UKC

When placing a QD on a bolt/runner which is offset from the general line of the climb, I've always put the gate of the bottom crab facing that direction; i.e away from the line of the climb. However, a recent discussion has cast some doubt on that being best practice - the argument being that in a fall it is possible for the QD to swing in an arc towards the line of the climb and twist in such a way as to make unclipping more likely. I suppose to be sure you'd have to see some close up footage of the exact way QD and rope behave in leader falls.

Does anyone have a take on this?

In reply to bpmclimb: I recently spent a month in Spain sport climbing and for the first 2 weeks I was OCD about the gate direction. If I found myself above a bolt with a gate facing the “wrong” way I would lose my resolve in an instant. Bored with this I took half a dozen deliberate and longish falls onto “wrong way” facing QDs and came to the conclusion that this is just another non-issue that distracts from the actual climbing. Since then I haven’t looked back (or down, even).

In reply to bpmclimb:


General rule of thumb is to have the spine of the crab on the direction you'll be climbing (ie. next bolt). So gate away from where you're going.

That said, if the route is bolted well enough, it really doesn't matter all that much.

In reply to bpmclimb:

It's not an issue I give much thought to. If it's a clip I can't afford to have fail (usually 2nd or 3rd depending on spacing) It might get a screwgate for the bolt and a pair of snaps for the rope otherwise it's just whatever's easiest to reach or whatever I can get in with the stick. That said, most of my clips are 60cm slings so the rope end can be used either way when I get to it, sometimes I think about it, sometimes I just clip and hope for the best. Probably grossly irresponsible but there you go. I've only ever had a couple unclip themselves and they weren't under load when they dropped the rope.
jk