UKC

Generally I carry 3 sets of nuts (small/large/offset), 4 torque nuts, up to 9 cams, 9 draws and a few slings etc. The cams are all racked on their own colour coded carabiners and this poses a problem when fitting everything into my gear loops. So I got a new harness with 7 loops and everything fits fine now.

Climbing with a new partner, she suggested pairing two cams on one crab then adding a draw to the one that I don't use the crab with. Is there any benefit to doing this? It would certainly make racking easier. Are there any other tips on racking that would help me be more efficient?

I do try to weigh up what gear I can leave on the ground but this isn't always productive.

Cheers

In reply to radddogg:

When you've got Elvis leg, whatever you chose on the ground will have been the wrong choice! 

In reply to radddogg:

Just leave the 3 or 4 cams and 10 or so wires that won't fit that route in your bag. 

In reply to radddogg:

Yosemite rack the QDs. Also ditch the torques (for summer) and also learn to use the back loops. 

 

I can fit a lot more on 4 loop sport harness (w/ tiny loops). 

In reply to radddogg:

I don't think there's any right answer. It's whatever feels best to you. Personally I double up some of my smaller cams. It's obviously easier handing a pair of micro cams than it is a pair of large cams, and I personally find it a bit harder to select to right cam first time in these sizes. Maybe the key is to organise things on your harness so you can find them easily, and to take only what gear you actually need. Will you need both cams and torque nuts for a given route for example, or do there look to be enough cam places to leave the torque nuts behind? 

In reply to HeMa:

Yosemite rack? not come across that before

In reply to paul_the_northerner:

https://www.coldmountainkit.com/knowledge/tips/yosemite-racking/

In reply to summo:

It can't be much of a route if you can do that

In reply to HeMa:

Ah makes sense, good tip.

In reply to radddogg:

I rack most of my cams in pairs on my harness gear loops which is why I'm not keen on DMM Dragons, at least not in the smaller sizes. The extendable sling is a great idea but impractical when pairing them up on one krab. I only carry the larger cams ( >3 1/2) when a) I know I need them and b) don't have a clue if I will need them.  What that means is that I try to avoid carrying large cams whenever possible. When I do they go on a bandoleer.

I have used "Yosemite racking" but I'm not a big fan as the gear tends to hang too low around the legs. I use a BD Chaos harness.  I think it has 4 gear loops and never really had a problem.

Al

In reply to timjones:it can't be much of a route if you can climb it with that lot on.

 

In reply to timjones:

Fair point. I'm just lazy and can't be bothered dragging more than 15 or so wires up a route. 

In reply to radddogg:

Back to the point. I probably carry 5 or 6 cams through the usual size range. Standard harness set up, each side. 7 or 8 wires on a single krab of mixed sizes, 3 cams on their own krab, 3 or 4 extenders. Repeat for opposite side. 

For a specific route I might add in large cams, hex/s, or a bunch of wires under size 1, or extra extenders, but I won't carry this routinely.

In reply to radddogg:

Personally I hate not having cams on their own krabs because, in extremis, I want to be able to plug in a cam and clip with the minimal fuss.

I probably don't carry as many cams and hexes as you do, though.

In reply to radddogg:

I couldn't get off the ground with that lot.  I have a small bunch of micros, plus  3 x #2, 3, 4.  2x #5 ,6, 7. 1 x 8, 9, 10.  5 or 6 cams, with the biggest being a BD #2.  About 10 QDs and a couple of slings.  Don't climb grit much.

Leave a whole lot of it behind and look forward to a simpler life of gear selection

In reply to radddogg:

Obviously it depends on the route, grade and your own experience but that sounds like a lot of gear. Perhaps you mean your wires split between three krabs rather than three full sets of krabs. Do you always need all those cams?

    Anyway, Yosemite racking can work very well as long as your gear does not hang too low. For cams I sometimes follow the same principle. Attach one cam to the harness gear loop and a second cam to the krab ( the one on the gear loop ) on the first cam.

In reply to nniff:

I wouldn't dare leave the ground with only that lot.

Or a life of forever getting gripped running out of gear.

 

In reply to radddogg:

I'd leave them one per krab, they often don't need extending and you don't want to be messing about with all the clipping and unclipping and re-racking faff which eats energy and can get valuable gear dropped. Then again, do whatever works for you, it's your rack.

jk

In reply to Mark Haward:

Yes, I have 4 crabs with nuts but only carry 3 depending on the route - micros, 00-7, 8-11 with some duplicates, offsets

No, and I usually try to leave the larger sizes if it looks like I won't need them

I think rather than sharing one carabiner I'll Yosemite rack the cams and go back to my 4 loop harness

In reply to radddogg:

Thats duplication. And why 9 cams, in the smaller sizes the smaller ones you can probably use nuts anyway unless your climbing harder routes.
I carry a similair rack and have been trying to slim it down for years, but I seem to end up taking the lot, just incase

 

 

In reply to J1234:

Sometimes a torque nut works better than a cam or vice versa, don't you find?

In reply to radddogg:

You just cannot beat a BFO Hex, you can even stand on them as you move up if you want, not that I would

 

In reply to wbo:

I guess it depends on whether you favour hard moves on  short pitchespit glorious full rope length pitch after glorious full rope length pitch

In reply to Mark Haward:

Yes, which is why it's more suited for them short quickdraws... for for those, it works like a charm.

 

In reply to radddogg:

Yes... mostly when the crack is all iced up... but thus far hasn't been the case in summer (yes, I used to carry hexes or torque nuts like 10-15 years ago... but not anymore... when rock climbing).

In reply to radddogg:

I'm slightly surprised you're struggling with that size of rack. 25 krabs worth of gear plus slings, belay etc. isn't really that large a rack and should fit easily on most harnesses.

In Winter my mates rack for mixed routes has on occasion been 3 krabs of wires, 10 hexes, 6 cams, 1 krab with hooks/pegs and 14 draws [34 krabs]. Equally, when climbing in Morocco in November we racked up to 20 cams and 14 draws although admittedly only 2 krabs of wires [36 krabs].

The vast majority of climbers I know tend to all rack cams individually. You can debate all sorts of advantages (or disadvantages) but the clinching argument for me is that each cam having its own colour-coded krab is just the simplest and most straightforward way of doing things.

The only thing I regularly Yosemite rack are individual krabs. I carry a varying number of screwgates and normally 3-4 spare wiregates, so they will get Yosemite racked rather than being clipped individually.

In reply to radddogg:

Yes - particularly if you can torque the torque but the cam might walk the walk.

In reply to radddogg:

As others have suggested, I would just get rid of a lot of gear. Ditch a set of nuts, the torques and a couple of cams - plus any extra crap, e.g. 400cm slings or reams of tat or dodgy bail carabiners.

 

In reply to radddogg:

A bandolier can be a good solution. Partic useful when swapping leads on multipitch.

In reply to HeMa:

I suspect that like most people who dislike hexes you don't carry them (in Summer) so don't get to realise how well they go into some placements that cams fit poorly. Also they are considerably lighter than cams so are actually a good way of doubling without carrying two sets of cams. 

In reply to C Witter:

There are routes where you will want that much gear. The guy is asking for advice on how to rack it.

In reply to The Ex-Engineer:

big wallets and big arms? 

 

In reply to DubyaJamesDubya:

The thing is, I used to carry them... and as things are like now, in fact I carry hexes half of my trad outings (which happen to be in winter).

So I do know how to use hexes, have used them quite a bit and have fallen on them (as well as cams). And still on the mediums I mainly climb (granite, some limestone) I always pick a cam 10 out of 10 times, provided the pocket or crack isn't frozen (also did so, when I was climbing with hexes in the summer). So from my experience, hexes are quite unnecessary if cams are also an option.

That said, if you're just starting out... hexes and torque nuts are a cheaper way to build a double rack. But, also quite soon, they'll be forgotten... unless you get into winter climbing.

And to be honest, I didn't really find places on grit where I wanted to place protection where a hex would have worked better than a cam. Granted, it was only for a short week. But can you kindly provide numerous examples on where a hex works better than a cam (and no place for the cam in the surrounding 1m circle).

In reply to radddogg:

One of the great advantages of cams is that you can place them very quickly and, with a bit of experience, pretty reliably, even if you're pumped silly. Why deny yourself that advantage by forcing yourself to spend vital seconds messing with swapping krabs or adding quickdraws before you can get the cam clipped and be on your way?

I find that even when in full 'expedition mode', with up to 3 sets of cams at once and maybe 20 quickdraws or slingdraws, things can still fit fine on a standard trad harness. Yosemite rack the quickdraws, of course (they only hang down 3" further"!) and any duplicate cam sizes too, but keep each cam size accessible so that you can just grab it, place it and clip it, without anything else being in the way.

In reply to HeMa:

Fair enough.

I've tried doing without them altogether and usually find I miss them when I do. One particular experience at Symonds Yat: 20 ft above my last runner I encounter a pocket, the only thing that fits is a medium hex slotted and rotated. No more runners until the top, a dirty 20ft of precarious climbing.

In reply to DubyaJamesDubya:

Odd, to me it sounds that a can would also work. Unless it’s a tiny pocket, in which case  inverted/cammed nut or tricam should work. 

In reply to DubyaJamesDubya:

Not in the Lakes and Lancs there aren't...! If you can't fit your gear on your harness, a valid response is: you're carrying too much! Apologies if that offends your sensibilities.

 

In reply to radddogg:

Obviously where possible I avoid taking gear I don't need, mainly to save weight (as I'm carrying too much of my own weight add it is ) but when I need to carry the lot on a multipitch for example I struggle to get everything in a standard 4 loop harness. I find each loop holds up to 7 crabs making 28 total slots. My full rack is 9 cams, 4 hexes, 4 screwgates (3 with slings), 3 sets of nuts, 10 draws, 1 nut key, 1 belay device. This makes 32 - a surplus of 4.

I tried Yosemite racking this week and am very happy with the results. The crabs go down from 10 to 2. The cams I bunch the bigger ones in pairs and the smallest 3 together reducing 9 to 4. Bonus that if I get the size wrong I can quickly try the next size. If I'm in extremis I can still clip the rope then sort out the extra cam. The torque nuts I double up too. Another added bonus is it speeds up the racking time.

Cheers for the suggestions, glad I asked now

In reply to C Witter:

No offence here

In reply to C Witter:

Are you sure?

On a decent multipitch route at least 4 pieces will in use at your belay stances on all but the first pitch.

In reply to timjones:

Unless I misinterpret you, you're saying that you will have "at least" four anchors - e.g. two hexes and two nuts?

Unless the rock is complete choss, that's not how most people build belays in my experience. If you've a tree or a block, you might only use the rope and no gear - or one sling and a locker. Otherwise, you place bomber gear and go off two or three pieces.  So, the only thing I'm not sure about is why you feel "at least 4 pieces" are necessary - unless you're hanging a portaledge!

Look: why carry four hexes for summer climbing in the UK? Take two and you'll never miss the other two. Or leave them all - if you've nine cams and 30 nuts and a few slings, you should be able to find a gear placement that doesn't require a hex! Or take them, and leave some cams - I'm not disputing that hexes can be useful. 

This is just my opinion - by all means ignore it. But, if you're climbing classic rock routes, they were probably first climbed with just a rope and maybe a few slings. So, of course you can climb with less gear - and two sets of nuts and 6 or 7 cams is still a sizeable rack. If you're climbing in the US or on extremes, then by all means ignore me - I've very little experience there. Though... the tendency seems to be for many extreme grade climbers to trim down their racks...

In reply to C Witter:

You have to budget for at least 2 pieces at the bottom of the pitch and to have at least 2 pieces of the correct size remaining hwen you complete the pitch in order to build the next belay.  The rack that the OP suggests is unlikely to include 30 nuts, A standard set of nuts might make up 10, but micros and offsets tend to come in sets of 5 IME.

 

Hexes are very much a matter of taste but for most mountain crags I would prefer to carry a set. Trees and blocks are great if they are there, but it would be foolish to gamble on their presence without good beta.

In reply to timjones:

Oh - of course, where is my brain!

In reply to J1234:

 

Plus of course, a hex on tape, can also be used just as a sling.

 

In reply to HeMa:

Had a full range of cams with me none would fit (rounded out inside)

In reply to radddogg:

ditch the torque nuts!!

just read few other posts.  so edited to.  Ditch the torque nuts if doing single pitch!!"

In reply to Paul Hy:

I'd always say take the hexes or the big cams but not both, the choice of which depends on the route and rock.  Plenty of knobbly cracks out there where cams won't seat properly.