Alpine draws with rubber retainer AND knot

Hi Adam,

I wouldn't have any issue with the potential for a reduction in strength from the knot itself, although it will weaken the sling, I doubt it will be an issue in almost all situations one might use a unfurled alpine draw. However, 

1. the knot will be left in one place for a long time. This with mean wear in the material that forms the knot where it rubs against rock. Overtime this might be an issue.

2. the rubber retainer is the issue. One great thing about sling draws is that they are the source of extra carabiners whenever needed. They are your stash. If you use a retainer, you can only cannibalise one of the two carabiners on the draw.

Healyje wrote:

Except that 8mm skinny dyneema slings lose 3-4kn strength per year and, again, are designed strictly as ultralight consumables for alpine ascents and not for long-term use in rock climbing.

Wait, what??? Exactly where are you getting your information that dyneema slings lose 3-4 kn of strength per year?  If that were true slings would be breaking left and right. Sh*t, I have personally taken repeated hard ass whips on dyneema slings that are a decade old and they are fine. Provide proof or I'm calling total BS on your statement.

J. Albers wrote:

Wait, what??? Exactly where are you getting your information that dyneema slings lose 3-4 kn of strength per year?  If that were true slings would be breaking left and right. Sh*t, I have personally taken repeated hard ass whips on dyneema slings that are a decade old and they are fine. Provide proof or I'm calling total BS on your statement.

I ran a trad rack of Mammut 8mm slings I used for four years and had a sample of a half dozen of them tested at the end of each year for four years. They came out at:

19-22kn > 16-18kn > 12-15kn > 8-10kn 

Mammut's commentary in response was that they are explicitly designed as a consumable for fast & light alpine ascents and not designed nor intended to be used long-term as a standard rock climbing sling. 

So hey, whip and knot away dude....

Kyle Tarry wrote:

 AAI is not just a bunch of wet-behind-the-ears guys with the "faint, bare minimums of competence."  They are a group of experienced climbers with a wealth of knowledge and far, far more years of experience and days on rock/ice than most people here.  Do you have any actual criticisms of their recommendation, or just attacks on their chosen profession?

Actually, that's exactly what 98% of them are. And the organization brings little if anything to the table other than lowest-common-denominator best practices for guiding. And while there is some intersection between those best practices and best practices for climbing, they are not at all one in the same thing.

Kyle Tarry wrote:

While Petzl does sell products, their guides for various scenarios (such as solo TR, anchor building, ascending ropes, etc.) are widely accepted to be good sources of unbiased information.

There is nothing in any way "unbaised" about their information - in fact, it's highly opinionated. And lot's of stuff is 'widely accepted', but that doesn't seem to even faintly slow down the pace of accidents and deaths in climbing.

Healyje wrote:

But really doesn't have anything to do with the current discussion unless you're using skinny dyneema for your master point in which case you should reconsider.

Haha!!  I have been using dyneema slings for anchors and knotting the master point since I learned to climb about 15 years ago.  Which is exactly what I was taught to do by my mentors (one of whom was a climbing guide at the time). It's pretty much the standard for all my partners as well.  Guess we're all doing it wrong. 

Kyle Tarry wrote:

Wait, so you're saying that 98% ...

Meeting and knowing a shitload of guides over decades is exactly how I arrived at my opinion and the few 'guides' that I respect were all great climbers before there was an AAI or AMGA (oh, and the first couple of decades were a basically a clown show before they became a real money machine).

Healyje wrote:

In general it's probably best to refrain from trying to 'improve' upon the basics of what we do. 

The biners in alpine / trad draws are designed to be free and unrestrained, leave them that way.

This

Adam K wrote:

To clarify, the reason I would want to use this type of system is to have one or two draws ready that are easy to extend in situations where I'm pumped or in a bad stance.. etc. 

Long sling around your shoulder clipped with a single carabiner. Unclip it at your side with one hand. Pull it free. Clip loose end to your cam carabiner. Clip biner that was already on the sling to your rope. Go.

If you feel you must fix the biner one one end, then consider using a Rabbit Runner rather than an open sling.

It kind of comes down to this: if you really need the advantages of a fix-end draw over a regular trad draw when the chips are down then you're probably already in way over your head.

There is no need to improve simple design that actually works. As we say in Russia, the best is enemy of good.

anotherclimber wrote:

I agree with you. But look at the link mentioned in the article that I posted below:

How to break nylon and dyneema slings

11mm dyneema sling with an overhand knot in them break at around half the strength of their full rating. Unfortunately they did not test the 8mm dyneema one which would have been interesting to compare. Now you probably figure no one is going to take a fall with that much force, but it's known that dyneema get weaker with age and use. 

Well duh, you're putting a dynamic load on a static material, of course shit isn't going to go well. Knotted dyneema slings are fine for use as a runner when a dynamic rope is in the system, although I personally think it's a bad idea for other reasons, such as concentrating the wear and tear. 

Seems like Wayne Crill's experience would argue for a fixed crab.  

https://www.mountainproject.com/forum/topic/109332940/climber-falls-in-eldorado-canyon

Healyje wrote:

You can choose what you like, but AMGA certification means absolutely zip other than some faint, bare minimums of competence which for, any purpose other than for selling certifications, shouldn't in any way be mistaken for real expertise.

HAHAHAHA, you have no idea what you are talking about.

Rob Dillon wrote:

Seems like Wayne Crill's experience would argue for a fixed crab.  

Two biners came off the rope, that a fixed biner would have made a difference is some serious speculation. One of those clips having been a locker making a difference is far less speculative and was Hank's take away at the time, not a fixed biner.

Joe Crawford wrote:

While the SPI doesn't require a very high standard for climbing ability, it would be doing a disservice to you, your instructors and other students to show up without the requisite skills, gear and attitude. 

Utterly confidence inspiring that they're willing to take money from pretty much anyone...

Joe Crawford wrote:

HAHAHAHA, you have no idea what you are talking about.

Let me guess, you're young, you paid, and now you're certifiable. Good for you. But one of us has decades of experience with guides and it isn't you. Bottom line is most shouldn't be guiding regardless of what they've paid and what piece of paper they've been anointed with.

Back to the OP... If you want to make an alpine draw with a fixed 'biner, without the strength-reduction of a knot or the potential issues of a little rubber retainer, just use climbing tape. 

Start with the carabiner on the sling, then make a few tight wraps capturing the biner snugly. Keep wrapping a tight layer or two up the sling until you get to a point taller than the carabiner. Three or four inches is usually enough. This results in a full-strength draw with a fixed carabiner on one end, and the carabiner can't rotate out.

It won't last too many climbs, but that's OK because you can rotate the wear point if you want. IMHO it can be useful for a few specialized situations, but not enough to do this very often. HTH.

Healyje wrote:

Utterly confidence inspiring that they're willing to take money from pretty much anyone...

Let me guess, you're young, you paid, and now you're certifiable. Good for you. But one of us has decades of experience with guides and it isn't you. Bottom line is most shouldn't be guiding regardless of what they've paid and what piece of paper they've been anointed with.

You're right, they will take money from anyone that submits a complete resume. In that quote of mine you dug up (that must be bonus forum points), I was advising the guy not to lie on that resume and take the time to get the required experience. That is because they will gladly take his money, but they won't give him a piece of paper if he doesn't earn it on the course. It's also worth noting that the SPI is a cert that says you are okay to guide top-roping, not guide multi-pitch rock, nor alpine rock, nor anything else. If a company hires a person with an SPI to do anything other than TR guiding on rock, that has nothing to do with the AMGA. The guide programs also have high standards and students that do not meet those do not pass and are not given a course certificate. On the advanced courses, students that do not pass the exam components on the first day are sent home. So, they'll take your money, but that is what every trade school, community college and university does. It is then up to the student to meet the requirements and pass the exams to receive the cert.

The AMGA as a money-making machine is probably an idea you should reconsider. They barely break even on most courses and membership fees are $65/year for non-certified members and $250/year for IFMGA. If a money-making scheme is the idea, you would think they would target folks with lots of money, not guides.

You're right that I'm young, and don't have decades behind me. But you're obviously old and bitter. Sorry that you're experiences with guides are not positive, but this old-school attitude that you should only guide if you're crusty and experienced is laughable. Guiding is not lucrative, it has always been young climbers who become guides (because we don't know better). I would wager that you wouldn't consider doing the work for several reasons, but the pay (or lack of) would surely be one.

Like guides, don't like guides, whatever, but don't make these wide, ignorant remarks about something that you clearly don't have any first hand knowledge of.

Joe Crawford wrote:
...but don't make these wide, ignorant remarks about something that you clearly don't have any first hand knowledge of.

Decades of unfortunate first hand knowledge is exactly why I'm making these remarks.

Healyje wrote:

I ran a trad rack of Mammut 8mm slings I used for four years and had a sample of a half dozen of them tested at the end of each year for four years. They came out at:

19-22kn > 16-18kn > 12-15kn > 8-10kn 

Mammut's commentary in response was that they are explicitly designed as a consumable for fast & light alpine ascents and not designed nor intended to be used long-term as a standard rock climbing sling. 

So hey, whip and knot away dude....

Thanks for the detailed reply Healy (I mean that). However, your evidence is such a ridiculously small sample set that its essentially meaningless. On the other hand, a bit more data (but again, hardly rising to the level of scientific data) was collected and posted by the BD QC lab and they seem to contradict your evidence for the most part. See here:

https://blackdiamondequipment.com/en_US/qc-lab-gear-doesnt-last-forever--slings--quickdraws/qc-lab-gear-doesnt-last-forever--slings--quickdraws.html

It would seem that there is some drop off in strength, but not 50% or greater after just 4 years. That said, I would agree that the new super skinny slings are not meant to last forever.

...and by the way, I don't ever knot my slings, so no whipping away on that type of rig anyway.

That BD test data is only marginally useful (in the sense that we have no idea about the age and conditions of the used stuff), but it certainly does show that generalized statements about either material (nylon or dyneema) are really hard to back up with real world data.

For example, some used dyneema failed at very low loads, whereas some used dyneema failed at completely reasonable near-new loads.  In addition, a bunch of the nylon stuff failed at very low forces too, and tubular webbing (also, presumably, nylon) failed at significant reduced forces.

The only reasonable conclusion you can draw is that people making generalized statements like "Don't tie knots in skinny dyneema but it's totally fine to tie them in nylon" has no idea what the heck they are talking about.  Clearly old nylon can be just as big a risk as old dyneema, and the data doesn't support any notions that nylon is much more robust or safer in this use case.

The DMM test data is also interesting, but it deals pretty much exclusively with knots used to tie webbing into a loop, which is not a common thing to do, given that dyneema always comes in a sewn loop anyway.   The only scenario I can see is somebody trying to cut a sewn dyneema sling and then re-tie it as a rap anchor, which wouldn't be a great idea, but then again the loads they achieved with every knot but the water knot are plenty high for a big leader fall, let alone a rap anchor.

(Presumably, the guys at BD and DMM are also a bunch of wet-behind-the-ears know-nothings with worthless paper certifications hanging on their walls...)