genepires

[Coldfinger]

Well I didn't want to spend a boatload of $$ on rope and didn't want to carry more rope than I needed weight wise and rope clutter wise.

 

Problem with a cheap but good 50m rope is either you can only rap 25m, or you have to buy another rope for $$$$ and 50m raps.

 

The folks just explained how I could rig 40m raps (with either 5mm cord or a 7.7mm climbing rope), which is usually just fine length wise. And now I can rig 30m raps with the Rando!

 

PM Sent!

Edited November 24, 2010 by Coldfinger

[RafalA]

I think that's kind of redundant with climbing, as when you come to the end of the rope you just make a new anchor. If need be, you can easily go to the side or back higher up to find appropriate terrain.

 

However, the technique would be worth knowing, if only out of curiosity.

 

Another plus for two full-length rope systems we've found is quicker descent - one person descends on rope #1 with rope #2. As soon as he's down, he sets up rope #2 for descent while the other person is rapping down #1. Then, just pull rope and your next anchor should be good to go. Leapfrog as needed.

[Mentat]

Carrying three ropes is a bit excessive but I understand what you’re getting at. You would only be able to lower to the length of your longest rope, and this technique is exclusive to single rope rappels. I feel there is an advantage because it simplifies setup at the rap. All too often have I had the conversation “can you see the bottom, where is the next rap station.” Throwing a contingency on and letting the last on rappel rig the pull down (remember it could be extended with about anything on your person) may streamline the retreat/decent and frees you from clutching the beta in a death grip.

There is no exception for being able to ascend rope at any given moment, but why prussic up X meters of rope just to move the block and reset?

 

Many of us have heard of climbers epic tales of raps gone wrong or fatalities. While fatalities on rappel as an immediate cause only account for about 3.2% of all mountaineering fatalities I would agree that rope management skills like this are somewhat esoteric. In a canyon this could be make or break. So I agree that this is another tool in the toolbox, and possibly a more elegant solution to having many knots in the rope.

 

http://www.summitpost.org/mountaineering-accident-statistics/658474

 

Edited November 24, 2010 by Atomic Libido

[Coldfinger]

Howdy, here's the update from a few days at the Bozeman Icefest:

 

Bright Orange color was f'ing great as it made the sharpie middle (three inch wide) and ten meter (one inch) marks really stand out and helped make the rope visible in low light. The neon color meant the marks could be seen easily by both leader and belayer to boot.

 

The ten meter marks were nice for 40m raps with a pull cord and even nicer for gauging rope used (as in the length remaining on a lead as well as the reach of the 50m & pullcord!).

 

We ended up using the pull cord only once, seems 50m works well by itself, and the Rando was what we used and was really great. Middle mark on the Rando made coiling easier also.

 

The 30m 5mm Mammut pull cord wasn't used but does seem a good deal less tangle prone than normal 5mm cord.

[Dane]

We ended up using the pull cord only once, seems 50m works well by itself, and the Rando was what we used and was really great.

 

One of the few things Evan and I didn't discuss over a beer or two that weekend was his rope choice. I was just happy to have any rope to climb on! Not like I was going to dis his choice of ropes while using them. Safely at my computer weeks later I can :-)

 

Having climbed a lot on 150' and 165' (50m) ropes I am not adverse to them in general or for mountaineering, ice or unexplored rock.

 

I had no investment here so just another opinion fwiw.

 

Been a while since I have used anything but a 60 or 70m rope on ice. Coldfinger and I climbed some together in Bozeman while using his ropes. My observation....a place like Bozeman with the majority of anchors and raps set up for a 60m rope is not the best place (may be the last place) to take a mismatched pair of 30m and 50m ropes. It was continually a pain in the ass on literally every climb I used them on. There are enough issues just climbing and with communicating even in a well traveled "practice" area like Hyalite that life is a lot easier if you just stick with the norm. Two 60m ropes in this case.

 

You'll get more done in a shorter and less hassled amount of time.

 

Even if I was to use a shorter rope in the mtns....better to have two ropes of the same length is my though. I like simple...really simple..it is safer. Ropes of different lengths isn't either imo.

 

Color and markings were cool though.

 

 

 

[stevetimetravlr]

You guys could always use the Wilson method where you just have one rope and tie a fifi into the end and utilizing a thick rubber band, when you unweight the rope at the end of the rap, it fires the fifi off the anchor and the rope falls down. Just don't unweight the rope during the rap. This is perhaps not a everyday rap option, but it sure works great and with one 60 meter you can rap 200 feet.

[Coldfinger]

Think I'd need a few OE's before I'd do that old school fifi thing! Crisssakes......

 

Guess the bottom line is that this system will work well for me, tradeoffs considered, especially as I don't plan on doing too many way extreme routes. Seems it will suit a lot of the alpine terrain I've seen quite well.

 

Dane's perfectly right about the length of quite a few of the climbs one can do, especially if one has to rap many times back down hard terrain, just seems like at many places one wanders off through the trees and gullies on the way down and only a few raps ensue.

 

As for Alpine, a lot of the stuff I've done has many ledges, crack changes and other weirdness, so it's often a kiwi coil or far less than the full length of some of the ropes we've brought (60m and up) anyway due to rope drag, route finding and/or communication issues.

 

I'd definitely agree with Dane if the plan is to lead a pitch and then have a top rope dance party, but then there's usually more than one rope anyway among the crew.

 

But for $165 I'm not going to complain and for once the rope got more comments for its awesome appearance than I usually do for my handsome mug.........

 

That and it was a big plus not having to lug around, handle and coil the usual XXXL pile of cord, though Dane did do most of the porterage of the hunter orange wonder. At least I have a good excuse to use your rope(s), then we can bring my screws (which I like very much--haven't seen many Helix's out there).

[pcg]

No one has mentioned this and I haven't tried it (yet), but it seems like it might be useful, if rapping off a single rope and using a tag line setup for retrieval as shown in the photo, to tie the opposite ends (hanging ends) of the tag line and the rap rope together with an overhand knot.

 

This would allow you to pull the larger rope back up and possibly aid in unjamming it, in the event the combination biner/figure eight gets hung up during retrieval with the tag line. The process would thus be to haul the rap rope down first with the tag line, remove the biner and knots, then haul the rap line back up and down the other side of the anchor via the other end of the tag line. The overhand knot is much less likely to jam during that process.

 

Extra work for extra insurance. Anyone see a problem with this arrangement?

 

[Coldfinger]

Well, seems like it would take a lot more time to rappel and you'd still have to pull the rope and maybe see it get stuck, looks like I'll be using the Esprit Alpine Escape rope and an EDK, rapping on both per Wallstein's suggestion.

 

Having looked into it, the EDK has some real advantages.

[pcg]

Well the actual rappel won't take any longer, but yes, of course the retrieval will take twice as long if nothing gets jammed. If the biner/figure eight gets jammed then it could possibly take far less time to retrieve, compared to not being able to pull that setup back up to unjam it.

 

My concern with using the EDK (other than my unfounded concern that it just looks scary) in this instance is that most of the research I've seen is based off the assumption that both ropes are equal diameter. I would want to know that an EDK tied with 5mm cord and a 10mm rope was bomber.

 

I'm also unsure about rapping with both ropes in a tube type belay device when one of them is 5mm cord. I have no experience with this, but it seems sort of funky to me. How many of them will even work with 5mm cord? Have you done it? How does it work?

 

You are right - several advantages to the EDK, not the least of which is that it is far less prone to jamming when compared to that complex arrangement in the photo.

 

Edited April 5, 2011 by pcg

[Coldfinger]

Well with the Esprit rope one CAN rappel on two strands, on the 5mm pullcord one CANNOT, so you can't take advantage of the EDK's resistance to getting hung up and instead have to use a bulky knot and biner.

 

Besides, why one would retire a biner one drops on the one hand but use the pullcord and biner method on the other hand (where the biner gets dropped each pitch that is rappelled) is a bit of a mystery to me.