Top rope aid climbing for learning good rock pro placement gear question

So it's been recommended to me both here and with local climbers that a good way to learn good rock pro placement is to do top rope aid climbing with the trad rack that I have. What additional and aid specific gear do I need to do this beyond all my trad and top rope gear? And is their any good online resources for me to read about the specifics of how top rope aid climbing is done? Thanks.

Edit: My intention is not to want to do real aid climbing, but to learn good rock pro placement by weighting the pieces with the intention of using that experience for trad climbing.

You will want aid ladders; tying slings or something like that is just gonna get annoying. Since you're just doing single pitches, you don't need anything beefy, but don't get pocket aiders either. Something in the middle with a little structure and stiffness. You don't even need to use a rope for your aid pieces if you don't want to since you'll be on top rope. It's just top rope climbing, but you're weighting aid gear as you go.

So what you need is a patient belayer and aid ladders and an aidable route that you can set a top rope on.

You could read some of the supertopo big wall guide as they talk a lot about aid climbing, but there isn't anything specific about top-rope aid climbing. supertopo.com/a/How-To-Big-…

Also add a fifi hook, or you can improvise one with a keylock biner on a short draw.

everything you need to know about aid climbing

supertopo.com/a/How-To-Big-…

(as Ethan C wrote above)

Top rope aiding is boring as hell, but if you must, here are the basic steps.

• You don't need hooks, ascenders or haul bag. Just one simple aider will do fine. No need for any aid specific trickery, you are leading trad.

1. Set up top rope anchor, have your buddy put you on belay, just like normal top roping.
2. Put a piece in, clip your aider to the piece, step into one of the steps. Bounce up and down that piece like a mad man.

# Do not look at the piece when you bounce test.
# Make sure you have tight belay at the beginning, just in case the piece pops.
# Vigorous bounce test beat the crap out of your gear, especially the smaller cams.

Since your intention is not to learn to aid climb, you do not need any special gear. Use a couple double length slings and tie them in the middle to make a couple of ladders. PLace gear, clip ladders to gear and stand on it. Bounce the crap out of it. Walk as a high in ladder as you can and then repeat until you are at the top of the pitch. Place gear as you would for a lead climb. DO clip the rope through the pieces as you commit to the next piece. That way, you''l get to see how the rope tensions on the gear once the rope is weighted and be able to observe if you have adequately slung the pieces.

You can tie daisies and aiders out of slings if you do not have them. Or use a PAS is you already have one. It is not worth buying any extra gear. Unless the climb is steep, you may not even need a daisy or sling to connect you to your aiders. Pick a route with a continuous crack system so you can place as much gear as possible.

In particular in the Chris McNamara book, take a look at this video on basic aid climbing. youtube.com/watch?v=IVJSx6d… If you bother practicing aid climbing, you might as well learn to aid efficiently!

Perhaps counter intuitively, you might be better off climbing harder pitches of vertical trad climbs. The reason being easy trad pitches don't necessarily protect all that well, especially where the climbing is easy. Look for something with a clean crack or face. You don't need to be able to free climb it, so don't limit yourself.

Agreed you don't actually need much of anything (you don't need to attach your "aid ladders" to yourself, just don't drop them) but a fifi hook might be nice on overhangs. Try not to get your gear stuck.

You should be fine with passive gear, cams are a little more likely to get stuck and a lot more painful to leave behind. Just think about taking it out and the path it must go when you place it in. For nuts, make sure you have a good nut tool and consider removal while placing. Hexes don't get stuck very often. For tricams, try twisting the tri-cam side to side if it's really stuck. Never placed a ball nut.

You might want to read Climbing Anchors by John Long. It's a good summary of trad gear and practices.

Aiding on all passive gear will be great experience for you, but it will be more difficult to get through some sections of some climbs without cams. Shouldn't be too high consequence if you're on TR though.

Good luck!

EthanC wrote:You should be fine with passive gear, cams are a little more likely to get stuck and a lot more painful to leave behind. Just think about taking it out and the path it must go when you place it in. For nuts, make sure you have a good nut tool and consider removal while placing. Hexes don't get stuck very often. For tricams, try twisting the tri-cam side to side if it's really stuck. Never placed a ball nut. You might want to read Climbing Anchors by John Long. It's a good summary of trad gear and practices. Aiding on all passive gear will be great experience for you, but it will be more difficult to get through some sections of some climbs without cams. Shouldn't be too high consequence if you're on TR though. Good luck!

My experience aiding is exactly the opposite. Nuts are far more likely to be stuck after jumping up and down on them than a cam. Cary a small hammer or rock in case you need to hammer on your nut tool.

CfJ, getting your other foot can be a bit of a pain if you don't tie a slightly offset loop (look up how to tie a pair of etriers). Or, use two of them, so you are alternating between weighted and unweighted aiders. A FIFi is cheap, but completely unessesary. Even when you star aiding they are best to avoid IMO (they just slow you down) and you can easily use a quickdraw when you need one.

mountainproject.com/v/today…

That's what I did for my first pair, worked fine for a bit - though I did tie the steps unevenly which was what prompted me to eventually buy some.

30" sounds kinda minimal. Depends on how flexible your hips are and how you feel about high-stepping. :) Longer aiders with more steps will also afford you the exciting experience of 'walking' up higher on a placement.

You can certainly tie up longer aiders with webbing; cheap dirtbags like me have done that for a long time. They work better than knotted-together slings, because they stand open a little better (though not as well as actual purchased aiders with stiffeners). Old editions of Mountaineering Freedom of the Hills might tell you how to build 'em, or Royal Robbins' Rockcraft books. Or some similarly hoary veteran.

csproul wrote: My experience aiding is exactly the opposite. Nuts are far more likely to be stuck after jumping up and down on them than a cam. Cary a small hammer or rock in case you need to hammer on your nut tool. CfJ, getting your other foot can be a bit of a pain if you don't tie a slightly offset loop (look up how to tie a pair of etriers). Or, use two of them, so you are alternating between weighted and unweighted aiders. A FIFi is cheap, but completely unessesary. Even when you star aiding they are best to avoid IMO (they just slow you down) and you can easily use a quickdraw when you need one.

Sorry, I just meant stuck irrevocably, as in lost. Whenever I've cranked down on a nut I can get it out with a rock and a nut tool, as opposed to cams which can be overcammed and basically lost. You're right obviously though.

Another good way of learning is to grab an expended climber and get her to grade your placements using cracks at the base. If you grade them first on a scale of one to five for example, you will learn if you are calibrated sensibly.

Climb for joy wrote: Thanks! That is something I do at the base of the cliff with my climbing partners and we critique each others placement. Although I think you meant experienced, not expended. ;) But I want more confidence in my placement by actually weighting it and seeing how it holds. So hence this approach.

You need someone more experienced to peep your gear placements than your friends. They're not solid if you're giving them advice. I would try and find someone who's been trad leading for a while. Someone you trust is 100% 100% of the time. If you can't, hire a guide and split the cost between your friends. You should solid by the end of the day. Remember always be looking for the constriction. Try and get fast placing perfect gear.

It's going to be a whole different ball game once you sack up and start leading. It's easy to figure out the best placements when you're standing on the ground safe and sound. You can take all the time you need. When you're on the route the clocks ticking, your arms burn.. You start sketching out hoping you don't fall and all this on a route way below your limit.

You'll start to figure what size goes where. You won't grab three wrong cams for every right one every time you place gear. You'll get faster more efficient. You'll fall and in turn trust gear. Soon you'll be leading trad at your limit.