Auto block used as rap device...

Ricky Harline wrote:

Auto locking rappel devices like the Smart Alpine, Gigajul, and Alpine Up are sweet and solve this problem nicely. Safety of a third hand without the faff. I don't know why such devices aren't more popular and why there isn't more investment from industry in such devices. 

These devices still have failure modes. A standard rap is pretty straightforward.  Often the auto locking devices have unusual failure conditions that one may not be fully aware of until it happens and then it could be too late. I experienced this over the weekend.

Ricky Harline wrote:

Auto locking rappel devices like the Smart Alpine, Gigajul, and Alpine Up are sweet and solve this problem nicely. Safety of a third hand without the faff. I don't know why such devices aren't more popular and why there isn't more investment from industry in such devices. 

These devices still have failure modes. A standard rap is pretty straightforward.  Often the auto locking devices have unusual failure conditions that one may not be fully aware of until it happens and then it could be too late. I experienced this over the weekend.

Kelvin Lu wrote: ...I experienced this over the weekend.

Care to share the specifics?

Ricky Harline wrote:

Auto locking rappel devices like the Smart Alpine, Gigajul, and Alpine Up are sweet and solve this problem nicely. Safety of a third hand without the faff. I don't know why such devices aren't more popular and why there isn't more investment from industry in such devices. 

Many of the assisted braking devices need some rope weight to lock if the brake hand is released.  This means they might not work if the rappeller is near the end of the rappel or if the rope is piled on a ledge below.  If you intend to count on an assisted braking device to function as a third-hand backup, then be sure to test the locking performance in a safe environment with very little rope weight on the brake strand..

rgold wrote:

Many of the assisted braking devices need some rope weight to lock if the brake hand is released.  This means they might not work if the rappeller is near the end of the rappel or if the rope is piled on a ledge below.  If you intend to count on an assisted braking device to function as a third-hand backup, then be sure to test the locking performance in a safe environment with very little rope weight on the brake strand..

I agree! Rope diameter, rope coating, rope fuzziness, type of carabiner used, and climber's weight are all massive variables that affect this. If you're used to only using thick, fuzzy ropes I wouldn't go out and immediately rappel on a super skinny new dry treated rope without testing first. Knowledge of the device and how the variables affect its locking is mandatory to use these devices IMO. 

I have never seen the Smart Alpine at least outright fail. I have seen it slowly creep down the rope when there isn't much rope weight providing a brake. 

I'm also curious to hear about this failure mode experienced over the weekend. What device, what carabiner, what rope were used and what was the problem?

Kelvin Lu wrote:

These devices still have failure modes. A standard rap is pretty straightforward.  Often the auto locking devices have unusual failure conditions that one may not be fully aware of until it happens and then it could be too late. I experienced this over the weekend.

To paraphrase: “I experienced a rare and/or unknown failure of a trusted device but… I’m not going to tell anyone what the failure was, you’ll all just have to guess.”

I love MP, sometimes it’s good and sometimes it’s great :)

Calling it now, this "unusual failure mode" likely involves letting go of the brake hand.

It's not like these devices are exploding during use or anything.

Daniel Joder wrote:

Why not use a Munter for the descent?

exactly my thought.

Once every 10 years or so I get 10 or 20 feet up something and realize I don’t have the rack. If I had to say how that could happen, it would be some combination of being relaxed, looking forward to the route challenges rather than being present, and typically already having done a bunch of leading that day. So I can believe something this basic  - forgetting to load your rap device - can happen once in a million times.
I’m never ever relaxed when setting up a rap and descending, and I never use a third hand, so I’m safe from this particular scenario (crosses self).

It’s easy to imagine making the mistake of not loading your rap device correctly. It’s much harder to imagine continuing on down with just an auto block, and not noticing that you aren’t using a rap device, period. I’ve accidentally left my rack on the ground before, but when I stopped to place that first piece of gear, I didn’t just continue up with a weird “hmm this doesn’t seem right” feeling inside the back of my head. 

EDIT lmao just saw the reverso bot test, amazing work to all parties involved, ignore everything I said below, beep boop maybe we're all just responding to stimuli in predictable ways.

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I'm still having a hard time believing this one is even possible. it's nothing like forgetting your rack, which you notice the second you go to place your first piece. it's also nothing like putting an ATC on upside-down, or forgetting to clip into the anchor, or jugging a rope without clipping into the jumars, or even (a partner did this once when we were both newbies) putting the same strand of the rope through both ATC slots before rapping. 

If you've rappelled enough times before, and you only attached yourself to the rope with the prusik and forgot the ATC (still believable), you'd notice the very instant you tried to start lowering. The brake strands wouldn't hang right, and the usual motion to get the brake to release would make you look at your belay loop immediately.

That mistake isn't even uncorrectible mid-rap, you just hang on your prusik, wrap some rope around your thigh, and put the atc on the rope below it...

And if my partner arrived at the chains with only the prusik and wasn't even batting an eyelash that something had gone wrong, that would probably be the last time we do anything but boulder together... 

Ronald Branch wrote:

exactly my thought.

I wasn't quite sure how this would work so I looked it up. Seems like a solid option but again would have required the awareness that it was needed in the first place.

https://youtube.com/shorts/Di_1MkSaZyM

My brother is an arborist and has shown me some arborist techniques used for tree work. They routinely use just a two wrap prusik to ascend and descend the rope. You lower by pushing down on the top of the prusik. I was surprised to see it, but it works perfectly fine.

granted tree ropes are clearly constructed differently than rock ropes.