Backed-Up bowline vs yosemite finish Bowline

Ive used the comp knot and like it. Very compact and clean. Have not had issue untying one yet but I really don't use it enough to have a large sample size.
Like you Victor, I use the Yosemite with the Lee finish as well for my sport climbing. I used the Yos for a long time without the Lee lock, then I found the Lee variation and it just adds that much more confidence. An excellent knot to tie in with.

Another reason I like the bowline to tie in with, is a cant go full stupid and leave a knot in the rope when I go to pull it after I untie from myself.

Cherokee Nunes wrote:

People who tie in with weird, niche designer knots are on their own when it comes to knot checks.

The singular most important advantage of the Fig 8 is that most competent partners can knot check it with a glance. 

I'm pretty sure that I can go into most any group of rockclimbers with a variety of "figure 8" eye knots that would pass all their at-a-glance vetting but in fact be different from anything seen in knotting literature.  And that the bowline is in part misunderstood & recognized because idiot authors constantly show the back side of it --just compare on-line images with those of the should-be-like-Bowline Sheet bend, usually shown from the top/front side.  

That "fisherman's" or "half-a-fisherman's" back-up knot is ... a STRANGLE Knot (or a dbl.strangle knot in e.g., a double Grapevine joint).  (And, as another poster remarked, such a knot shouldn't come untied --sounds like any such loosened knots ought to have been more tightly set or given "one good turn..." more (i.e., => Dbl.Strangle).

But where loosening is likely, I found that the Mirrored Bowline seems to work well :: it is never set tight (as just recommended for a Strangle), but parts abut each other on attempts at loosening and prevent further loosening.  In contrast, the End-Bound Dbl.Bowline was designed to be a knot that CAN be set tight --the simple tail loop around the "double" main loops enabling that --and needing to be set well.  But YMMV per material, and I'll not forget the time I fought to put in an EBDB in some 3mm-ish twisted polypropylene cord, having to employ a 3rd hand (of teeth) in order to get it set tight enough to hold while I worked it even tighter, only to watch it after a minute or two of holding (and my smug "There, THAT'll learn ya!" thinking) just ... see all the tight loops sympathetically loosen.

As for that nice Competition knot, use a long enough tail that you can reeve it through the harness and poke it back out through the knot :: I think that this gives you some added security and kindness (via load spreading) to the rope & harness.  Should by some devilry the re-tucked tail come out (?!), and then come out of the harness, you'll have a conspicuous bit of rope alerting you to that!  And, nb, similar knotting can be done with the Fig.8 vice overhand base.

Oh, re the Tarbuck knot, I've not yet seen any evidence --test data-- to show that it works as intended (beyond someone's speculation).  A caving, knot-tying late physicist I knew said that he realized rather that it could NOT work as advertised!?

*kN*

Eric Craig wrote:

The Tarbuck knot predates nylon ropes. It was used with natural fiber ropes that have limited shock absorption qualities,  and much lower breaking strength.  It added a small amount of shock absorption to the system. This, and more, is my recollection from reading "On Climbing" by Charles Evan's more than a half century ago.....

Purely for historical interest I think Tarbuck devised his knot in the early 1950s for use with the hawser laid nylon ropes which came into use in the UK after the war. I think he wrote a little book "Nylon rope and climbing safety" which can be found on the internet. The knot became completely obsolete when kermantle ropes became almost universally used for climbing. I still find it useful as a sliding knot for tent guy lines etc.

Use a figure 8. . . 

Edwards Bowline is definitely my favorite. Mostly because I like having the tail end pointing downwards. But it's also a bit more secure than just using a Yosemite finish.

I've been using this bowline variation, which I've called a tucked Yosemite bowline, for many years---at this point it's been tested and retested in a broad variety of conditions. It unties after loading but is stable in use and the rope end is in an out-of-the-way position and can't be accidentally clipped.

F r i t z wrote:

Prying a truly welded fig8 loose expends effort that I would rather save for my next burn. 

This. And even if it's not fully welded, why waste any finger strength on untying a knot? 

Double checks with my usual partners are just verbal anyway. To make sure we didn't forget something. Like, good knot? or harness doubled back? We don't look at each's other stuff. If I couldn't trust my usual partners to tie a knot correctly I wouldn't be climbing with them. When I do climb with kids or novices I use a figure 8 and we both visually inspect each other. 

Mr Rogers wrote:

competition / brotherhood knot anyone?

As I noted above, this good knot can be (IMO) improved by using a Fig.8 vice Overhand knot as the base --same idea, bringing the Returning Eye Leg back into the knot to "twin" it working from the end away from the eye, as your cited instruction shows for the Overhand.

*kN*

rgold wrote:

I've been using this bowline variation, which I've called a tucked Yosemite bowline,

One can gain some bit of slack-security (as I call it) by giving the tail's final wrap & tuck a "wide swing" --i.e., what a stiff rope will more comfortably do--, tucking in on the other side (left vs. right or vice versa) of the main line and out from there.  The wide swing has this Tail crossing the main line (in an "X"), and thereby gaining some security vs. the main line feeding material back into the knot when slack.

There's also a sort of  "Lee's Lock" finish worth employing when using the otherwise finished "Bowline on a Bight" re-threaded --where the complete tracing done by the Tail in that case is pointless : yeah, it matches a known knot (big whoop), but the Lee's Lock closure gains in security.

*kN*