UKC

hi, just want some tips on what length rope and diameter to buy for a beginner,

In reply to h.cook2000:

What kind of climbing do you do/want to do? Indoor? Outdoor? Multipitch? Trad? Sport?

In reply to h.cook2000:

Judging from your other posts it seems likely you will be doing a fair bit of top-roping, in which case you would probably be best off with something at least 10mm in diameter, personally I would go with a 10.5mm rope. Thicker ropes generally have a thicker sheath surrounding the core ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kernmantle_rope ) the core provides the majority of the strength but the more substantial the sheath the longer it should last.

As for length, that will depend on what you want to climb, if you are just going to climb ten or twelve meters then a 60m rope will be a bit of a pain, but then again if you buy a 40m rope you will be limited to climbing a maximum of 20m. If you are going to progress to leading routes it might be best to buy a longer rope than you need because the ends tend to get the most abuse and when they get tatty you can chop several meters off each end and still have a usable length left.

In reply to purplemonkeyelephant:

I want to progress to them all eventually. But sport and top rope will be main part at the start.

In reply to EddInaBox:

Ok thanks

In reply to h.cook2000:

I would say a 60m 9.8mm rope is a good shout for a wide variety of climbing styles and routes, and will future-proof you when you want to progress to longer routes. Edd is right about thicker sheaths being more durable but with modern ropes and belay devices I wouldn't even think about a thick and heavy 10.5mm rope. That rope can really weigh you down on walk-ins and with rope drag when you're climbing.

In reply to purplemonkeyelephant:


A quick bit of internet research shows 9.8mm ropes ranging from 60g/m to 66g/m and 10.5mm ropes ranging from 69g/m to 71g/m, a maximum difference of less than 700g and typically about 400g (that's only 200g by the time you've reached the lower-off on a 30m sport route) but personally I would go for a 50m 10.5mm or maybe a 10.2mm to start with (lighter overall than a 60m 9.8mm) and get a longer thinner rope later on once my first rope had been hammered and I had more experience. In fact that's just what I did do, I've only just retired my first rope from leading, a 50m Beal Top Gun II and it's at least eight years old and was my only rope for the first few years, used inside and out two to three times a month. I've got eight ropes now plus the original, the damn things seem to breed.

There exactly are you going to climb?
It is important because different destination require different length of the rope. For Portland it's good to have 50m for example. For Chamonix 70m is a good length.

I would not worry to much about buying something you could not use in future. Ropes are reasonably cheap and you can get a good resale value here or on ebay on 1 - 2 years old rope.

In reply to h.cook2000:

Whatever is cheapest! It'll only last you a couple of years but by then you'll have a better idea of what you want to spend your money on...

I picked up a 70m Beal Yugi 10.2mm from V12 Outdoor a while ago. It was on sale for ~£69, then add my 15% Premier discount... bargain whichever way you look at it

Dry treatment may protect the rope, but I never use a single rope in the wet - I don't sport climb in the rain and it is rarely raining indoors... Trad/winter climbing it is much more worth it IMO.

If you are going to use it outdoors (for sport) I would get a 60m, but you can probably get away with a 50m 80% of the time on sport? (just make sure the end is tied to something!) 60m folded will also give you 30m 'halves' for trad if you are desperate although proper halves are much better.

In reply to h.cook2000:

Just get the Eldrid anniversary 9.7 60m comes with rope bag

In reply to h.cook2000:

Get a 60 m single. My first rope was a 50 m single which did me really well as I learnt to lead outdoors and then trad. However every so often there was a a route we couldn't do because it was just over 25 m and unable to lower off/abseil from which was mildly annoying. This happened most when we moved to trad.

In reply to EddInaBox:


If you took this approach with all of your climbing gear, clothing, food and equipment you could be left with some brutal walk ins. Rather you than me.

It's not just weight though. Skinny ropes handle better.

In reply to h.cook2000:

If you're thinking about horseshoe there must be over 100 routes you can do with a 35 metre rope.

35m is a good wall rope as well. You could get one cheap 35m rope and do it to death. Or if you can get a cheap 70 like that one above, chop it in half (your local wall should have a hot knife).

Then you can trash you wall rope half 3 times a week, doing fall practice, stamina workouts etc and you'd still have a nice outdoor rope for horseshoe. Next xmas get a 70m outdoor rope and take the second 35m indoors and trash that.

That could set you up for the next few years.

In reply to winhill:

If you use a 35m, be especially sure to knot the ends. It's really easy to do a route just over 15m and lower someone off the end. Almost happened to me once, never again.

In reply to purplemonkeyelephant:


That's why you get a rope bag. Makes it easy to manage which end you're using too.

In reply to nutme:

>> Ropes are reasonably cheap and you can get a good resale value here or on ebay on 1 - 2 years old rope.

Blimey, perhaps I'm over cautious, but I'd think twice (or three or four times) before buying a 2 year old rope off ebay for climbing purposes!