UKC

Hi

I'm making the move into using double ropes (I will be using 1/2 ropes) and wondering if the way I should be setting up my belay at the top of the climb is the same as if I'm using a single rope and doubling up the system?

Any advice and tips are greatly appreciated.

In reply to russholland:

Each rope is strong enough to hold the belay, you don't need to double up.

So if you have a belay with 2 pieces of gear it's the simplest format - tie each rope to one of the pieces - job done.

Then variations on that & a "single rope belay" for more complicated setups.

There are probably pictures on David Coley's website, www.multipitchclimbing.com.

In reply to russholland:


Not sure what that means. I just take one rope to one anchor and the other to the other one, assuming that my partner is leading through. If I'm doing all the leading I equalise the points with a sling and tie one of my ropes to the power point with a clove hitch.

In reply to Jamie B:

I usually aim for a 3 (happy with 2) point anchor system and use the single rope to create the belay. I was wondering if I would have to do this for each rope? Therefore doubling up the system. Poor choice of words

Thanks I thought I was making life complicated for myself.

In reply to climbwhenready:

Thanks I'll have a dig around that site.

In reply to climbwhenready:



There is indeed. Look at the belay section. This shows many, many ways.

In reply to russholland:
There is no correct answer for one number of belay points that is safe.

A sling in good condition around a large tree can be bombproof on its own. Some rock may require 5 or more pieces for the belay if none of the placements alone are that great.

Personally two medium to large nuts in good independent placements or 1 large nut in a bombproof crack and an averagely good cam back in an independent placement (for example) would be good enough for me.

Answering your question for three or more placements. Use one rope on a cluster of roughly half of the placements and the other rope on the other cluster (independently and using the same techniques you would with 1 rope). Bare in mind that a single half rope is also strong enough to use on its own, but it's normally easier to split it between two ropes for a number of reasons.

In reply to CurlyStevo:

Thanks that makes sense. I always aim for bombproof.

In reply to russholland:

Easiest way is, with two bits of gear take one rope to each. If they're in reach just clove hitch the ropes to the gear, if not, return the rope to your harness and secure in a manner you're familiar with. For more than two anchors it's as it would be with a full rope but a little easier. It's hard to go wrong if you're already comfortable making belays with a single rope but a good book will probably give you some ideas you'd not considered.

jk

In reply to russholland:

Don't get me wrong, I am not advocating using 2 pieces of gear if the belay calls for more. However it illustrates the difference between single and double rope belays - basically build half the belay out of one rope and half out of the other, whatever makes the most sense at the time.

In reply to russholland:

or just always build the belay out of the large sling, clip into the tied rope loop/s at your harness. Using rope on belay stances will create a few problems if things go wrong, but you also have the rope for climbing. Which on some long pitches will be essential.

The only time the rope is useful is in extending a belay system on a large stance, to you can sit on the edge and see your second.

In reply to summo:

Rope in the belay could make a big difference if the leader takes a factor 2 at the start of the next pitch, I know you should try and mitigate against this by placing gear ASAP on the next pitch but that's not always possible.

In reply to gethin_allen:


you can simply clip your highest stance anchor as a runner, if you really think there will be no initial gear placements, that way the 2nd always takes an upward pull. Also using ropes on stances removes flexibility, it has to be either single pitch, or the 2nd leading through, for a leader to carry on with the next pitch once you've used a rope on an stance creates lots of unnecessary work. Plus it reduces the available rope for the leader on the next pitch.

Unless out of reach, a sling is consider the best option(IMHO). The others aren't less safe, but they greatly reduce your flexibility and options.

In reply to summo:

What about when the anchors are too far apart for a large sling to equalise them all or simply you have too many anchors (as the rock quality and/or placements are less than ideal)

In reply to CurlyStevo:

At the extreme I would have to use my emergency sling as well as my normal 240 sling for the stance. Perhaps even using the rope for one anchor, but I would do everything possible to avoid this. I can probably count the number of routes on one hand where I can't equalise with slings because the anchors were too far apart. I can't think of many if any routes where I've really used more than 3 bits of gear. If it's that marginal I've needed 4, 5 etc.. then they are probably worthless and I'm over looking something obvious, or didn't carry the right type of gear for the route. Or just pick the best 3, equalise with a 240 sling and then body belay to protect me and the stance. Often if gear is less than ideal, you can move position to create a better angle on a marginal rock etc..

In reply to summo:
Sure but your post seemed to definitively say, the only time the rope is useful is in extending a belay system on a large stance, so you can sit on the edge and see your second. I'm just saying sometimes this isn't true. This is the starting out forum after all.

Anyway personally I'm of the opposite opinion. I think the dynamic nature of the rope makes rope equalisation superior to a static sling in the general case of climbing in a 2 and switching leads. It can allow the anchors to at least partly equalise when the angle of pull isn't exactly what you anticipated as well as absorbing any direct forces on to the belay. I only use a sling when there is a specific reason to rather than by default.

In reply to summo:

I can't remember ever going with much less than three anchors - usually two main ones, and an extra one for luck. The only times I would use a single anchor would be eg. some massive tree at the top of a route. On more marginal belays I might have had a lot more than 3. I think on the classic stance on Cemetery Gates I had six, because none was quite 100 per cent bombproof (probably something like 90 + 80 + 70 + 60 + 60 + 50)

In reply to russholland:

As everyone else says, if you can find two fail-safe placements, one rope in each is enough, and is quick and easy to set up. As you are, I think, a self-confessed novice then the main problem with this is judging the quality of the placements. Until you've had a few years' experience (I hope this doesn't sound patronising) you probably need to view each placement with scepticism and treat it roughly before you decide it is reliable. If in any doubt you should put more gear in and equalise - this might often lead you to have two pieces on each rope. You will probably be much safer belaying with two ropes as you are more likely to bother with 3 or 4 bits of gear than you would do with a single rope.

In reply to summo:

"you can simply clip your highest stance anchor as a runner, if you really think there will be no initial gear placements"

This is OK if the gear is high above the belay but, this could be bad if your gear is behind (horizontal to) the belayer as a high impact fall could smack them into the rock causing them to drop you.

In reply to gethin_allen:

granted everything is about best assessing the line of the route and where you stand in the first place. So you can lock off, not get thrown against the wall (ie. locking off hand is facing out the crag, not in), this is why you should turn the device around and not lead through straight away, as the lock off is from the opposite direction. You should, in an ideal world be placing stance runners above waist height anyway. I simply believe in starting out with best practice, nothing dangerous in using the rope, but it's not the best solution in most stance management cases.

In reply to summo:


I build both rope and sling belays, but if you are talking about best practice then arguably using the rope is a better starting point (and I say that as someone who has argued in favour of sling belays before - if you are bringing up two seconds and leading all the pitches a rope belay is a PITA). Even if I built a sling belay I would consider clove-hitching in with the rope better than clipping in with a cows tail, and just clipping your belay loop directly to the powerpoint is almost always a bad idea.

For the typical situation (swinging leads in a pair) using the rope or a sling should be pretty equivalent in terms of 'stance management' except that you need less gear for the rope belay, don't need to mess around tying (and later untying) knots in slings, have a more easily adjustable system for better avoidance of extension (I don't really believe any belay is truly 'equalised' but aiming for it avoids extension if gear fails) and get the benefit of more dynamic components in the belay... which is best practice now?

If you can reach all the pieces it is easy to escape a belay made from the rope by just building a sling anchor underneath; if you can't then there is a good chance your anchors are too far away to have used a sling anyway.

In reply to summo:


No it doesn't, it creates next to no extra work if you're organised. I almost exclusively use rope to equalise my belay because it's the one thing I've always got with me, it's quick and easy.


When's the last time I ran out of rope? Ah yeah, a single pitch slab in the Mournes I think. Before that? Erm... probably some snow plod years ago where we might as well have been moving together anyway.

jk

In reply to andrewmcleod:

If you ever go on an assessment and start building anchors with rope, for 1 or 2 seconds, it's pretty likely you are going to have a nightmare solving any of the problems that get thrown at you. It is simply too rigid and inflexible a system to build anchors from. It's a last resort.

If you build a sling belay then you clip the rope loops you tied through your harness, if to far off, you clove hitch the rope. Cows tails to the sling equalised point, or clipping your strong point directly are vastly inferior.

You belay whilst clipped into your sling stance. The second arrives and you clip them to the same sling UNDER your Krab, so the rope and system is automatically layer for you to head off again. etc.. or if they are leading through, you clip them to the stance whilst you swap gear, then turn your belay device around and off they go. It is so simply, it's untrue.


Using a sling for stances is standard practice in the instructional world because it simplifies everything and speeds things up. Getting knots out is easy, if you tie the right knot in the first place. Adding 1 or 2 metres of rope into the system, which you will tight against offers very little increase in dynamic impact, compared to all the rope already out, knots tightening etc.. I reiterate sling equalised anchors are best practice, that's at any professional level, SPA, MIA, BMG...


But why have to build an extra stance when you could build a sling rigged stance in the first place, if your mate was hit on the head, that is a few minutes wasted. You can escape the system anyway from a rope rigged stance, it just takes a little longer and is some what faffier. So there would never be need to build a second stance, you would escape your rope stance, get to your second, then once they are OK, you would rig a new stance there, go back up your rope, strip it out etc.. then work out how you getting off, which will generally be downwards.

In reply to summo:

Hi,
The speed on using a cordelette vs. a rope-based belay often comes up.

Few people have timed this with a stop watch. I have. There is really no difference if you include the time to coil and uncoil the cordelette. Both make complete sense. One thing worth saying is the one reason the cordelette approach is popular when teaching is that the whole team might not be that experienced. This can make the powerpoint thing safer and quicker, but if everyone is experienced it make little difference.

In reply to David Coley:




Are you sure ? On double ropes

2 nuts/ bolts , 2 krabs/quickdrawers, step down, tie ropes together with an overhand, clip to rope loop , done.

or if closer belays

2 nuts/ bolts , two clove hitches, done.

In reply to gethin_allen:


Surely the rope between leader and second would stretch as much (leader waist at same height as belay, same number of ropes between leader and second as between second and anchor) or more (fewer ropes and longer between leader and second - 1 or 2 - than between second and belay - 2 or more). If the belay points are within arms reach the leader to second ropes would do the great majority of the energy absorption after only a few m of climbing so there would be limited benefit of rope use in the belay unless the anchors were uncertain and marginal gains were important? Perhaps useful if concerned about a factor 2 fall might be for the second to deliberately belay well below the anchor points and then for the leader use the top anchor as a runner. This would eliminate the risk of a factor 2 fall (which only exists if there is no substantial ledge in the way so there shouldn't be issues of hitting stuff on the extra stretch in this scenario.
With very short factor 2 falls such as leader slips with waist by reasonably low anchors there are other mitigating factors. The total fall energy is relatively small so much of the energy can be absorbed by the belayer plus knot tightening etc (but this, of course, depends on the weight of the leader and the quality of the stance!).

In reply to russholland:

Just be aware that some people claim that you should never clove hitch two ropes together (as if you treated them as a single rope), like this: http://www.beal-planet.com/2014/img/dessins/mousqueton-relais2.png (third diagram). "They" claim that one of the ropes can slip. I don't know any tests being done and do it all the time. Good enough for Beal? Good enough for me. http://www.beal-planet.com/2014/anglais/concept-beal-mousquetons-de-securit...

As someone mentioned above, you actually need just a single rope and escaping the belay can be easier, but if you bring up the second in a guide mode, that wouldn't make much difference. I know it's redundant, but my 8.1mm ropes sometimes don't give me enough confidence...

In reply to Rick Graham:



Yep.
You need to take into account the whole cycle. i.e. the second tying in, the leader untying. And whether the second is belayed up in guide mode or not.

The differences seem small from my measurements, and seem to come down to the individuals involved more than the system used. One time where a cordelette is faster is if you need to reposition yourself after you have built the belay - taking photos being one example.

In reply to David Coley:

I find cordelette really handy for single pitch where you might want to equalise three anchors on a single rope. It's faster by a huge margin when anchors are out of reach of the stance.

On half ropes and with two anchors I can't see the point.

In reply to Rick Graham:



For anchors out of reach, I'm used to clove hitching each strand back to a second carabiner on the belay loop. Are you saying that, having clipped both anchors, you create a double bight with an overhand out of both tails at an equal distance from the anchors on the other side from your belay loop which you can then clip to your belay loop?

In reply to BnB:


Yep, a very good use for a cordelette. "Huge" might be pushing it though. I'm not sure any of this is huge time wise

In reply to David Coley:


You obviously haven't seen me faffing about trying to equalise three strands via clove hitches

In reply to BnB:


2 nuts/ bolts ( high anchor points )
2 krabs/quickdrawers, (clip a rope into each anchor point )
step down to stance
tie ropes together with an overhand, ( on the two ropes going back down to the second climber )
clip to rope loop , ( clip one or both loops formed to my rope or belay loop , if using only one,
to clip an extra belay point, good if the top two are well above)
done

A bit more explanation in brackets , really quick, perfectly equalised and can be done with only one krab used per anchor if you tie back to your rope loop with the rope and a few half hitches.

Probably best used when leading through ( this is 99% of the time anyway ). Leading in blocks, using an autolock/reverso etc a cordellette system is probably better.

In reply to russholland:

There are reasons why guides prefer cordelettes, but they typically don't apply to a pair of equally experienced climber swinging leads, in which case using the rope to fabricate the anchor is fast, efficient, and robust (at least if you have the rigging skills to do this efficiently, which of course cannot be taken for granted).

If you've got beginners in tow, if the party is leading in blocks, or if you are engaged in big-wall tactics with bag-hauling and second-jumaring, then the the ability of a cordelette to simplify either complex rigging or belay-stance changeovers is an advantage for most experienced climbers. (But not all---see for example Mark Hudon's big wall anchoring tips in www.hudonpanos.com/Wall-Tips/2-to-1-Hauling.pdf)

When using just the rope, there is no reason to ever be "faffing around" with clove hitches. It is simple and reasonable to have a rigging strategy that is implemented rapidly in the same way every time for every (3+ piece) anchor configuration. I've been using such a method for twenty years at least and have posted a picture at http://www.rockclimbing.com/images/photos/assets/1/176681-largest_34116.jpg (most of the time no one would bother with the optional redirection point), and David's site lists the approach as the "DIL loop" method.

I too have timed the two methods (with three-point trad cragging anchors, which tend to be standard in the US), and if you take into account that the second has to wrap up and store the cordelette upon leaving the belay (which is appropriate since it is a time penalty associated with cordelette use), then the rope method was overall a little faster for the people I tried this out with, all of whom were experienced with both approaches. If you have beginners who have to wrap up the cordelette, then there's a good chance the all-rope anchor will be the faster option, although the other advantages of a cordelette for beginners would probably still be decisive.

Nowadays, when more and more climbs (outside the UK) have substantial bolted anchors, clove-hitching in series without any attempt at equalization is going to be the fastest and most efficient approach. In any case, the idea that their are "huge" differences can only indicate a lack of rigging experience with the purportedly slower method.

Making this an issue of "best practice" is silly when the reality is that different approaches are "best" in different circumstances. But I'd say that sooner or later, someone is going to drop their cordelette, at which point it's "advantages" become moot and efficiency in rigging with the rope becomes the only game in town. For this reason, even if for no other, it seems to me that climbers starting out should first of all be proficient rigging their anchors with just the rope.

.

In reply to rgold:

If you are using double ropes (not standard in the US) with 2 anchor pieces a two-clove-hitch anchor is trivial and easy to adjust. Adding a third piece makes it marginally more complicated but you can still do it in either 3 clove hitches, but with the awkward series adjustment, or 4 clove hitches with a loop of slack between the two pieces on the same rope, which means there is always free rope to adjust each clove hitch individually.

In reply to russholland:
Having watched this DMM sling/rope test - youtube.com/watch?v=Vrgadjo9niY& - I was quite amazed at how easily the slings broke especially considering that I've never heard of it happening in real life. I'll be a lot more careful about building belays than I have been in the past.

pmc