Using a dog-bone as a cam sling?

I second this question... seems good to me but would be interested to hear some other opinions.

1. -H

Full disclosure:I understand Black Diamond re-slings cams, however I figure for the time being this could work....

Several keyboard jockeys will jump on here shortly and tell you "yer gunna die."

Realistically, while it's certainly not as strong or reliable as a proper reslinging, it's probably going to work fine for most applications. I wouldn't place it as a keep-you-from-decking piece, but I personally wouldn't worry about it much either. YMMV.

Matt Proj flasher wrote:

Full disclosure:I understand Black Diamond re-slings cams,...

Yes, but only their own.

I figured the rainbow colors would keep me off the deck with magic and such

My opinion 

Will it work: yes it'll hold falls

Are you going to die: not from that

Is it ideal: probably not due to the there being no play in the dog bone being girthed like that.  I can see that causing some issues with your cam walking.  Why not just water knot a sling or use a piece of cord with a double/triple fishers? 

Edit: that dog bone is way cool I can understand the appeal. 

That makes complete sense, I guess looking at cord on a critical placement tends to make my head game go out the window; prolly why I only rack stuff on wires or slings

Marc801 C wrote:

Yes, but only their own.

Picture is of a old camalot if i'm not mistaken?

From the looks of the tag on the dogbone, it looks to be at least 20 years old. Most manufacturers recommend 10 years for nylon for replacement in unused conditions. 

In addition to that fact girth hitching the sling as you have done in the picture is very destructive to the material and is generally regarded to reduce overall strength by about half.

With all that said, I would recommend either tying a new sling with webbing, cord, or having it re-slung at some service. 

Correct it's an old camalot, Wes thanks for the insight I'll be sending it in within the next week but figured I'd see if I was bueno or not

FYI those cams aren't very strong anyway according to https://www.mountainproject.com/forum/topic/109709356/is-this-cam-safe-seasoned-climbers-remember?page=2 

22kn initial strength

17.6kn (aged so 80% strength and i think this is being generous)

clove hitch reduces strength by 70% so in the end you are left with 12.32kn

Far from ideal but you sure as hell wont die.

You'll never be able to extend it. Fishermans on some cord seems like a better plan to me.

Nick Drake wrote:

You'll never be able to extend it. Fishermans on some cord seems like a better plan to me.

Why can't you extend it? This confuses me because I don't see it being any different to extend it like I do on a normal cam with an alpine sling. Given I normally carry long alpine sling doubled over for med extension, fully extended alpine if I need something long, and doing this would make it harder to just clip a quick draw to it for a short extension (but you could always remove a biner from the quick draw and still attach it that way.

The only real negative I can think of is the girth hitch which will cause the sling to fail alot sooner. I know alot of people use girth for PAS type devices but generally you aren't taking falls on those so alot less damage.

Just a note to say that those old u-stem camalots bordered on death traps and had lots of issues with spitting up around the wire termination ball. They're also the only cam I've had completely disintegrate in a fall on an otherwise solid placement (and this was back when they were brand new). Wouldn't even think about using them and ditched mine long, long ago as complete trash.

in common practice a runner is clipped to the sling.  If you clip the runner direct to the piece, using the dog bone as a means to rack your cam only, it would be perfectly safe, because it is not in the loop.  In fact the rigidity of the bone may help your rack hang better.  you may have discovered the new climbing trend.  

Thats one sweet pattern on that dog bone. Jealous!

ViperScale wrote:

Why can't you extend it? This confuses me because I don't see it being any different to extend it like I do on a normal cam with an alpine sling. Given I normally carry long alpine sling doubled over for med extension, fully extended alpine if I need something long, and doing this would make it harder to just clip a quick draw to it for a short extension (but you could always remove a biner from the quick draw and still attach it that way.

The only real negative I can think of is the girth hitch which will cause the sling to fail alot sooner. I know alot of people use girth for PAS type devices but generally you aren't taking falls on those so alot less damage.

Because it was late at night and my brain wasn't functioning. For some reason I had quick draws in my head (I think leaving a biner off one and getting it onto this on lead would just be a royal PITA), if you have two biners on an alpine draw you could just leave it "racked" shortened and clip all of the strands of sling into the biner on the dogbone on the gear. So yeah ignore my post.

rob.calm

rob.calm wrote:

Using a dog bone for extending a camming device can cause a twisting force on the cam, which may lead to its failure to hold. This is the purported cause that lead to the death of the well-known alpinist Goren Krupp, http://www.traditionalmountaineering.org/News_GoranKropp.htm.

Looks like the potential problem there was that the stiff (and too short) dogbone caused the cam to walk into an unsafe placement.