Understanding Climbing Fall Forces on Small Gear

Phil Esra wrote:Wow, lots of confidence here about falling on tiny gear. The late Bruce Bindner (Brutus of Wyde) put it well--I am paraphrasing--sometimes the ones you think will hold, don't, and sometimes the ones you think won't hold, do....]

Exactly, that's why redundancy goes up as placement quality goes down. But I would argue that it's going to be difficult to advance through the grades if you are unwilling to fall on small gear. As a general rule, as the difficulty of the free climbing increases, the opportunity for bomber >0.5 Camalot placements (or bomber med/large nut placements) decrease. Of course there are exceptions to this trend, but if you limit yourself to only climbing these exceptionally safe yet difficult (ie >= 5.11) routes then you've really limited yourself.

Brassmonkey wrote: In certain grades/areas/routes you have no choice about the gear. I don't think people are saying to treat them like bolts, but they will hold in most circumstances when placed appropriately in the right system.

Just sayin', my free rack of cams stops at a blue/purple offset Mastercam--plus one medium sliding nut sometimes. If a placement is too small to take one of these or a nut, my options are to run it out, bail, or french free.

Strictly out of curiosity, what are these routes that y'all are placing tiny cams on, then falling on? Keithb00ne? I hope we're at least talking about granite and not some gritstone death route.

Phil Esra wrote: Strictly out of curiosity, what are these routes that y'all are placing tiny cams on, then falling on?

Coarse & Buggy at JT is a great example.

a few things

1. all this talk about how much force this or that piece of gear is going to experiences is pretty useless ... there are too many variables and unknowns to account for ... unless someone MEASURES it before hand its just folks trying to come up with an intraweb answer

2. small cams fail more often period ... to put it simply there is less surface contact, they are more susceptible to rock irregularities, the strength of the cam is weaker ... now ive had small cams hold succesfully down to the 00 TCU ... but ive also had what i though were ones in good placements fail several times ... just because your 300 lb friend took a 100 ft whipper on one and it held once doesnt mean the are "fine" ... anyone who whips on em regularly will tell you microcams fail more often ... never trust a single small cam if you can help it

3. small nuts still fail, but the are MUCH better than small cams if you can find a good placement in good rock ... generally the rock or nut has to break, that is if you place it properly against lifting it out with rope drag ... this GREEN dmm peanut has held 20+ whippers so far, and its not retired yet ...

green peanut

this one was retired after quite a few falls ...

dmm brass offset

4. as someone mentioned if you want to climb higher in the grades you need to get into microgear ... and youll whip on it ... this is especially true for squamish where harder cracks tend to be thinner .. in fact many people first "11a" trad lead takes micro gear ...

kangaroo corner, everyones first "11a" trad lead

5. if you are worried about gear you should probably used the softest catching rope you can ... according to beal and the CAI models, the reduction in force is nothing to sneeze at ...

beal gear impact forces with belay device/rope

6. you should probably also use a tuber or something similar ... the top runner will see less force all other things being equal ....

DAV Panorama ... force at brake and top runner

7. you should probably use a dynamic belay when possible

DAV Panorama ... belay types

DAV Panorama ... belay forces

8. you should minimize rope drag with runners and slings ... no point talking about soft catches if your belayer doesnt even feel your fall due to drag/bends in the rope ...

beal fall factor including friction and angle changes

9. BACK IT UP ... at good stances get in another piece ... the nice thing about small gear? ... its LIGHT ... an extra bundle of small nuts weights little but can save you on those finger cracks ...

10. you should just go out and take clean whippers on microgear backed up by many pieces of course .... no one here can realistically tell you how much force youll see over the intrawebs or if the gear will hold ... ONLY you going out and TESTING it will tell you

warning ... you might die, get seriously injured or get a bruised ego in the process ...

;)

Well I learned I'm a giant pussy in light of the casual manner so many posters casually and repeatedly take reported 20+ foot whippers on what I've always thought was micro gear.

jon apprill wrote: Coarse & Buggy at JT is a great example.

Got it, thanks for putting it in words I can understand! Pumpy, with a pretty clean fall. Takes small nuts well. I would definitely leave the 00 behind, but to each his/her own. Unrelatedly, DUDE, where is that "Pipeline" in your profile pic? Never mind this thin stuff.

Phil Esra wrote: Unrelatedly, DUDE, where is that "Pipeline" in your profile pic? Never mind this thin stuff.

Pipeline is in Squamish but I'm anything but a hard climber. With a valley giant it's tr the whole way :-)

To go off on a slight tangent, BearB's pic under item 7 is interesting. If I am understanding it correctly, is shows the leader being belayed directly off the anchor on a multi-pitch climb. Is that a euro thing? Is it common?

wfscot wrote: I hate to beat a dead horse, but this is pretty important. I looked around and I'm fairly certain that the UIAA measures force on the *leader*. Here are a couple non-official links: alpineexposures.com/pages/f… rei.com/learn/expert-advice… If someone has info that they are really testing the force on the *top piece*, I would love to see it, as that would significantly lower the forces for a given fall factor and rope.

Yes, impact force measures the force felt by the climber, or more specifically, the force at the end of the rope.

NC Rock Climber wrote:To go off on a slight tangent, BearB's pic under item 7 is interesting. If I am understanding it correctly, is shows the leader being belayed directly off the anchor on a multi-pitch climb. Is that a euro thing? Is it common?

vimeo.com/44869774

;)

Phil Esra wrote:Wow, lots of confidence here about falling on tiny gear. The late Bruce Bindner (Brutus of Wyde) put it well--I am paraphrasing--sometimes the ones you think will hold, don't, and sometimes the ones you think won't hold, do. If you don't believe this now, keep climbing hard over gear and report back in a decade. The areas I climb, the grades I climb, there's almost always a better pro option right below or above that desperate tips crack. The Brits have made a sport of bad pro in crappy rock, but they don't claim it's not dangerous. [Just saw Reel Rock last night--great piece on Hazel Findlay. Lots of adorable quotes about shit pro.]

Climbing on small gear/poor gear is a personal thing - if it doesn't do anything for you, don't do it; it's as simple as that. Of course when I mentioned Brits in my previous post, I didn't imply that it's not a dangerous undertaking. I simply meant that they know how to do it well. And most British climbers I have known are very happy climbing HVS and E1 and E2s, so it was not really meant to be a generalizing statement to be taken literally.

About what Bruce Bindner said - I disagree with his statement, but I dare say that of course this largely depends on the kind of experiences that we each have had. Climbing is a personal experience; and personal experience cannot be calculated with numbers and strength tests. I was simply advising the OP to find some safe ways to gain some personal experience rather than listening to gearheads talking about numbers.

bearbreeder wrote: vimeo.com/44869774 ;)

Thanks!

This thread has been very insightful. I have pulled on my small gear, double it up where it is in question, and feel safe in my placements. Examples of those with experience falling and leading on small gear definitely gives me more confidence. It's all about making good decisions and mitigating risks.

bearbreeder wrote: vimeo.com/44869774 ;)

Great video. Thanks!

climbnplay wrote: Climbing on small gear/poor gear is a personal thing - if it doesn't do anything for you, don't do it; it's as simple as that. Of course when I mentioned Brits in my previous post, I didn't imply that it's not a dangerous undertaking. I simply meant that they know how to do it well. And most British climbers I have known are very happy climbing HVS and E1 and E2s, so it was not really meant to be a generalizing statement to be taken literally. About what Bruce Bindner said - I disagree with his statement, but I dare say that of course this largely depends on the kind of experiences that we each have had. Climbing is a personal experience; and personal experience cannot be calculated with numbers and strength tests. I was simply advising the OP to find some safe ways to gain some personal experience rather than listening to gearheads talking about numbers.

Sorry, not disagreeing specifically with anything you said upstream. Just broadly arguing that tiny cams are fraught. My wife climbs above our 00 all the time. (I don't think she's ever fallen on it, but she's not much of a faller.) And yes, the Brits are masters of marginal pro for sure, as evidenced by the fact that they are not all dead.

A couple of examples from my personal experience--

Tideline (11a, Olmsted Canyon, Tuolumne)--medium-length fall (15'?) on a medium-sized cam (red C4?). The force popped a chunk of granite off the rock; the cam tipped out and became passive pro, and held the fall. That wouldn't happen with the expansion range of a tiny cam.

Crack Attack (11-, Indian Creek)--longish (20'+) fall on a green C4. The cam held, but left 3"-long gouges behind it, and stopped at the very lip of the crack. The smaller lobes of a tiny cam would not have stayed in the rock.

Witch Doctor (5.10a, the Needles)--medium fall onto Blue Alien. The crack was thin enough that I could not orient the cam directly in line with the fall direction--the trigger got in the way. The fall rotated the cam, the trigger wedged in the crack, and the cam pulled. Took a long ride. The braided sheath wrinkled up like a straw wrapper--wild.

Just, you know, be careful out there.

wfscot wrote: I hate to beat a dead horse, but this is pretty important. I looked around and I'm fairly certain that the UIAA measures force on the *leader*. Here are a couple non-official links: alpineexposures.com/pages/f… rei.com/learn/expert-advice… If someone has info that they are really testing the force on the *top piece*, I would love to see it, as that would significantly lower the forces for a given fall factor and rope.

If you don't believe me ask Gear Guy at Rock and Ice. See paragraph 5:

MARRIAGE MADE AT ROPE FACTORY
Which is more important, the number of UIAA/CE falls a rope can hold, or how many kiloNewtons it can hold? —climbboy via rockandice.com

Choosing between those two is like choosing between good looks and personality. They each have benefits, but ideally you get both.

While falls held and tensile strength are important and sound sexy, they are just two of the many bits of data you should factor into your rope-choosing decision. Consider that ropes don’t break; they wear out and can also be cut (for a cold dose of reality, read the Accident Report on page 22). The number of falls held and breaking strength don’t necessarily make a rope more durable or tougher, or even mean that it will hold more real-life falls, which are never close to the CE drop test, a savage ordeal that if you were somehow able to replicate in the field, you’d see Jesus.

Consider that unless your rope sustains a core shot you’ll climb on it until it reaches a fuzzy cattail-like state that has you rightly questioning its reliability, and you’ll retire it then. The number of falls the rope has held … well, who can even remember?

The more important number on a rope hang tag is “maximum-impact force.” This is the maximum number of kiloNewtons a rope transmits onto the top piece of pro in a fall.The more important number on a rope hang tag is “maximum-impact force.” This is the maximum number of kiloNewtons a rope transmits onto the top piece of pro in a fall. Lower numbers are, of course, preferred to higher numbers, especially if you like to climb above teeny nuts.

Ropes can achieve a low maximum-impact force a number of ways, but often it’s by stretching. The more a rope stretches, the lower its impact force. This is a double-edged sword. Low-impact force is nice, but if the rope stretches so much you hit a ledge, it’s not so nice. For that reason, also pay attention to “Dynamic Elongation,” which tells you, in a percent, how much a rope will stretch. The perfect playmate is a rope with a low dynamic elongation and a low maximum-impact force. Don't waste my time!

Greg D wrote: If you don't believe me ask Gear Guy at Rock and Ice. See paragraph 5 : "...The more important number on a rope hang tag is 'maximum-impact force.' This is the maximum number of kiloNewtons a rope transmits onto the top piece of pro in a fall."

Gear Guy is wrong---note the placement of the dynamometer. The maximum-impact force is the load transmitted to the leader or, if you wish, the maximum tension in the rope from the top piece to the leader.

Greg, just cause gear guy has spoken, doesn't mean he is right. Same goes for you.

The impact force is defined as the maximum tension in the rope when a climber falls. Since there is no friction between the climber and the top piece, the tension is the same throughout this section of rope. In a frictionless system, the belayer must resist this tension with an equal and opposite force to arrest the leader fall. Since the climber's side of the rope and the belayer's side of the rope are nearly parallel, these two vector forces will add together. In this case, the top piece will see nearly double the force that the climber sees.

This is true if there is no friction in the system. But, there is friction on the belayer's side of the rope, especially at the top piece. 1.66 times the climber's force instead of double is the acceptable number to determine the force on the top piece.

To clarify, the MAXIMUM IMPACT FORCE RATING on your new rope is the force measured in a lab test, a severe test using 80kg, fall factor 1.77, static belay.

Phil Esra wrote: Just sayin', my free rack of cams stops at a blue/purple offset Mastercam--plus one medium sliding nut sometimes. If a placement is too small to take one of these or a nut, my options are to run it out, bail, or french free.

If you don't have any gear that fits, what are you Frenching on?

Hi, do you know which edition of DAV Panorama the tables were from? I'm trying to track down the original experimental protocol. Thanks.