Trad preferences

New trad climber. Been sport climbing for a year and a half now and just about finished my rack of cams, nuts, hexes, etc. Just wondering what are some preferences for attaching runners/webbing to the rock nuts and some suggestions on the gear....nylon, BD dynex, dyneema etc. Thanks again.

M Waters

Personally, I carry the thin 24" Mammut slings. All of them are tripled with two biners into the "quickdraw" formation. I really like the Bluewater Titan runners however. Depending on the situation I'll carry sport draws and shoulder length slings or just shoulder length slings. Sometimes I clip short to the piece, sometimes it gets a draw, and sometimes it gets a full shoulder length runner extended. Every once in a while I break out the double length runners. Most of the time I have at least one double length on me though for tying off to a horn or building anchors with.

As far as biners for the runners are concerned go with something small and light but not so small as to be unusable. Nuetrinos are good and cheap, Mammutt Moses are nice and so are countless others. If you're going to invest money in biners for runners do it right the first time. I desperately want to unload all my quicksilvers and hotwires that I swapped over from old sport draws for lighter smaller guys.

Just my .02, your, and other peoples mileage may vary.

I carry a combination of quick draws (like you see sport climbing with dog bones) and trad draws made of 2 carabiners with 8mm dyneema sewn runners. The orange ones from Mammutt. I have 5 or 6 quick draws and 4 trad draws. Over my shoulder I carry 6 8mm dyneema sewn runners, all with one biner attached. 3 of them are double length, 3 are normal (24inches? can't recall)

All my biners are wild country heliums.

When I climb, I split my stoppers between 2 biners. Put in a nut of the appropriate size, then clip on a trad draw and extend as necessary. All my cams have a biner on them already, so if I need to extend that I pull one of the runners from over my shoulder.

Hope this helps

I started out with a few different types of slings, runners and cord but slowly have come to only using Mammut Dyneema. For me it's the easiest to deal with, lightest and most versatile. I have around 14 of the yellow 24 inch, 4 of the blue 48 inch and a couple of the really big 96 inch. Only negative I have with them is they are obviously sewn so you can't untie and thread them behind things like you can do with webbing. I would also think that in other areas different options would have their benefits. I climb primarily in Yosemite, Josh and Tahoe and can't recall needing much else with the exception of some longer webbing for extending anchors in Josh.

I keep all of my 24 inch runners tripled into alpine draws with two Mad Rock Ultralight Wiregates (cheap and light).

I carry around 8 sport draws and six trad draws with a 12" runner. My trad biners are bd ovals and quicksilvers. I also carry around 3 24" runners and at least 2 48".
It is important to remember not to clip carabiners together. The carabiners can open each other pretty easily. There was a thread a while back where a guy posted a video about it, but I can't remember what thread it was.

This is definitely helping out.

@Tan, all my draws and biners are wild country heliums as well...they're awesome.

6 60cm Alpine draws (I use gold/white mammut as well)
4 regular sport draws
2 30 cm Quickdraws
2 120 cm Slings + 2 biners

- bolt anchors
3 locking biners for belaying from the top
4 for setting up a TR
1 120cm sling

Gear anchors
-4 locking biners (can use non-lockers but make sur to flip them upside down)
-20 foot cordelette

That is my rough guide. If the route I'm going on traverses a lot I might bring more runners, if it's straight I might bring more sport draws or clip in direct to the cam biners...

I prefer nylon. Although there is a weight saving with dynex / dyneema / all super skinny stuff, nylon is more durable and does not lose as much strength when tied. I regularly find myself slinging natural features and tying knots in my longer slings (24" & 48"), so knotted strength is important to me. Take a look at the DMM drop test video for more info on the knotted strength of the two materials.

Also, there are reports that the skinny dynex / dyneema slings lose a significant amount of their strength simply due to aging. I think this was stated to be about 20% a year, with minimal use. There is more info on the strength loss issue in a thread on Supertopo. I am sure that you can find it with some searching.

In the end, it is a preference. The skinny slings are lighter and will work just fine. I have some 6" draws made from dyneem and love them. I am just VERY conservative with climbing equipment and like what I consider the added flexibility and safety factor found with nylon in longer slings. Also, I do not climb hard enough for the weight saving between the two materials to make a difference.

YMMV. Best of luck in building your rack!

I like nylon. I have some dyneema slings, but nylon is my workhorse. It's better for friction hitches, somewhat dynamic, cheap, and in general more versatile than dyneema/spectra.

caughtinside wrote:you can't just cut and tie them if you need to bail.

caughtinside wrote: they last half as long, and they are fully static.

-10 or so alpine draws made out of the thin dyneema stuff
-couple free runners over the shoulder

Almost all (micros excluded) my cams have their own biner so when I place a cam I usually just remove the bottom carabiner from one of my alpine draws and clip it to one of the runners on my shoulder. Then I take what's left of the draw and clip it between the cam/rope. The next cam I place I'll just use the runner on my shoulder that has the biner from the previous draw. I find that even though there is the extra step of taking the draws apart sometimes it allows me to use the same method for pitches that have a lot of passive gear or pitches that have a lot of cams.

Oh btw have you guys seen these new petzl carabiners? petzl.com/en/outdoor/non-lo…

-wire-gate
-keylock(doesn't snag as easily)
-small

Was just looking some that my friend bought and they are pretty slick. A bunch of alpine draws made out of these would be ideal imo

I have seen the new Petzl biners....they look sweet. Haven't had a chance to use em but I'll bet they're about as clip friendly as a WC helium.
I was reading that you should not girth hitch a sling to the cable loop of a rock nut cuz it could rub thin and possibly cut. True/False? If you wanted to create a snug fit around the loop so the soon to be attached biner won't have so much play what could you do?