Gear-Related Quirks and Phobias

It seems like most of the climbing partners I've had have one or more seemingly unreasonable beliefs or fears about gear. Being casually fascinated by psychology, I thought it might be fun to inventory our observations of such quirks. 

It's not my intention to start a gumby-bash ala "I can't believe he retired his rope after 5 falls." Rather, I hope we can approach this with love and curiosity. If we aren't total jerks, maybe someone will chime in, explain why their "phobia" is reasonable, and save a life.

For myself, my weirdest gear phobia (that I'm aware of) is that I'm WAY more afraid of a rope breaking while rappelling over clean terrain than while leading just about anything.

 Another phobia is of solid-gates on the rope ends of draws. I think this is a reasonable fear in certain multipitch applications cuz gate flutter, but solid gates freak me out on single pitch too--where it would be nearly impossible to exceed the open-gate rating of a biner. Exposure therapy has definitely helped, but I've long since replaced all of my bent gates with wires.

How about you and your friends?

Bonus points if we can avoid the gates in vs. gates out argument for at least the first 2 pages.

Probably just because a lot of my first trad leads were in the gunks, but I trust a well set pink tricam more than just about any other piece of gear despite having never even weighted one. They just feel good man

I get much more afraid than is rational that my rope will get cut, especially on top rope. 

Although the consensus is that two opposite and opposed draws are totally fine for a toprope, i almost always use a regular draw combined with a locker draw.

Here around Barcelona, most popular multipitch routes have bolted belays with two modern bolts… and 90% of the locals seem to just use a sliding x with a single sling and call it good. It is probably super good enough but my phobia is to tie a knot in the sling for my master point.

Tee H, I am of the same school with the locker quick draw thing… although if I forget that locker draw on the ground I’m ok with the two reversed draws, but not my usual habit.

Tying a knot is not a phobia, it's basic redundancy / no extension ! I wouldn't use a sliding X either. 

I'm on the rappel-phobia team too, I always fear to take a big swing to the side, and to damage the rope.

I'm on the heavier side and often when I place gear smaller than a 0.4 (cams or nuts) I will place 2 right next to each other. Heck, if I'm low down on a trad route, my brain considers my last 2 pieces when calculating a ground fall, as if my top piece might blow despite me never ripping a piece of gear before. I've also fallen on my 0.3 Z4 several times and it's held, but that was all in solid granite, and I trust other rock types less. 

There are times on sport routes where I consider my last draw unclipping also despite it never happening before. I use a locking quickdraw with Edelrid sliders on both ends on pre-crux or pre-runout bolts sometimes. 

Maybe I've read too many accident reports of crazy shit happening to gear during falls.

K Gowrote:

I'm on the heavier side and often when I place gear smaller than a 0.4 (cams or nuts) I will place 2 right next to each other. Heck, if I'm low down on a trad route, my brain considers my last 2 pieces when calculating a ground fall, as if my top piece might blow despite me never ripping a piece of gear before. I've also fallen on my 0.3 Z4 several times and it's held, but that was all in solid granite, and I trust other rock types less. 

There are times on sport routes where I consider my last draw unclipping also despite it never happening before. I use a locking quickdraw with Edelrid sliders on both ends on pre-crux or pre-runout bolts sometimes. 

Maybe I've read too many accident reports of crazy shit happening to gear during falls.

Don't mean to spook you further but I recall at least one accident report where 2 adjacent cams inexplicably blew in a perfect horizontal crack. The suspicion is that one pivoted and knocked the other one out

Somehow I trust a good ice screw more than most rock protection 

Nylon on nylon and you are going to die. People  told me that while tying a nylon rope to a nylon harness. Or that everything should be redundant while using one rope.

Here is a good one. I know some that is afraid that he will fall and rip his teeth out. Not bitting the rope but somehow hitting or catching them  on  the rock. Has nightmares about that too, but still climbs outdoors every week. And only believes that will happen outdoors, indoors is completely fine. 

I carry locking carabiner for run out and back up both mussy hooks if I top rope them.

K Gowrote:

I'm on the heavier side and often when I place gear smaller than a 0.4 (cams or nuts) I will place 2 right next to each other. Heck, if I'm low down on a trad route, my brain considers my last 2 pieces when calculating a ground fall, as if my top piece might blow despite me never ripping a piece of gear before. I've also fallen on my 0.3 Z4 several times and it's held, but that was all in solid granite, and I trust other rock types less. 

There are times on sport routes where I consider my last draw unclipping also despite it never happening before. I use a locking quickdraw with Edelrid sliders on both ends on pre-crux or pre-runout bolts sometimes. 

Maybe I've read too many accident reports of crazy shit happening to gear during falls.

I saw this from Edelrid recently: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypJGkEaZiLc
I thought the word "neuralgic" was an odd choice, but perhaps appropriate to a risk-management/psychology discussion.
In any event, being aware of when/where/why the belay chain might let you down sounds rational to me. 

What's the line where awareness morphs into something less optimal? Can someone who knows more about psychology chime in about the spectrum from learning to phobia to habit to disorder to full-on psychosis? How many camming devices do you need in your apartment before you're diagnosed--beyond quirky--with hoarding disorder or schizophrenia? Can we expect the Accidents in North American Mountaineering writeup about a climber hospitalized by the collapse of a tall stack of climbing equipment bins? I think there's a documented case of someone who was concerned about ropes untying on rappel, so had 6 foot tails and perished rappelling on the rope proper and one of the tails. In hindsight, maybe we can say the risk of confusing rope ends outweighs the risk of a knot untying, Maybe the sub optimality of this situation could be predicted (does anyone really make this decision based on data?), but, at face value, a habit of long tails doesn't sound particularly quirky.

And satisficing is the ability to make a rational decision about a relatively minor thing and just stick with it. Doing so often useful to be able to use the rational brain to think about important things; and it saves time. As in, a decade ago you considered the advantages/disadvantages of wire gates vs. solid gates or fat rope + tag line or double ropes. For you, the differences are small, so you choose one and just stick with it. That's a feature, not a quirk. E.g. https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/12/opinion/decision-making-herbert-simon.html 

And why are we blaming all this on the gear. It's your climbing partner who's on the quirky/disordered/psychotic spectrum, not the gear...

I don’t attach my PAS to my belay loop, I hitch through the hard points on my waist and legs ‘cause Todd Skinner.

Bruno Schullwrote:

Somehow I trust a good ice screw more than most rock protection 

ice screws are like air bags. You don't want to have to use them..
                                                                                                    -W Gadd

I'm terrified of cross contamination of soft goods with some unseen thing that will weaken it.

I've gone so far as to pH test samples of stuff to prove nothing super acidic got on things after they've been dropped in a parking lot. 

I had an airline leave my fucking bag out in the rain and let it get soaked. I dont think my stuff got wet thanks to my fairly waterproof pack, but I ended washing a LOT of stuff.

I don't use chalk. Its unholy.   

Peter Ywrote:

Don't mean to spook you further but I recall at least one accident report where 2 adjacent cams inexplicably blew in a perfect horizontal crack. The suspicion is that one pivoted and knocked the other one out

Oh good, cam on cam action. I am generally suspicious of horizontal cam placements anyway unless they are quite deep. I also have concerns that with 2 closely-placed pieces of gear the top one blows and fires out of the crack straight into the carabiner clipping the lower piece to the rope and opens the gate which causes the rope to pop out, the carabiner to unclip from the sling, or even the carabiner to fail if leveraged weirdly on the crack. None of this keeps from climbing trad, but I have to push the "what-if" scenarios out of my brain on lead sometimes. 

Several people I climb with have an irrational fear of using the EDK to join ropes for rappels, despite the evidence that it is an extremely safe method when tied correctly with ample tails.

Me constantly calling it the "European Death Knot" rather than the official "Flat Overhand Bend" probably doesn't help.  But it sounds so much cooler to say "European Death Knot."  Be a great name for a band, for that matter.

Nose hooking wiregates scares me. I am more concerned about a nose hook than gate flutter.

Double checking my knot at the Crux while leading, what if it came Un tied?

Edited to add: And more than id like to admit on TR

I also often glance at my knot pre crux

I hate chalk and rarely use it, sensory issue I guess

Toothed ascenders for the win. Honorable mention for "never metal to metal".