Posts tagged climbing-anchors
What is the simplest setup for rappelling that is fully redundant? The most common system seems to be rappelling off of both strands of a rope passing through two rappel rings on separate anchors....
I'm new to rope-climbing, I have made some slings to use as false-crotches/cambium-savers/friction-savers that act as my "canopy anchor" when climbing. These were all made with lengths of my 11.7 m...
I've enjoyed climbing and cutting trees for many years. I now want to go to higher levels, but safety is a primary concern, because I am afraid of heights. I'm about to order gear for recreation...
Climbing anchors usually have 2-3 redundant protection points, which distribute weight. So if one point breaks, this will not be a catastrophic failure. However, what should I do in practice if th...
I have a 120cm nylon runner that I want to use to tether me to an anchor bolt while cleaning the anchor. The runner has a small fray (pictures below). Is it safe to use?
Is it safe to girth-hitch nylon webbing through my harness tie-in points and then shorten the webbing via an overhand loop (assume it is too long) and clipping the non-bight part to the bolt in the...
If I'm using a natural feature such as a boulder or a lump of rock as part of an anchor by tying a static rope around it, what are the best knots to use? I'm thinking that there would be different ...
I love free climbing but have never climbed with ropes. While reading through this question, I realized I would never have thought of these scenarios, but due to the answers on that post, the physi...
I just recently returned from a course where we utilized a static rope to construct a top-rope anchor from a top-accessed ledge: the system was like that described in this answer - the resulting co...
Would amsteel blue rope be appropriate for use in anchor building for climbing or mountaineering? I expect it's not very abrasion resistant so it wouldn't be good up against some rock or an edge. B...
I was going through anchoring techniques and I came across this well-received question: Anchor without cordelette? How should one decide when to go for a Cordelette or an Equalette?
While browsing the DumbAnchors blog, I came across a post which points out the poor use of a single strand (not a loop) of webbing for building top rope anchors. The blogger doesn't say why these ...
I, an experienced climber who knows how to rappel, would like to take some people on a scramble route that requires rappelling into a notch. The other people on the trip have standard top rope clim...
I was looking at buying some cord to make a three point cordelette (I am American, after all). I see that REI sells a pre-cut length of 7mm cord that is 6.4 meters (21 feet), but one of the review ...
My friend and I were on a tough sport climb and couldn't make it to the chains. Thus, we had one quickdraw still on a bolt and we didn't want to leave this behind, (a quickdraw on this same projec...
When drilling new holes for expansion anchor bolts, you need to clean the dust out of the hole before you hammer in the bolt. People will accomplish this by either using a blow tube or a bellows an...
I am going to do a climb that has a long lateral traverse I drew up three options, and Option #2 seems to me to be preferable to the other options. What do you think the best option is for this ...
This question asks how to set up a top rope anchor. It states that No angle of tension shall exceed 60 degrees. Why?
I was out ice climbing with a group today and they were using three-point anchors using two vertical v-threads (abalakovs) with one backup ice-bolt. They said the vertical v-threads (one hole over ...
I'm signed up for an AMGA single-pitch instructor course (to learn how to teach other people single-pitch climbing). One of the pieces of gear we're supposed to bring is a 30 meter static rope "for...
I've seen a few of these comparisons around but I've always struggled to make sense of them. At the moment I do quite a lot of Alpine style routes (lowish grade (HS), long multi pitch routes, typ...
When setting up belay there are many ways to connect the anchors. One way is called equalette and is supposed to adapt to a certain extent to the direction of pull. How is such an equalette constr...
Rolled aluminum descending rings like the SMC Descending ring are light (11g) and cheap ($3) which makes them great for carrying and leaving behind on long descents, but in my mind they are disposa...
V-threads, or Abalakov threads (after the inventor Vitaly Abalakov), can be tricky to make (especially left handed in the dark...), but when you miss the mark on your first attempt, or second attem...
I have the John Long book on climbing anchors and also a couple of others that describe the subject more briefly (Pesterfield, Traditional Lead Climbing, and Freedom of the Hills). When it comes to...
I have climbed for a long time, but I want to switch to cordelette anchors for speed on multipitch. My main concern is in redundancy with the cordelette. I mentally check the anchor for any proble...
I'm going to the crag with some friends in a few days and I plan to lead the first route, clip into a quickdraw on one of the anchor bolts and build a top rope anchor on the bolts. I've been practi...
I was just looking at an article about an expedition on Eiger. I came across this picture. Is this setup right? For more info on the expedition: http://www.markseaton.com/stories/eiger.htm Ku...
The Association of Canadian Mountain Guides demonstrate Fixed-Point belay systems in this video. Fixed-point belay systems as demonstrated make no effort to equalise the loading on the two anchor...
Sometimes when I'm trad climbing it seems really tough to avoid an awkward belay, and a common type of awkwardness is when the belay device ends up too low. Below is a drawing of a situation I was ...
So I've been thinking about developing some canyons around here for canyoneering, but while scrambling up Red Rocks Canyon in Waterton and looking at all the large logs jammed rather high up in the...
Everyone knows redundancy is chief when building climbing anchors. However, I have seen several types of anchors that don't appear to be fully redundant due to a single ring providing the master po...
I took some kids out climbing last night at a small crag popular for top roping, but I wasn't too impressed with their choice of anchor placements, or lack of additional hardware considering their ...
I've been learning to build basic TR anchors; a sling clipped to two bolts with a master point in the loop of a figure-eight on a bight. While learning this I struggled to get a tidy figure-eight ...
