A Swing and a miss

I recently picked up the Camp Swing. It disappoints. 

The swing is sold as an alternative ("clone") of the petzl connect adjust, with a very slightly different method of operation, it's basically a single tuber plaquette device

so there's just a hole for the biner, instead of the rope being through the biner, as with the connect adjust.

This, combined with the extra little metal tab opposite the hole for the carabiner facilitate the main selling points of the Swing over the connect adjust (and other lanyards, like the Slyde), namely

• Ergonomic adjuster for quick and easy adjustment
• Unique design allows adjustment even under load

It does that. It does it like a dream. Letting rope out feels safe and secure while weighted, it's quick and intuitive. Unfortunately, the most basic feature got overlooked. Pulling rope back in (shortening the tether) is a huge pain, with a bunch of friction to contend with. I cannot begin to imagine why. I'm considering cutting the 9.7mm rope that it comes with off and maybe trying with a thinner cord, as I really like the overall design.

My Swing also has a sharp bur, somewhere on the inside of the rope travel, which is slowly (but loudly) shredding its own rope. I've obviously only got a sample size of one to work with, so this is likely just a manufacturing defect. Here's what that looks and sounds like (this was before ever racking/taking it outside) https://streamable.com/jxdakl 

Well, kudos for the title, and thanks. Regarding the burr... What's the reason you didn't return it and get a new one? 

It could be that whatever is doing the rope shredding is also increasing the friction.

Joe Say'n wrote:

Well, kudos for the title, and thanks. Regarding the burr... What's the reason you didn't return it and get a new one? 

Not enough time, leaving the country soon.

mbk wrote:

It could be that whatever is doing the rope shredding is also increasing the friction.

I've heard others report the same thing, likely without the shredding

I love my CAMP Swing but only because I aftermarket modded it. I use it for a daisy when aiding and the original length of rope it comes with is much too short for that as well as the thickness of the rope it comes with is ridiculously hard to extend and take in the rope. 

Out of the box it's a worthless piece of equipment. 

I replaced the rope with 9.0 mm rope and I would suggest that's a thick as anyone goes. I initially used an 8.3 rope and though that worked fine, it did have a habit of slipping when hanging on the Swing with loads (such as jugging a fixed line with a haulbag attached to the belay loop) 

For a personal tether at belays when freeclimbing I'd say that somewhere around 8.4-8.8mm rope is going to be your sweet spot. 

Kevin DeWeese wrote:

I love my CAMP Swing but only because I aftermarket modded it. I use it for a daisy when aiding and it's much too short for that and the thickness of the rope it comes with is ridiculously hard to extend and take in the rope. 

Out of the box it's a worthless piece of equipment. 

I replaced the rope with 9.0 mm rope and I would suggest that's a thick as anyone goes. I initially used an 8.3 rope and though that worked fine, it did have a habit of slipping when hanging on the Swing with loads (such as jugging a fixed line with a haulbag attached to the belay loop) 

For a personal tether at belays when freeclimbing I'd say that somewhere around 8.4-8.8mm rope is going to be your sweet spot. 

Any ideas where to grab some thinner dynamic cuts? Or are you using static?

Nathan wrote:

Any ideas where to grab some thinner dynamic cuts? Or are you using static?

I got a 30m Sterling Nano 9.0 and cut it to the length I wanted (Since it's for aid, i used about 9' or so and connected two swings together similar to a Petzl Dual Adjust) Obviously I have a lot of extra 9.0 rope left over that i'll use for... idk, something. 

I'm not convinced that the dynamic properties of a 3-4' section of rope used for the Swing would have any difference in terms of shock absorption over static cord in a daisy fall simply because there's so little rope to actually stretch before the shock hits your body. (plus, connecting it to your ladder's top loop allows for a bit of zippering of the stiching of the ladder's loop in a fall that will absorb shock as well) 

If you're using the swing as a personal tether while freeclimbing then you'll never go above your anchor anyways and the dynamic properties of the rope are moot anyways so it'll be cheaper to just go with 8-9mm cord. 

I was using a kong slyde for a while and was able to buy small sections of dynamic rope from bluewater. Email them directly, theyre cool about it. I got a 10ft section of 2 different ropes they currently have, i believe they were 8.8 and 9.1. And they mostly chatged for shipping. I think it was like $18.