Speed Big Walling as Four

Your system will need some minor tweaks. These can only be learned by doing. Your leaders should prepare to always be low on gear. Plan an efficient way that he can tag up gear cleaned from the previous pitch. If the leader can run it out to not need more gear for a block of 4 or more pitches you will move faster

Do some practice runs a quarter and half way up your intended route so you don't have to haul so much.

Please let parties pass who are moving faster than you are.

Okay. It's clear that leading in blocks is a must, and it's clear that two ropes is ideal. Does this seem more plausible than the earlier system? It includes short-fixing.

Tie 8 knots. Cloves are difficult to untie after weighted, hard to move on a biner and occupy a whole biner.

We are not rope soloing at all. Would this alter your suggestion in any way? Three other questions:

1. Aren't there some disadvantages to jugging a weighted haul line? I'd imagine jugging over any bulges would be very difficult. Your lower-out line would need to be twice as long, since you lower yourself out while attached to the bag. The haul line would have to be running through the pulley before the hauler jugs (meaning the pulley can't just stay with the hauler the whole time), since you can't easily put the pulley on after the bag is weighted, right? The proposed system does mean that cleaning is delayed 2-3 minutes, but it seems like an OK compromise to me.

2. Why can't the haul line function as a tag line in my system? Once the cleaner is up, the bag should be hauled enough to pull the gear up to the leader's current position, correct? It seems worth it to eliminate the need for another line.

3. What would change about the system in the event of a pendulum or traverse? I understand that they are techniques that must be practiced, but I don't see how the outlined steps would be changed in a pitch with traversing or pendulums. Maybe I don't understand what you meant.

Just trying to be clear on these finer points. Much appreciated!

Alex Wyvill wrote:We are not rope soloing at all.

Why not? The logistics/techniques of shortfixing and self-belaying with a grigri are not difficult given the whole scope of logistics/techniques you're getting yourself into. If the leader waits around for an average of 10 minutes at the top of the pitch for a someone to reach him and put him on belay, that's an extra 5 hours on a 30 pitch climb.

Alex Wyvill wrote:The proposed system does mean that cleaning is delayed 2-3 minutes, but it seems like an OK compromise to me.

There is no way it will take 2-3 minutes for 2 people to jug a 130 ft free hanging rope. In your proposed system cleaning will be delayed for significantly longer than that.

Alex Wyvill wrote:2. Why can't the haul line function as a tag line in my system?

You can use the haul line to tag up gear.

Alex,
sounds like a fun trip.

A sensible and common way to do this is to climb in a four, but as two pairs. Each day the pairs rotate. Pair 1 do the climbing and cleaning ONLY, pair 2 the hauling etc. ONLY. There are 2 ropes plus one haul line, and no tag or other lines.

Jane leads with only the 70m lead line. On reaching the belay she pulls up the slack, ties the rope off and starts to self belay (short fix) with a grigri and backup knots. Although you say you don't want to do this, I suggest you try as it will speed things up.

Helen jugs the lead line, cleans and brings up the second rope. She tries this rope off to the belay then gets back to belaying Jane. She tags up the pro to Jane on a loop of lead line, then belays as normal. Helen carries some water and food so the climbing pair is somewhat independent most of the day.

Pete jugs the second rope and brings up the haul line. Pete is not tied into the bottom of the second rope, but uses either a grigri as a back up or knots.

Paul releases the bags then jugs the second rope too.

Pete and Paul space haul.

Rope soloing: we have Gri Gris, but we cannot afford a proper rope soloing device. After hearing a few stories of Gri Gris not catching falls/being difficult to feed without modifying the device, I have strong reservations with using the device improperly.

David: seems like a less clustery system (I particularly like that the haul line is taken up by the belayer, not the leader), but I have to ask: would it be better to cut the second lead rope out of your system (jugging the weighted haul line instead), or to have the disadvantages of another rope in the cluster?

Wait.....each day the pairs rotate? I thought this was speed climbing we were talking about.

Alex Wyvill wrote: but I have to ask: would it be better to cut the second lead rope out of your system (jugging the weighted haul line instead), or to have the disadvantages of another rope in the cluster?

On many pitches jugging the the haul line will be difficult.
1. if it goes up a slab or over a lip
2. the last person has to jump on the bag, put jugs on the line - then release the bags. This is advanced stuff.
3. it will be scary.

Erik Sloan wrote:Wait.....each day the pairs rotate? I thought this was speed climbing we were talking about.

Erik, the OP clarified this a few posts up. He didn't mean speed climbing in that sense. Just a speedier way to do multiday stuff. In his table he has "put up portaledge" and stuff like that.

All the best

Alex Wyvill wrote:Rope soloing: we have Gri Gris, but we cannot afford a proper rope soloing device.

If you're aiding then you can use use a clove hitch to solo aid while short-fixing. It will probably be slower than a gri-gri but will give you more security. You could also use a clove hitch to back up the gri-gri. I think David's system would be less clusterfuckish than yours

I'm becoming more open to this rope soloing idea, and David's "pair-leading" idea.

When rope-soloing on either cloves or a modded gri-gri, do you remain tied in? The setups I've seen have you either hauling a large coil of rope up with or leaving a large coil at the base, like this:

I would prefer to have the leader tied in at all times. Am I missing something obvious here?

David Coley wrote: On many pitches jugging the the haul line will be difficult. 1. if it goes up a slab or over a lip 2. the last person has to jump on the bag, put jugs on the line - then release the bags. This is advanced stuff. 3. it will be scary.

Yes. Ghost riding the pig is scary.

Alex Wyvill wrote:I'm becoming more open to this rope soloing idea, and David's "pair-leading" idea. When rope-soloing on either cloves or a modded gri-gri, do you remain tied in? The setups I've seen have you either hauling a large coil of rope up with or leaving a large coil at the base, like this: I would prefer to have the leader tied in at all times. Am I missing something obvious here?

It would be wise to stay tied in so that, once the belayer finishes cleaning the previous pitch, they can put you on belay for the rest of the pitch you just started on.

I agree, I just don't understand how that would work. It seems that you're either tied in when you start the pitch and being belayed by someone else, or you're not tied in and rope soloing. It's the transition that's confusing me.

Solid open-source literature on rope soloing just for speed while still part of a team has been tough for me to locate. Currently working through Andy K's guide.

If you're worried about rope solo leading to short fix, just run it out on a Pakistani Death Loop. Then you get to stay tied into the end of the rope. This is speed climbing right?

Rope gets cloved to the anchor with no slack going to the follower. The end of the rope that doesn't go to follower gets clipped through protection and the leader uses a clove hitch to feed him/herself slack to make upward progress. the rope must be carried by the leader so that the loop formed by the leaders tie-in and the leader's clove hitch doesn't snag on flakes, etc. This is easily done through the use of back-up knots clipped to the leader's belay loop.

Alex, you stay tied in.

1. get to belay
2. pull up all the slack
3. tied the rope to the belay leaving a big loop carefully stacked in a sling or sitting on a ledge
4. apply grigri and backup knot and up you go.

Alex Wyvill wrote:Em, if you are jugging a haul line, you can't tie backup knots, because there's a bag on the end.

Don't do this...

sam england wrote:This is speed climbing right?

Four people, 6 ropes, a 200lb haul bag, and portaledges is the complete opposite of speed climbing! Upthread the OP admitted that the thread title is in error.