The Devils Lake top rope cluster Fu&k thread...

AHHHHH! The madness!!!!!

Burt Lindquist wrote: ... I must also admit I am more than capable of at times putting together a poorly thought out TR anchor.... I am sure if you ask a few friends they will laugh and agree....

Burt's "this route has great gear!" has been known to draw a smile or two - not many people have the patience or the skills to find all the placements he does ... but I'm veering off into lead climbing again.

Weather looks amazing this weekend...anyone planning to set some jive ass anchors for the sake of the thread?

Spent all day out yesterday over at Birthday Rocks and Horse Ramp. Had both places to our own..... and the day was the nicest weather I have climbed in all year.... bluebird sky, mild breezes, perfect temps, and dry dry air. Perfecto! We are having October in November this year.

Ted,
I might head out there this weekend to get on some janky anchors. It'll be my first voyage to the lake and I'll be flying solo, so if anyone has any camping beta feel free to PM me. I have a rack, rope, and ability to make fu&ked anchors.

Burt Lindquist wrote:Spent all day out yesterday over at Birthday Rocks and Horse Ramp. Had both places to our own..... and the day was the nicest weather I have climbed in all year.... bluebird sky, mild breezes, perfect temps, and dry dry air. Perfecto! We are have October in November this year.

Those were almost the exact words of newscasters today as they described the ultimate perfect day for a CUBS WORLD SERIES PARADE !! here in Chicago 5 million is estimate of crowd along the parade route and in Grant Park,,,which means a whole lotta open routes and no crowds at DL on a day like today.! Wish I could get back up once more time this fall.,just to set some crap anchors so somebody would find them and take pics to post.

However none of you know who I am, was up at the lake yesterday and spent the whole afternoon to ourselves on D'arcy and Sometimes. Heading up Sunday as well if anyone would like to set multiple sketch anchors. Getting back into it after a 10 year hiatus, not much of a leader yet so maybe, just maybe if I try hard enough my anchors will be featured here

I was running at the lake today and found a bad anchor on rococo variations. Things I didn't like:
1. The rope is running over the rock.
2. The master point of this anchor is a pulley, eliminating the friction that you want in a top rope.
3. The pulley is attached to a piece of cord that is tied in a loop rather than used as a cordelette (no redundancy).
4. The anchor is supported by two boulders. There is no third piece.
5. The entire anchor is supported by the red webbing. The green webbing won't come into play unless the red webbing fails, at which point the force on the green webbing and everything else in the system will be higher because it just fell a few feet before catching.

Bottom of the anchor:

Top of the anchor:


I walked to the bottom of the route and explained to the party that their anchor was not safe but the builder insisted it was fine because it was "backed up" and then they said they were taking it down anyway. I should have offered to show how to do it right but I felt like if I went further I may have been perceived as confrontational so I left.

As a bonus, here's the nearby crack where gear apparently goes to die (see cam and tricam), not sure if this was related to the bad anchor but since there was a hammering rock next to the cam it looked to me like it may have been stuck that day:

Justin, that cam has been there since at least November 18th. I was going to make a go at removing it but ran out of daylight (and the warmth of the sun!), oh well - did you give it a shot?

And yeah, that anchor - this is not the first time in recent memory that we've seen a pulley in this thread as the masterpoint... and from your pics it looks like it very well be one of those cheap plastic crevasse rescue pulleys.

I didn't try to get it out. It's really beat up and looks very stuck to me.

So with all this shitty anchors. Why are there no dead climbers? If no one dies is good enough of an anchor. We go alpine climbing and slinging a frozen bolder is a great anchor.

I know that is not much as fun as laughing at some one that has no idea what they are doing but do install some bolts at the top of the climbs the pro sucks. Even in the gunks, eldo, Yosemite they do that.

I was running at the lake today and found a bad anchor on rococo variations. Things I didn't like: 1. The rope is running over the rock.

While not ideal, also not a YGD moment, just a "YGHTBANRSTYS (yer gunna have to buy a new rope sooner than you should)" moment.

2. The master point of this anchor is a pulley, eliminating the friction that you want in a top rope. 3. The pulley is attached to a piece of cord that is tied in a loop rather than used as a cordelette (no redundancy).

Yeah, I don't get the pulley anchor thing.

4. The anchor is supported by two boulders. There is no third piece.

This is fine. Honesty, even one boulder would have been enough, especially if the sling were tied off with a knot (e.g: figure 8) for redundancy of the soft goods. If it's a giant boulder or tree, it's not going anywhere, and if it does, having a second one probably isn't going to do you much good. Either way, 2 huge boulders is a bomber anchor setup.

5. The entire anchor is supported by the red webbing. The green webbing won't come into play unless the red webbing fails, at which point the force on the green webbing and everything else in the system will be higher because it just fell a few feet before catching.

Yeah, I couldn't follow the anchor setup based on the pictures, but it sounds like they were redundant but not equalized, which is...fairly pointless.

Ted Pinson wrote:I was running at the lake today and found a bad anchor on rococo variations. Things I didn't like: 1. The rope is running over the rock. While not ideal, also not a YGD moment, just a "YGHTBANRSTYS (yer gunna have to buy a new rope sooner than you should)" moment. 2. The master point of this anchor is a pulley, eliminating the friction that you want in a top rope. 3. The pulley is attached to a piece of cord that is tied in a loop rather than used as a cordelette (no redundancy). Yeah, I don't get the pulley anchor thing. 4. The anchor is supported by two boulders. There is no third piece. This is fine. Honesty, even one boulder would have been enough, especially if the sling were tied off with a knot (e.g: figure 8) for redundancy of the soft goods. If it's a giant boulder or tree, it's not going anywhere, and if it does, having a second one probably isn't going to do you much good. Either way, 2 huge boulders is a bomber anchor setup. 5. The entire anchor is supported by the red webbing. The green webbing won't come into play unless the red webbing fails, at which point the force on the green webbing and everything else in the system will be higher because it just fell a few feet before catching. Yeah, I couldn't follow the anchor setup based on the pictures, but it sounds like they were redundant but not equalized, which is...fairly pointless.

did anyone die?

Andy P. wrote:Justin, that cam has been there since at least November 18th. I was going to make a go at removing it but ran out of daylight (and the warmth of the sun!), oh well - did you give it a shot? And yeah, that anchor - this is not the first time in recent memory that we've seen a pulley in this thread as the masterpoint... and from your pics it looks like it very well be one of those cheap plastic crevasse rescue pulleys.

as for pulleys,,,,,what about the 'revolver' carabiner? I've used it with another identical length and shape carabiner as my doubles over the edge for the rope to 'roll' over on toprope. Was trying to help someone up a route with a few pulls, and wanted a bit less friction in doing so. Never seemed that it was a belaying problem as far as too slick' and not enough friction to hold a toprope fall. I know the Revolver is intended for tough directional placements, such as on a long sling when trying to keep your lead rope fairly straight in line with the climb,,but seldom have needed it for that lately. This worked just great for my purpose.

JulianG wrote: did anyone die?

That's a rather low bar to set.

Interesting. This is a single-point anchor! The green webbing does not actually provide any backup for the most likely mode of failure.

You tried, Justin!

To the best of my knowledge, the types of anchors that have caused accidents in the past have been single-point anchors. Had they used their cord as a cordolette, they could have easily had a two-point anchor with the master point below the lip.

I would hate to be the belayer, or the rope's owner.

Anyone who led "Rococo" would laugh at the notion that a bolted anchor would somehow be useful here.

AHHHHHHH!!! The madness!

JulianG wrote:So with all this shitty anchors. Why are there no dead climbers? If no one dies is good enough of an anchor.

I think the issue is not so much that an anchor like this is means imminent, certain death but that it changes the calculus from multiple failures being required for a failure of the system to only one failure being required for a failure of the system.

In the usual anchor where three pieces of gear (or boulders or trees) are connected with webbing to a cordelette tied in a master point, all three pieces of gear would have to pop or all three pieces of webbing would have to fail or all three legs of the cordelette would have to be cut for there to be a failure of the system (or some combination of these). In an anchor where only one boulder is used if the knot in the webbing is cut or comes untied, if the loop of cord is cut or comes untied, the system fails. People make mistakes, unexpected things happen. It's not about whether or not the boulder is going to slide off the cliff.

In the example I posted it's the same amount of work to make the existing anchor as it is to make the system redundant by using at least the two pieces that are already in place. I don't see why we wouldn't want to make the anchor as safe as possible given that all the necessary gear are already in use and it won't take any more time. Maybe it's a one in a million chance (I'm making up a number here) that the existing anchor fails but I'd rather make it a one in trillion chance by tying a few knots differently.

JulianG wrote:So with all this shitty anchors. Why are there no dead climbers? If no one dies is good enough of an anchor. We go alpine climbing and slinging a frozen bolder is a great anchor. I know that is not much as fun as laughing at some one that has no idea what they are doing but do install some bolts at the top of the climbs the pro sucks. Even in the gunks, eldo, Yosemite they do that.

1. Positive outcomes do not indicate well-managed risk. If you're curious why, see Affirming the Consequent.
2. This isn't the Gunks, Eldo, or Yosemite. The Lake is its own place, with its own traditions, access concerns, and history. Perhaps most importantly, bolts are banned by the park.
3. Given that the boulders in question appear to each be the rough equivalent of a bolt in failure strength, I doubt having bolts would have improved things much. The problem is with the way the boulders are connected to each other and not, as it appears, with the strength of the boulders themselves. Based on that, I would say it's very likely, that even with a two-bolt anchor atop this route, we'd still be talking about a bad setup.

James M Schroeder wrote: 1. Positive outcomes do not indicate well-managed risk. If you're curious why, see Affirming the Consequent. 2. This isn't the Gunks, Eldo, or Yosemite. The Lake is its own place, with its own traditions, access concerns, and history. Perhaps most importantly, bolts are banned by the park. 3. Given that the boulders in question appear to each be the rough equivalent of a bolt in failure strength, I doubt having bolts would have improved things much. The problem is with the way the boulders are connected to each other and not, as it appears, with the strength of the boulders themselves. Based on that, I would say it's very likely, that even with a two-bolt anchor atop this route, we'd still be talking about a bad setup.

Still with so many bad anchors that people set there should be a lot more dead. People do win the lottery despite the adds

There is a comment in this tread were a guy refuses to use an anchor because he thinks that is not safe but he does watches the guy that set it up lower his girlfriend and said nothing about until he start making fun of it on MP. People call me an asshole

Bolts doesn't necessary make it safer but it helps. I noticed someone belaying of the bolt that were meant to anchor the belayer. I did stop and correct her not because of the bolt but because she didn't know what to do with her hands and the guy she was belaying would have deck from from 70 ft.