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What is your favorite ascent method?
"You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose. You're on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the one who'll decide where to go..." -Dr. Suess |
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I use a Texas system, but I can't give a fair answer because I haven't tried anything else. I can see a lot of advantage to a Frog system if you need to go faster or cover greater distance, but I Texas because I don't want to deal with a chest harness.
I used to use prussik knots, which are a lot of fun and have a few advantages over mechanical ascenders, but they're slow and really wear me out.
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Edit: I confused texas kick and texas ropewalker. Balls. Texas kick because it's easy and fast to rig for short climbs. To be honest, I try not to ascend more than 20' or so if I can avoid it.
[last edit 3/26/2012 2:11 AM by MindHacker - edited 2 times]
"That's just my opinion. I would, however, advocate for explosive breaching, since speed and looking cool are both concerns in my job."-Wilkinshire |
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Posted by MindHacker
Edit: I confused texas kick and texas ropewalker. Balls. Texas kick because it's easy and fast to rig for short climbs. To be honest, I try not to ascend more than 20' or so if I can avoid it.
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Oh, I love ascending long distances!
"You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose. You're on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the one who'll decide where to go..." -Dr. Suess |
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Posted by DJ Craig
Oh, I love ascending long distances!
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I'd rather climb, shimmy, ladder....
"That's just my opinion. I would, however, advocate for explosive breaching, since speed and looking cool are both concerns in my job."-Wilkinshire |
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i have no idea what are the different techniques to climb back up a rope, but i have been using a full body harness with a built in rope grab at the chest + a hand rope grab with two slings for my feet. I regularly have to climb up 150+ feet after i do my bridge swinging. it get me up in a decent amount of time. although using a powered capstan winch would be the best way EVER.
It doesnt matter how you die.
But only how you live. |
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Posted by -Rio-
i have no idea what are the different techniques to climb back up a rope, but i have been using a full body harness with a built in rope grab at the chest + a hand rope grab with two slings for my feet. I regularly have to climb up 150+ feet after i do my bridge swinging. it get me up in a decent amount of time. although using a powered capstan winch would be the best way EVER.
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That is called frog ascent. It's probably the most common. Texas is also very common, which is where you have a hard ascender and a foot ascender both connected to your harness. The hand ascender goes on top, and the foot ascender on the bottom is attached to the footloops. So the main difference is that you have to move both ascenders up manually each step, but you don't have to have a chest harness.
"You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose. You're on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the one who'll decide where to go..." -Dr. Suess |
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Posted by DJ Craig
That is called frog ascent. It's probably the most common. Texas is also very common, which is where you have a hard ascender and a foot ascender both connected to your harness. The hand ascender goes on top, and the foot ascender on the bottom is attached to the footloops. So the main difference is that you have to move both ascenders up manually each step, but you don't have to have a chest harness.
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oh, thats how i did that my first few jumps when i was using my climbing harness... its a pain in the ass when your going up a long ways.
It doesnt matter how you die.
But only how you live. |
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Posted by -Rio-
oh, thats how i did that my first few jumps when i was using my climbing harness... its a pain in the ass when your going up a long ways.
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It's not bad at all if you get the length of the two ropes just right. Most people tend to make both of them too short, especially the footloops, which makes things really inefficient.
"You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose. You're on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the one who'll decide where to go..." -Dr. Suess |
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Texas, and yeah, I usually have it too short or too long. I keep meaning to pre-set everything and keep it in a bag, but then I always end up using the gear for other stuff first...
I also like the 30' cable ladders for cheating 
Turn off the internet and go play outside.
http://spamusement...hp/comics/view/137 |
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Frog, but that's the only one I've used. Didn't know other existed (other than in principle) until after already having my kit. I find ascending with it really isn't that bad, I've done 80 feet no prob, and will ideally be doubling that within the next few months. If anything its the first 20 feet that's the worst...hand feeding the chest ascender sucks.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/beenerman/ |
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Frog is my favorite.
Have used others. Used my own method using a minitraxion at the waist and a handled ascender for a while. Have also ascended hundreds of feet using two prussiks, but that was back in the day, working in trees when I wasn't familiar with using mechanical ascenders.
I've ascended up to 500ft to get out of a mine using multiple ropes. Furthest I've done in single runs is a few 300's, but I do 200ft pretty regularly.
I've found the Frog to be pretty simple for passing the biner where two ropes are clipped together.
Protip: If you have trouble in the first 10 to 15 ft, there's a couple fixes.
1. Get about a 2lb deep sea fishing lead weight and use some 550 cord to prussik it to the bottom of the rope.
2. Do footlocking for the first 15 feet or so (if you don't want to carry the lead weight around with your gear).
When you go to stand up in your footloop, have the rope trailing down between both feet, sandwich it between your feet, then sandwich it with the foot in the footloop ontop of the free foot, with the rope snugged in the middle. As you stand up in the footloop, the rope is pulled through your chest ascender (or other harness attached ascender).
Alternatively, you can just squeeze your feet together, but you have to hold them moderately hard to grab the rope well with them.
3. If multiple people are going up a rope, have each next person pull on the rope for the guy going up till he gets up about 20ft. Then just the last guy has to footlock the rope for himself till it feeds freely.
It saves you from doing that crappy dance where you stand up then have to hold and pull the rope through.
Give a person a match and they'll be warm for a minute, but light them on fire and they'll be warm for the rest of their life. =) |
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grigri + ascension
"No risk, no reward, no fun."
"Go all the way or walk away"
escensi omnis... |
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Posted by \/adder
grigri + ascension
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lately thats been my go-to setup as well. It isnt nearly as efficient as a frog setup (or so I'm told), but you cant beat the simplicity for changeovers and for short climbs its pretty convenient. I use a small pulley attached to the ascender to help redirect the rope....much easier pulling it down than yanking it up.
www.tohellandback.net |
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Posted by terapr0
lately thats been my go-to setup as well. It isnt nearly as efficient as a frog setup (or so I'm told), but you cant beat the simplicity for changeovers and for short climbs its pretty convenient. I use a small pulley attached to the ascender to help redirect the rope....much easier pulling it down than yanking it up.
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No pully on mine, next time I'm going to try just a simple carabiner, though.
I have a croll chest setup, the positioning is way too awkward if you need to do a pull up at the end of the ascent.
"No risk, no reward, no fun."
"Go all the way or walk away"
escensi omnis... |
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I use prusik knots for mid to long distances.
For short to mid length, I see if there is any way I can just climb a nearby wall.
If it's only like twenty feet or less in length, I just climb the rope unattached.
I'm cheap and don't make enough money to afford all those expensive pieces, so I can't really do any huge distances, nothing like those dams and mines that I've seen around here. This stuff is mostly just for smaller downtown buildings.
[last edit 9/30/2012 4:13 AM by Tastee-Freeze - edited 1 times]
Entry to the rooftop playground is free, if you look up enough to know it's there.
-Dsankt on 'The Crane Style' |
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Prusiks...Awwwww yeaaahhh....
I'm a poor college student with a very limited budget. One thing that I've found helps a lot is if create an ascender with a locking biner:
1) Throw the prusik loop into the biner.
2) Loop the prusik loop around the biner and the rope the full length of the biner
3) Clip into the excess off of the prusik loop.
I wish I had pictures of this setup...
I've found this moves around a little easier and gives you a handle to move the "knot" around.
Happy poor man's ascending!
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Posted by -insertnamehere-
Prusiks...Awwwww yeaaahhh....
I'm a poor college student with a very limited budget. One thing that I've found helps a lot is if create an ascender with a locking biner:
1) Throw the prusik loop into the biner.
2) Loop the prusik loop around the biner and the rope the full length of the biner
3) Clip into the excess off of the prusik loop.
I wish I had pictures of this setup...
I've found this moves around a little easier and gives you a handle to move the "knot" around.
Happy poor man's ascending!
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I'm really curious about this but don't really understand what you mean. You should take a picture next time you have a chance!
"You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose. You're on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the one who'll decide where to go..." -Dr. Suess |
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Posted by -insertnamehere-
Prusiks...Awwwww yeaaahhh....
I'm a poor college student with a very limited budget. One thing that I've found helps a lot is if create an ascender with a locking biner:
1) Throw the prusik loop into the biner.
2) Loop the prusik loop around the biner and the rope the full length of the biner
3) Clip into the excess off of the prusik loop.
I wish I had pictures of this setup...
I've found this moves around a little easier and gives you a handle to move the "knot" around.
Happy poor man's ascending!
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I think what you have there is called a Bachmann's Hitch, does it look like this?  It's a type of friction knot. Very useful, and a little easier to use than just a straight prusik.
Entry to the rooftop playground is free, if you look up enough to know it's there.
-Dsankt on 'The Crane Style' |
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Wow, it just got oldschool up in here.
Give a person a match and they'll be warm for a minute, but light them on fire and they'll be warm for the rest of their life. =) |
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