MoapaPk wrote:I've used these sometimes:
http://www.rei.com/product/471123/smc-descending-ring

For low-stress raps. They have about the same kilonewton rating as 8mm static rope. I find that most people seem horrified by them, and will go to great lengths to try to back them up.

If "bailing" from any route, especially a BC Alpine type, why does one need any kind of "Rap RIng"?

It is only a one time static rap thus thread the rope, regardless the diameters, through the bail webbing/cord and move on.

Less tat/crap that is left behind to litter them hills.

Sure, I trust the "thin" rap rings, but I would never top rope or lower off on them. That being said, for many years I carried cheep full-size locking carabiners to leave on the rap stations on longer routes. Leaving behind these cheep carabiners, I called them "leaver biners," on the route had several advantages. They saved time because I could clip into a whole bunch of slings vey quickly. They were safe. The chances of those slings to all break at the same time were next to zero. In addition, I'd cut out the worst looking sling and brought them down in my pocket. If there were only two or three really bad ones, I would leave my own sling. Another advantage of carabiners on rap stations is the rope moves easily through them. This came in handy during pulling the rope, if you wanted to speed-up or slow down the rate in which you pull. Regulating the speed of pulling the rope helps with avoiding rope catching on bushes, trees, cracks and blocks. I figure, losing a few dollars is better than getting stranded on a wall.

Regarding the two posts above, I had a friend who was killed in the Sierra rappeling off just the slings (no ring or biner). Somehow he moved the rope ends (rapidly?), possibly to equalize the rope, the webbing melted and he fell to his death.

The other one involved my friend Bruce many years ago in Tuolumne. The weather turned bad, the party bailed off the South Crack using two slings and one (regular) biner. The slings were placed in a corner and somehow, the rope was unweighted during the rap and flipped over the gate of the biner, disconnected from the biner and Bruce went all the way...

I'm not criticizing the above posts, just want to mention that either one has limitations and things to watch out for.

Yes, I am aware of the chance of failure of non-locking biners. I added the word "locking" to the text. Thanks.

asmrz wrote:Regarding the two posts above, I had a friend who was killed in the Sierra rappeling off just the slings (no ring or biner). Somehow he moved the rope ends (rapidly?), possibly to equalize the rope, the webbing melted and he fell to his death.

Surely this was not a freshly placed newly tied/attached piece of webbing/runner. I just attempted to duplicate the same scenario in my garage with a brand new piece of 1" tubular and an 8.8 and gave up after five minutes of "rapidly" moving the rope through the looped webbing. Yes there was an obvious wear mark. But no "burn" through.

Obviously your deceased friend had attempted to utilize an older placed piece of tat that even had a rap ring been attached, would have also failed.

That brings up another point. NEVER trust a fixed piece of webbing that obviously appears to have in place for lengthy amount of time. Always carry a slew of bail runners and some small quicklinks (if you do not trust rapping solely off the webbing) to put in situ after removing the old worthless and dangerous tat. I have more often than not come upon a bundle of crap that folks keep adding to instead of cleaning away and simply adding a new piece or two.

Rick, you always know the best. As a mountain guide, you should never recommend unsafe practice on public forum. What a pitty, you know some of the readers here cannot make up their own mind, so people like you have the responsibility to provide information that is correct and safe. Safety is the most important thing in this activity. Shame on you buddy...

Kahuna wrote:
If "bailing" from any route, especially a BC Alpine type, why does one need any kind of "Rap RIng"?

It is only a one time static rap thus thread the rope, regardless the diameters, through the bail webbing/cord and move on.

Less tat/crap that is left behind to litter them hills.

There is some merit to this point of view. If you know the rope won't be "sawing" at the webbing, the ring is probably superfluous. I've read a report of someone who set up an intentional "sawing" geometry, where he had footloops of rope over webbing, and it took ~200 alternate steps on the rope to fail the webbing. I've known canyoneers who dispensed with the rapides when they knew they would be the only likely user of a very remote descent for years to come.

But I don't know what happens when you pull 100 ft of rope through webbing in a short time.

I've had webbing melt on rope exactly once, when I tried to tie prusiks of webbing around rope. But how quickly it melted scared me a bit.

asmrz wrote:Rick, you always know the best. As a mountain guide, you should never recommend unsafe practice on public forum. What a pitty, you know some of the readers here cannot make up their own mind, so people like you have the responsibility to provide information that is correct and safe. Safety is the most important thing in this activity. Shame on you buddy...

Alois, please do show where I condoned rapping directly off a piece webbing w/o any kind of rap ring/quicklink. I just presented it for discussion and I in fact wanted to make a staunch point as to how so many out there trust their lives to the crap slings that liter the entire Sierra. I simply attempted to "burn" through a piece of brand spanking new 1" tubular webbing with an 8.8mm cord in the manner you posted and I could not.

Pitty on YOU Alois for assuming.

I figure you did not have your glasses on for the second most important point of my post so I will elaborate it just for you Alois as I assume you meant that this is a "recommended unsafe practice".:

Kahuna wrote:That brings up another point. NEVER trust a fixed piece of webbing that obviously appears to have in place for lengthy amount of time. Always carry a slew of bail runners and some small quicklinks (if you do not trust rapping solely off the webbing) to put in situ after removing the old worthless and dangerous tat. I have more often than not come upon a bundle of crap that folks keep adding to instead of cleaning away and simply adding a new piece or two.

I will reiterate that any fixed gear in situ on any route, regardless of type or location, should ALWAYS be considered suspect and either replaced with NEW slings/webbing & small quicklink (**Petzl "GO" is rated at **25kn) which is Stainless Steel and will last 100 times longer than the SMC Aluminum Rap Ring.



OR,

Construct a whole new anchor built w/quicklink and the older one cleaned up so as not to create any confusion.

MY personal BC Alpine "Bail Kit" consists of a dozen or so "leaver" Stoppers of various sizes, 10ea 24" X 11/16" Tubular Webbing and 5ea 5MM Petzl "GO" SS Quickinks. I also always carry a small Leatherman Knife that I can use to tighten down the nut on the quicklink.

**Petzl "GO" Tech Notice/Specs





There are a handful of us "Guides" throughout the Sierra that do our part and have done so for the last 10-20 years, in annually cleaning up and replacing the death trap "Rap" tat that so many build on and leave behind.


Oh yeah, I would NEVER RAP with any cord/s skinnier than a "Twin Line" 7.7 doubled up.... NEVER!

So many factors can totally ruin your day if using anything thinner. #1 being the wind. Just a small 15-30 MPH gust will take that 200 or so feet of super thin cord and rap it around any protruding rock or natural feature thus rendering it completely useless and unretrieveable. Then, you are totally screwed.

Sorry Alois if I wasn't more "to the fact point".




I DO NOT CONDONE NOR DO I EVER RAPPEL DIRECTLY THROUGH ANY RAPPEL/ANCHOR SLINGS. NOR DO I EVER RAPPEL OFF ANY OLD TATTERED SHIT CLUTTERED "AMERICAN TRIANGLED" OR ANY OTHER BS SLING ANCHORS THAT SO MANY IGNORANT PEOPLE CONTINUE TO BUILD AND RAPPEL OFF THROUGHOUT THE WESTERN UNITED STATES... NEVER!






Is that better, Alois?

I will reiterate that any fixed gear in situ on any route, regardless of type or location, should ALWAYS be considered suspect and either replaced with NEW slings/webbing & small quicklink (**Petzl "GO" is rated at **25kn) which is Stainless Steel and will last 100 times longer than the SMC Aluminum Rap Ring.

Chief, I know an awful lot of canyoneers who just buy Bluehawk quicklinks at Lowe's or Home Depot (you can get stainless most places). I'm sure the testing is not as thorough as Petzl's, but I've never heard of a quicklink failure (and we have lots of canyons around here). They are often used for connectors in construction hoisting chains, so there is probably a fair amount of liability concern -- but probably a lot less awareness of counterfeits. Yep, they are almost all made in China Some of the cheaper folks just buy chain, and cut every other link.

I'm sure this is another can of worms. These cheapo links are about 1/4 the cost of the Petzl product. I do know some folks who do really big raps and buy the Petzls.

EDIT: here is a decent ompromise: http://www.store.canyoneeringusa.com/co ... d=10914082

Maybe a lot of the disagreement here is just what people are thinking of as a typical rap. We usually do just 30-100', almost never free-hanging for more than 10'. And now there is the valid point of: why use a metal ring at all for such a short trip, if you don't think others are likely to use it?

The one time I melted webbing, I wasn't so much concerned about the webbing, as the melt that stayed behind on the rope.

Regarding the rap with webbing only, the scenario I would envision would be, one starts the rap, a bit later one finds the ropes are not of equal length, one attempts to equalize the ropes while in a rap position (weighting the rope with your body weight) and in process one provides rather severe friction to the webbing. Not much friction combined with weight is needed under this scenario, the temperature needed to melt the webbing is less than 400 degrees

I'm sure those of us climbing for a while, have done things not exactly by the book, because of the need for speed, weather, not having the right gear etc. but...

Rapping is the most dangerous activity there is in climbing. Just look at AAJ Accidents for the last 40 years. Pretty big percentage of deaths are due to errors on roped descents.

Couple of rings or quicklinks of any kind on your harness (in the backcountry) just in case you need to make an unplanned rap or two would prevent any accidents.

I'm not advocating this for local crags or areas where descents are equiped.

And if you leave pro and rap slings, aren't you already leaving garbage behind? What difference does one ring make?

Chief, I know an awful lot of canyoneers who just buy Bluehawk quicklinks at Lowe's or Home Depot (you can get stainless most places). I'm sure the testing is not as thorough as Petzl's, but I've never heard of a quicklink failure (and we have lots of canyons around here).

I DO NOT trust the skinnier Chinese Quicklinks thus the Petzl GO.

But, I do utilize the beefier Chinese 6MM ones on rebolt projects of rock/sport routes with Mussey Hooks attached for the anchors. I Camo em so that they will not be seen from the road etc. I do the same with all my hangers and bolt heads.

Kahuna wrote:Alois, please do show where I condoned rapping directly off a piece webbing w/o any kind of rap ring/quicklink.

Here:

[If "bailing" from any route, especially a BC Alpine type, why does one need any kind of "Rap RIng"?

It is only a one time static rap thus thread the rope, regardless the diameters, through the bail webbing/cord and move on. ]

That smells a lot like "condoning" to me.

Now that were done with that, I'll say that I tend to agree with you. Rope through the webbing for a rap seems fine to me. It would be wise to make sure you're at your center-point before you take off, I'd imagine. Eliminates most/all need to pull the rope in either direction until you are down or at the next rap station.

I also agree about the piles of old webbing with new added to it. To be fair, not everyone can eyeball a piece of webbing and tell if it's good or not. Add another brand-new piece and get on your way. It's nice that the guides do go through and clean the old stuff out from time to time. The majority of climbers probably don't have the wisdom to cut what is "bad".

Negative. I was merely presenting a scenario for discussion.

I will not nor have I ever done so. When rapping in the BC, I DO NOT cut any corners. Thus the pretty extensive Bail Kit.

Let us all remember that rappelling incidents comprise 80-85% of all fatalities in the climbing community. They are NOT accidents. They all had some sort of a conscience decision making process within the chain of events that ultimately led to the fatality. It/they did not "just" happen.

Kahuna wrote:Negative. I was merely presenting a scenario for discussion.

I will not nor have I ever done so. When rapping in the BC, I DO NOT cut any corners. Thus the pretty extensive Bail Kit.

Let us all remember that rappelling incidents comprise 80-85% of all fatalities in the climbing community. They are NOT accidents. They all had some sort of a conscience decision making process within the chain of events that ultimately led to the fatality. It/they did not "just" happen.

Rick.

Your words are not presenting a scenario for discussion. Allow me to "present your scenario for discussion".

There is a technique that many people use which negates the need for a rap ring/quick link. You could just thread the rope directly through the webbing, and rappel that way. There wouldn't be enough friction to harm the webbing. I don't personally do this with my GIANT bail kit, but it is one way.

Your words "It is only a one time static rap thus thread the rope, regardless the diameters, through the bail webbing/cord and move on. " Sound like Hey, why would you do it any other way? Anything more is excess. Dummy.

You presented it as your platform on how it should be done. If you can't see that, I'm not sure what to tell you. I'm glad that you don't use this corner-cutting method that you appeared to endorse - Lord knows we all want you to come home safe and happy.