UKC

I'm after a belay with assisted braking. Not really after a gri gri as I'm a leftie. I only sport climb so somthing suitable for trad isn't necessary. The click up and back diamond pilot have caught my eye I just wondered if anyone on here has any recommendations.

Many thanks. 

I'm a fan of the click up - though like most you need to be careful paying out on lead that you don't lock it up inadvertently.  The newer version isn't as good though apparently!

It's a very similar style of belaying to a standard plate / tubular device too so easy to swap back and forth if necessary.

Cheers,

Stu

I think the Mammut Smart 2.0 is the best among the assisted tube style belay devices.

I use the Salewa Ergo myself, but only because the Smart 1 was so large. 

Click up is great, you need to get used to it a bit, but it’s not a massive change from using a tube style device. 

However I’d recommend popping down your nearest climbing shop and having a good look at all the options and a chat with the staff, I’m sure they’ll be able to help.

I’m a leftie and have used a GriGri for sport ever since they came out. I just use it right handed. If Gary Moore could play a right handed guitar, I figured I could brake a rope with my right hand. It’s not difficult.

I would say, try to get your hands on as many different devices and try belaying with them. Do some fall tests as per the videos here, https://www.dropbox.com/sh/dxe1sxfk4veb492/AABpL05TRoq-oBjrvtZKF7gsa?dl=0, and see which you are happiest with.

I know quite a few left handed climbers who simply use the grigri normally with right hand on the brake rope. Seems to work fine? 

Otherwise the Edelrid Jul 2 is my top choice as it's compact and will last forever because it's made of steel. 

Click Up for me. I've recently tried a Gri-Gri and a Gri-Gri 2, i couldn't get either of them to pay out as smoothly or readily as the Click Up.

As the meme says "They're all good dogs Brent!"

I.e. you can't really go too far wrong.

...but here's some suggestions based on my own research and experience:

• I own and use a BD Pilot and really like it (I'm also a leftie). I find it a very natural action to give slack etc. It's a wee bit 'hairtrigger' for lowering - you can give your partner quite a fright if you crank it open the first time, but with practice it's very smooth. It's also quite cheap so it's not like you're taking out a mortgage if you don't like it/break it/lose it. Doesn't prevent lowering issues, but does lock up on it's own when there's a fall. Can't be used for abseiling (according to BD) and is single rope only of course. You also can't do a direct belay for multi-pitch (i.e. attached to anchor). So a 'one trick pony' but it's very good at that trick!
• I've used a Click-up and it's very similar in action to the BD Pilot. Hard to choose between them. Also single rope only and no abseiling.
• Edelrid MegaJul looks very similar as well. Also single rope only and I presume no abseiling.
• If you also needed to be able to abseil on it, and to work with two ropes for Trad or do direct belays for multi-pitch then the Edelrid GigaJul seems like a good option. Not too expensive, nice and light, but a wee bit odd looking. Not used it personally.
• Never used a GriGri. Can't really comment.

Hope that's useful.

Dave

+1 for the BD Pilot, simple and easy to use!

The Click up is good.  I also liked the Mammut Smart but the length of it is inconvenient for racking and it catches on people.  The BD looks like a better "copy" of the Smart.

Al

No answer … but a additional question.

What about Edelrid Giga Jul? Since I use most of the time a Gri-Gri and now and then a Click-up, but are willing to change for better.

Any lock ups in the sliding system due to rope dust, sand, etc with the Mega Jul?

Less rope spaghetti like with the Click-up?

Sounds as a sturdy ""thing what Edelrid writes about the Mega Jul (I use every two years a BD ATC guide or a Petzl Reverso, since the teeth get rubbed off). 

The Giga Jul handled similarly to the Mega Jul when I had a play about with one last year.

My experience is that it's a good device for sport climbing, there's a bit of a knack to using it well (but less so than using a Gri Gri). They are both very sensitive to the cross sectional profile of the karabiner which they are paired up with, too fat and it either won't fit in the groove at all or will be excessively grabby, too thin and it's like using a bog standard ATC belay plate.

There really is no substitute for having a play. A good way of seeing how well you can provide a catch with an unfamiliar device is to clip the rope through first or second draw and have your mate (stood at ground level) pull hard on their side of the rope with you facing away from them. A competent belayer should be able to catch well with any device but will find that some are more reassuring than others due to providing a very positive locking action (why I now use a Gri Gri 2 over the Mega Jul). IIRC this is the way that the DAV teaches belaying, I was introduced to it at a BMC tech committee meeting last year.

Yes BD pilot is really simple - narrow range of function but very user friendly for left or right and quick to learn.  Curious about abseiling - but just curious. 

Regarding the BD Pilot for abseiling, I just re-read the tiny microscopic instructions and it doesn't specifically say 'don't use for abseiling'. It does say don't try to do a direct belay (guide mode).

However, clearly if you did use it for abseiling not only are you abseiling on a single rope so you should have some sort of backup, but there is no guaranteed locking so you would have to be holding the brake rope all the time and have a 'third hand' backup on the brake rope.

Don't think I'll be trying it.

Be wary about the pilot, it doesn't always auto block/auto assist. It needs a specific combination of rope, carabiner and astral alignment for it to work properly.

Mine worked poorly with my old battered wall rope but works perfectly with its shiny new replacement, counterintuitive. 

A friend trialled one recently as a gri gri alternative. By chance he found he had the perfect combination to execute a smooth hands free lower. 

It’s always with time and plenty of use that the glitches emerge.  

Never used one on brand new slick thin single rope with a heavy person on the end of it.  Just a fuzzy wall rope with a 50kg sylph (an elemental spirit of the air) attached. 

don’t you just hate that.   

Are you not relying on a single rope every time you abseil? Imagine what would happen if you tied your halfs together and abbed off, only for one to be cut through by a sharp edge. The rope would pull through* and you'd plummet to your death.

* - ok, depending on which rope is cut and what you're abbing off, there's a chance the knot won't pull through - but I wouldn't like to rely on that as a backup...

Yes that does indeed give me pause. Less so with two ropes tied together where at least you have a knot so depending which rope fails you should be OK, but definitely if doing a 'retreating' abseil on a single rope doubled up where you don't knot the rope at the anchor at all. 

Is adding a knot and tag line even when abseiling on a single doubled-up rope overkill?

(sorry bad use of the term 'kill' there!!)

Mamut smart is a good multi-handed device, cheap light, reliable.  Like all these things takes a small amount of practise to get slick.

My MegaJul does two ropes (though there is indeed a single-rope version of these devices).

Also, you can ab on it, though it's not particularly great for that (first, it's hard to keep it running smoothly between too much and too little fraction when abing; it's a device designed to lock up, with a thumb-loop to keep it unlocked; second, being small it can heat up a lot on a long ab).

Still, if you want an assisted-locking device for two-rope trad, then the MegaJul is a good option.

If you want it for single-rope, single-pitch then I'd use a ClickUp (original version).

Just took delivery of the Giga Jul as I'll be indoor climbing quite a bit to shift some timber after being out for 8 months before getting outside. Looks like it should do everything pretty well and much more familiar to a tube device than a gri gri or similar.

It's also cool colours so obviously already a 6/10 at least.

Also a big fan of the original Click Up.

Dave is quite right that as a single rope device you can only use it on a single ab rope (eg maybe where you leave one in place and won't need to retrieve it from the bottom  such as for repeated descents on sea cliffs) but I have used one to 'self lower' (ie tie into one end of the rope  and then lower myself off  from a fixed anchor) which has the same effect as abbing.

or use an Alpine-Up with 2 half ropes.

Abseiling feels very secure as it locks itself off (might still want to back up with a prusik).

I've not tried it, it may be great, but it seems a bit big and heavy compared to a MegaJul or my DMM Mantis.    How do you find it?

Do you mean abing with it in locking mode using a krab as a lever? Or abing in the usual non-locking way?  I know lots of people don't like the the krab lever method and when I was writing the review Edelrid told me, its probably easier to just do it the normal way with a prussik as back up, but I find the krab lever way rather good.

Well I've only abbed with it "raw", using the thumb loop to prevent locking -- probably not an ideal way to use the device.

The Alpine Up is indeed a big thing and quite heavy on the harness if leading. I don’t use it seldom for this reason. With thinner twin ropes the Alpine Up gives less “salad” then with thicker rope (for me the double). With a double rope it is a lot of doing, very likely because I do not practice/use it enough? 

A Reverso/ATC gets also hot when one rappels fast so will the MegaJul. As TobyA says rappel in non-blocking mode, and belay in locking-mode sounds plausible for smooth operation. Hopefully the feeding is as easy as an ATC, I had the Giga Jul, the courtship was very short, it blocked all the time. With a smile: I am going to sponsor the industry and give the MegaJul a try. 

Nope, I think that's very much the wrong way - I imagine that in using the thumb loop to release it when abseiling you run the risk of dropping yourself a bit, catching your thumb and probably lots of other not great outcomes. Edelrid's instructions now only seem to refer to abseiling with it the other way around - https://media.edelrid.de/images/attribut/54544017_GAL_MegaJul_MicroJul_Mega... (picture 11) and recommends using a prussik as back up, but they used to suggest abseiling in the locking mode using a krab in the nose hole as a lever. I guess this ran the risk of someone in a panic pulling back on the lever not letting it go, but that's the same risk as abing on a grigri - I think if you understand how it works and want a locking abseil device the megajul (like a Grigri on a single rope) works well.

It's a bit bulky but not very. It depends what other stuff you would carry up a multi pitch route normally (sport or trad.). It's not that heavy either.

I did a rough comparison:

Alpine-Up 180gm plus screwgate 77gm

vs Reverso 59gm plus screwgate 56gm plus another to attach prusik 56gm.

Difference=86gm...…..not far off the weight of a quickdraw.

I think that is worth the security you feel when abseiling. And when belaying you get assisted breaking for sport routes. There is a dynamic belaying mode for trad.

FWIW I don't in any way think of myself as more "backed up" when abseiling on doubles. If I read you right, you're thinking of the scenario of the rope on the knot side getting cut, and the knot saving you by jamming in the anchor. That sounds only 50/50 at the very best.

I would have thought it's more healthy to think of any abseil, whether single or double, as "all eggs in one basket", and make damn sure that the rope(s) aren't sawing across any sharp edges. 

Modern ropes don't just "fail". They can of course get cut, but that is to a large extent a controllable risk .... as is not tying the knot properly, abseiling off the ends, etc, etc.

This one

https://www.ukclimbing.com/gear/climbing/belays/edelrid_giga_jul-12021

I got one for my son when he started climbing so he could belay me without me worrying if he is paying attention lol.

Euge

Why can't you ab on a single strand with them? Abseiling is just lowering except you move and the rope stays in one place.

*Yes I know you can't use a double rope ab with these.

Yes, I was confused by this too!

There is a lot of friction involved in a lower.

About 30% reduction at least over the lower off ring.

With a convoluted pitch past several overhangs as on my local wall you can just about lower thro your hand.