Rope Solo Device Survey

Rope-solo survey: https://surveyhero.com/c/4a4722c3

Sooo...everyone who rope solo's (lead or TR) has their own ideas of what the ideal solo belay device should be like. I decided to create a simple survey (8 questions) that lists some important design considerations. These are my own initial thoughts and I'm curious to see how the soloing community would rank them. It might shed some light for someone who would consider designing a new device. I know both John Middendorf and I have have been green-lighting some ideas over on the Rope Solo discussion on FB. I don't have tons of experience designing climbing equipment but have created a few products and prototypes and have tinkered around a bit since retiring.

The survey info may or may not be worth much for creating a new climbing product like this because it's such a small niche market that it most likely would not be cost efficient. Really a device like this needs to serve another purpose/market in order to be cost-effective. However, when people are paying upwards of $500-$1400 for a Silent Partner on eBay who knows?! Realistically though, the future of soloing devices most likely will be relegated to repurposed/modified existing belay type devices. It's fun to dream, though!

If you have a few minutes and are an interested or experienced practitioner of rope soloing, please take the survey. This is the first time I've designed a survey like this so please be kind!

The survey might be more useful if it allowed for differentiation between the different types of rope sololing.  I have differet priorities and use different devices and rope sizes depending on what type; lead, top, aid.  

Ģnöfudør Ðrænk wrote: The survey might be more useful if it allowed for differentiation between the different types of rope sololing.  I have differet priorities and use different devices and rope sizes depending on what type; lead, top, aid.  

I trust this guy because I can’t pronounce his name.

Try Cam wrote:

I trust this guy because I can’t pronounce his name.

Sound it out; you'll figure it.

In the 1-8 feature ranking question, is 1 most important or least?

At the beginning of the question:

"Please rank the following in order of importance to you, first being the most important"

  

Ģnöfudør Ðrænk wrote: The survey might be more useful if it allowed for differentiation between the different types of rope sololing.  I have differet priorities and use different devices and rope sizes depending on what type; lead, top, aid.  

I understand where you're coming from. 

I kind of get at that in question #4: Primary use of this device? Lead, TR, or AID

I'm trying to force a choice here in order to see where most of the interest lies. Obviously it would be best to have a device be useable for all three. The market also most likely would not support three separate devices. However, if one of the uses showed more predominance than other and compromises needed to be made in design, then that would help guide the decision making.

There are more than enough TR solo devices. I think the focus should be on lead solo'ing. 

Austin Goff wrote: There are more than enough TR solo devices. I think the focus should be on lead solo'ing. 

I agree!

Austin Goff wrote: There are more than enough TR solo devices. I think the focus should be on lead solo'ing. 

I have no reading comprehension skills, but I agree!

yeah, not very easy to take the survey if you do both lead and TR solo

SICgrips wrote:

I understand where you're coming from. 

I kind of get at that in question #4: Primary use of this device? Lead, TR, or AID

I'm trying to force a choice here in order to see where most of the interest lies. Obviously it would be best to have a device be useable for all three. The market also most likely would not support three separate devices. However, if one of the uses showed more predominance than other and compromises needed to be made in design, then that would help guide the decision making.

When soloing,  the majority of time for me is top roping, BUT, there is a multitude of devices for top rope solo that are tried and true.  I cant see any urgent need for anything new.  The need lies in lead solo.  The revo demonstrated this when rumors started flying about it over a year ago.  The big question that myself and many others had was will it work for lead solo. 

I just dont think that at this time a device exists for lead solo that is bullet proof.  They all seem to have a down side or potential for failure.

Thanks for the survey, taking it actually made me consider certain aspects of rope soloing devices that hadn't crossed my mind.

One surprising thing I took away from the survey is that catching inverted falls is very low on my priorities for a rope solo device. When I do rope solo, it's primarily for aid climbing because of how much of a cluster it has been for me trying to lead free climbs while futzing with my system. And if I'm aiding, I can adjust my backup knot so that if there is a specific danger of inverted falls I can at least keep the fall short. Also, in 8 years of climbing I can't remember taking one inverted fall on lead (though I did while bouldering, but that was a wardrobe malfunction, haha).

I've only ever TR solo'd...I'm not really the right audience for this right?

It's for anyone who has done any type of rope soloing : TR, lead, or aid...or all or any combo of the three.

Probably just stare at it!   Likely that it will just mainly be for those who are interested on the rope solo group on FB (or anyone else that wants to see it). If John Middendorf, myself or anyone else thinks they have a design that can be made in a home shop or produced reasonably it may help inform that. However, as I mentioned in the first post, most likely it will continue to be people using/modifying existing devices instead of creating a dedicated device like the Silent Partner/Soloist. There just isn't the market for creating a new product like that - at least from my perspective. There's enough options out there that people will continue to find one that meets their needs even if there are significant compromises. So far it's been kinda interesting just seeing the percentages of what everyone is using.

Petzl makes a number of devices it says are suitable to top rope soloing.  None of these are listed.

You're absolutely correct. To be comprehensive it should have included other ascenders, rope grabs, etc. However, my main purpose (which I failed to make explicit) was to see what "auto-locking" belay devices were being used. Of course i violated that criteria also by including the Silent Partner and Soloist that are dedicated soloing devices.

It would be interesting to see what other devices/methods respondents entered in the fill-in-the-blank option under "other". Unfortunately I haven't been able to figure out a way to access that info with the "free" survey engine.

I typed "clove hitch method" under the "other" category. I tried using a running clove hitch as my "belay device" a couple times out of curiosity. It works, but there's little to recommend it in my opinion. It is cheap! And it will catch inverted falls! But it's also fairly cumbersome, even having another carabiner in the clove to make it easier to loosen. Also, it might bite your finger off if you get it caught in the clove while falling.

Yeah, I was thinking that a significant number of the "others" might be the clove hitch method because it easily accessible to anyone without extra gear.

ROPE-SOLO DEVICE SURVEY RESULTS
Link to results

It’s been several weeks since the “The Ideal Rope-Solo Device” survey was announced. There were 235 who finished the initial background info questions; 185 who finished the ideal device ranking, and 177 who finished the last questions dealing with rope size/cost of device/necessity of a chest harness.

Each person is likely to interpret the results differently, however for me there are three major observations/interpretations:

1) Devices currently in use fell into 4 major groupings: far and away the largest device in use is the Grigri. Second group of most used devices are the extinct Silent Partner and Soloist. Third grouping is the Eddy/Revo/Cinch/Vergo, and the last grouping is the LifeGuard/safeguard/Matik. None of this was surprising to me but it’s interesting to see how they fell into natural groupings. I should have also included Solo-aid as an option. Unfortunately while there was a significant number of write-ins in the “other” category, I haven’t been able to find a way to retrieve the answers in the “free” version of the survey.

2) Rankings of device characteristics. They seem to fall into three major groupings. “Frictionless” vertical progress was at the top of the list by itself. Next grouping consisted of immediate lock-up/catching inverted falls/easy feed without a cache-loop. And the last major grouping was” minimal size and weight/easy protected down-climbing/cost/and ability to use as a normal auto-locking belay device. Unfortunately I left out “easy ability to rappel”. For me this ranks up there with “frictionless” vertical progress and would love to have seen how it ranked compared to the others.

3) Last major insight for me was around the cost of such a device. Check out the results yourself, but my major takeaway from the cost questions in relation to the other questions is: it’s not likely economically feasible to produce a device like this. Many of us already surmised this. Given that it’s such a niche market to begin with over 80% of the responders expecting to pay $200-$300 or less, I don’t think it likely that a dedicated product will be developed unless there’s a major break-through in design (i.e. super simple and reasonable to produce). OR, if such a device could find a larger market (economy of scale), such as serving as a normal auto-locking belay device; as an alternative to auto-belays in gyms; or as a device for the rope-access service industries, etc.

What I see in the foreseeable future is the continuation of using current/future “auto-locking” belay devices, in both stock and modified forms, to meet rope-solo needs. The Eddy, Grigri, and Revo already in significant use, tick a lot of the most desired criteria. Maybe the best hope for future generations of mass produced “auto-locking” belay devices, is that their rope-solo friendly characteristics will improve for our non-standard use of them. Wouldn’t it be great if one of the manufactures gave a nod to the soloing community and kept us in mind as they designed future generations of their products. Of course they would have to have the disclaimer “Under NO circumstances should this device be used for solo self-belay” which means rope-soloists will remain “pirates" of a sort.

An interesting alternative to the above conclusion would be if a CAD design for a dedicated rope-solo belay device were developed, it could be licensed (or open-source crowd developed) and the parts for assembly could be made by a CAD machine shop that had become familiar with producing it and could cut the parts upon-demand or in very small batches. It would be expensive but then those who were willing to pay the premium for such a device could have the parts made and assemble themselves. Not likely but it’s a thought.

Anyway, this was my first survey. There are many things that I could/should have included or done differently to improve it...but hey it is, what it is.

Sorry about that - try the link again or this: https://surveyhero.com/results/123872/de0bb088e67443b79dc1113fb8f6fe07