UKC

Just a thought - given that spinner leashes cost £40 for the set and are liable to part if you fall on them, is there an argument for attaching them to your axes with a very thin loop of cord (say 3mm)? That way when you have your lob it's the loop that gets ripped open and not the leash?

On the subject of lanyards, I've noticed a huge reduction in faff/tangles since I started attaching them to my abseil loop with a snaplink rather than having them hard-locked into my harness. This means that I can quickly unclip the axes rather than the runner if I get in a tangle! Also I can get them away from me when I want to belay. Personally I'd recommend trying this.

In reply to Jamie B: I would want to increase the chances of something holding not decrease them and I'm not convinced that 3mm would "rip open" in any case. My Quarks have 3mm loops for the clips which won't go in the holes in the pick. This year I threaded my lanyard loop on the waist belt rather than the belay loop which seemed to work OK and reduced some clutter including that that would be created with a krab. I also used a Grivel Daisy Chain which worked very well. I clipped it to the belay loop with a screw gate krab which meant it was easily accessible to detach and use as a belay anchor point equalizer. In fact this year I think I got myself better organised than I have ever done in the past and everything worked superbly. Now that I'm getting too old to do it I think I may finally have cracked it.

In reply to Jamie B:

http://alpineinstitute.blogspot.fi/2010/05/diy-leashless-ice-tool-tetherumb...

And forget the spinner and use real biners (eg. DMM Phantom screwgate for the harness and phntoms for tools).

In reply to Jamie B: the use of krab 4 attaching lanyard to harness my have some merit as long as snap gate behaves itself. not really had an issue witness space on harness loop.

Been using grivel lanyard for a few years and although it states not for climbing, IMHO there is no way it will fail if you slip and land on it. So adding cord into the system has no benefit, it just introduces a weakness.

cheers Davey

In reply to Jamie B:

Would you not need two krabs, one for each axe, otherwise unclipping wouldn't work?

In reply to Jamie B:

I wish they wouldn't, I would rather have some rated to hold a fall (any manufacturers out there???)

2nd this, have been doing it for years with a clipper leash attachment to join the spring leash to the axes which is tidy but releasable too.

In reply to Andy Nisbet:


Possibly, I guess it depends where you are relative to the gear.

In reply to jonnie3430:


Although they're not rated for a fall, it appears that sometimes they hold and sometimes they don't. Anyone got any anecdotal evidence about what sort of fall will break them, or for that matter which is stronger between Grivel and BD?

In reply to Jamie B: Grivel: " the double spring must never be used as a self belay for the climber or to belay a companion. Its strength is limited to 200kg.
The two small carabiners have a maximum resistance of 750kg and must never be used instead of normal carabiners when climbing or belaying."

For BD, see http://www.blackdiamondequipment.com/en-us/journal/climb//qc-lab-how-strong...

In reply to jonnie3430:

A via ferrata set

In reply to Jamie B:
Hi Jamie,
I have tested my leashes before. I got pumped out and slipped off my axes on plumb vertical ice. I dropped off and the leashes held me. I have a simple grivel spring leash, larks foot onto belay loop on harness and nano wire gate (very stiff gate and small) onto each axe (viper has suitable hole to clip direct).
I thought most leash set ups were rated to 200N, I am not sure if the spinner is weaker than the others.
Mine held me fine (80kg) and I just yarded back up on the leash and a screw I placed as a handhold. I was more worried about pulling a tool out into my face.

I was surprised how the lads leash in the Aladdins video seemed to vapourise when he fell on it as it was a very similar fall to mine, except less steep terrain. One thing I do keep noticing is the krabs at each axe keep being cross loaded by the leash tape so I must put some elastics on them if I remember to prevent this.

Cheers
Andy

In reply to Jamie B: I took a lob earlier this season Jamie and it was the 3mm cord that failed not the landyards. The way I see it is, if I drop an axe it will hold and I still have my axe but if I fall I'm not in that horrible position of hanging by my landyard with an axe out of reach. Yes, landyards that would hold a fall might have it's merits but that's my thoughts on it.

In reply to Jamie B:

I've taken a one metre fall on vertical ice with them and I use cheap dog leash clips from Spey Valley Hire. Surprisingly the leashes or the cheap clips didn't break though reaching my axes again was interesting!

In reply to Jamie B:

I dropped a metre onto my grivel ones and didn't break them.

In reply to Jamie B: Here's a wee story about lanyards that made me rethink my use of them. (Some of this is a little graphic so beware if you're squeamish.)

A couple of years ago I was belaying someone on top rope on a route that's about WI4. He was climbing with stretchy lanyards attached to his tools. About 20m off the ground he got into a bit of bother and both feet ended up skidding off the ice, leaving him hanging on his tools. Before he could get his feet back on he ran out of ability to hang on and he let go, sagging onto the rope. There was about 30m of rope between us so with the stretch in the rope he dropped about a metre or so. This stretched the lanyard on his top tool out to full extension and the tool then popped out.

At this moment he was hanging on the top rope with a freshly-sharpened BD viper accelerating towards him under gravity plus the tension in the lanyard. What's more, with the lanyard being clipped to his harness, there was little chance of it missing him.

Narrowly missing his face, the pick slashed across the side of his neck about an inch below his right ear, opening up a wound about 50mm long and 8-10mm deep. Amazingly it missed everything vital and there was surprisingly little blood. A bit of saline and some steristrips sorted him out and he got away with another scar for the collection.

My conclusion from this was that, unless I'm somewhere where dropping a tool is going to be a serious problem (e.g. an Alpine route) then I leave the lanyards at home. I view them as something to stop you losing your tools rather than something to sag, let alone drop onto. The chance of a tool popping out or breaking when you take even a short static fall onto it is high (see the photos in Craig Luebben's book for what happens to picks when they're overloaded.)

I know quite a few people have dropped onto their lanyards and everything has held. Please don't assume that this is going to happen every time.

In reply to AdrianC:


Yes, umbilicals/lanyards are for multi-pitch ice and/or multi-pitch winter/alpine stuff..

For singe pitch ice/mixed/winter or what ever, leave the lanyards in the sack or home.

In reply to AdrianC:

Your experience sounds similar to what we observed at the Ice Factor when people started using lanyards instead of wrist-leashes. Our solution was to stop climbers from hard-linking onto their lanyards, instead having a krab clipped onto the top-rope from their harness. Getting back up to axes following a fall can be difficult, but preferable to someone's face being slashed in two.

An alternative which I think deserves some consideration would be to lanyard one tool to the other. After all, you're surely unlikely to drop both?

In reply to Jamie B:


Not unless you've done something really silly, like tying them together