Clipping racking biners???

Kyle Tarry wrote:

Can you simply provide evidence of your claims that people regularly clean racking carabiners off cams?

Also, can you clarify what I am "dead wrong" about, since I just posted screenshots and said "here's a racking carabiner"?  I am not making any claims of my own here.

Let's try to stick to the facts, not ad hominem attacks.

Almost nobody out there climbing hard trad day in and day out is cleaning racking biners off cams. I would almost go so far as to say that nobody is doing that. I feel like most of us know this. I have no clue if hillbilly is a troll account or not as I’m not on these forums quite enough to know but I wouldn’t get worked up about it.

Maybe, just maybe if you’re just cruising moderates and trying to be as crazy economical about gear as possible you could make a case for it? I dunno. It’s not a thing people do. And it definitely makes more hoopla and is more difficult, not more efficient. Especially if leading at / near / or above your limit. 

Hillbilly Hijinks in the morning:

Hillbilly Hijinks in the afternoon:

Hillbilly Hijinks in the evening:

Yukon Cornelius wrote:

I have never seen nor heard of anyone taking the racking carabiner off of a cam when they clip an alpine draw to it. 

I have done it. And I  have left the "racking" carabiner hanging there doing nothing. But it isn't normal because I don't organize my rack in the way people nowadays commonly do. I do have that generational thing going. 

Seems like it would be a lot slower and more annoying to end up at a belay with a bunch of random carabiners in the wrong places. "oh sorry I can't separate this cam from its sling because I took the carabiner off and now it's in the anchor" 

I don't think a few misplaced carabiners would slow things down much. Maybe it's more of a problem nowadays because many people carry A LOT more gear. 

I've also never heard of people bringing quickdraws with only one carabiner (sounds hard to place?) or only bringing over the shoulder slings with one carabiner each, except for maybe on very easy routes.

I have done both routinely. It mostly works out really really good. It also supports my leave no unused carabiner behind fetish, even though I have occasionally broken that rule. It creates a minutia of efficiency that I guess all those people you do know about have never experienced. 

So I don't know how hard these climbs are today, but during my guiding years in Yosemite I guided New Dimensions, Nabisco Wall, The Good Book, Oz and some similar one pitch routes. I routinely carried about 3 each open draws with 2 carabiners and with a single, plus a few over the shoulder slings. 

It's probably true that it's a generational thing. I think that over the shoulder slings with one carabiner have fallen out of fashion because they are harder to place quickly, or when you have to swap hands to get them off. Maybe when hillbilly hijinks graduates to climbing el cap in a day, he will get it ;)

They aren't harder to place quickly,  swapping hands or any other faffing around is no more so than that which is neccessary when using "alpine" draws. Often enough the opposite of what you think is what is actually true. If what I claim weren't true, I would always and only carry alpine draws. My opinion isn't because I don't have much experience with quick draws or alpine draws. I started using with them in 1975, and  continued doing so for about 20 years. Consequently I am fine going climbing with someone who does organize their rack the way most people do today,  and I was fine with it 30 years ago too. I can go either way. Same with cam or nut brands. Or type of aiders. I might even rack on gear loops, except not for some wide crack pitches. 

I have never done an El Cap route in a day. But, BITD when just a few were regularly doing it, I was invited by a couple of those people, who WERE doing it, to join them. More than once. I  didn't because I was to busy guiding. 

I have guided the RNWF Half Dome in under 12 hours. No linked pitches, no short fixing, no simul climbing. Client always on belay. He free climbed everything through 5.9. No gimmicks, no actual hurrying, just SIMPLE efficiency and my being familiar with the route. We both had FUN. 

Please notice I didn't say anything is wrong with racking biners, alpine draws, etc. Obviously that stuff and system works.

I killed another thread. My apologies.

Eric Craig wrote:

I killed another thread. My apologies.

Murderer!

Threadslaughter maybe. I didn't mean to kill it.

Ricky Harline wrote:

Hillbilly Hijinks in the morning:

Hillbilly Hijinks in the afternoon:

Hillbilly Hijinks in the evening:

Harumpf lol.