Hot answers tagged climbing
14
I am not sure about the being able to feel more, but the most important reason I don't use socks is to avoid the rock boot sliding on my foot.
If you are on a marginal grip using just the edge of your sole, you don't want the boot to move at all.
This is also one of the reasons that rock boots for more experienced climbers are much more rigid than those ...
12
Although I am not a lab technician it is important to understand the dynamics at play in these tests. Below is the best example I have read on the subject.
For the full article please read below.
Alpine Exposures - Climbing ropes explained
UIAA Wikipedia
NOTE: Also included is the section on "impact force", which is a factor of the fall height, weight ...
11
This might sound a bit daft - but you could be holding on to the rock too tightly. Your other questions indicate you might be pretty new to climbing, and it is common for beginners to make this mistake.
Primarily, you should be climbing with your legs - pushing your weight up. Legs are used to your weight - arms, and fingertips, are not. If you are steady ...
11
In addition to using a Finger exerciser, I do the following:
Squeezing plasticene or stress balls
Dumb-bell curls
Chin-ups, both on a bar, and finger chin-ups on a door frame or similar
Press-ups on fingertips
These give finger, hand, wrist and forearm strength - worthwhile using them together. The thing I'm not so good at is toughening up the backs of ...
11
The following references from a few major rope manufacturers cover rope care thoroughly. Please see the bottom of this answer for a summary.
From Bluewater Ropes:
Avoid stepping on your rope. Beside the potential of cutting, stepping on a rope will grind dirt into the core and increase the possibility of internal abrasion.
Protect your rope from ...
10
It means the rope is rated for X falls where the fall factor is 1.77 and the weight is 80kg. In layman's terms it's a pretty big fall with a pretty big guy, the sort of fall that if you took you most likely wouldn't want to climb again for the rest of the day! You may well never have such a big fall at all (in fact I'd hope you wouldn't!)
That said, the ...
10
Climbing is the best exercise for finger and hand strength improvement, just make sure to warm up and stretch.
EDIT:
Just want to defend my answer. There are a lot of books out there you can read about climbing for training. Many of them will tell you not to waste your time cross training. The best training for climbing, is climbing.
Now if you are ...
10
Most climbers use a re-threaded figure 8. The knot is not that important, though. In reading many accident reports, I have never seen one where the knot came untied or where there was a rope failure due to the knot on the harness. Pick a knot you're very familiar with, check it, and you're done. Spend more time checking belay devices, locking caribiners, ...
10
A carabiner is designed to be loaded only along the long axis, near the spine (leftmost figure below). It will be weaker in any other direction of stress. Primary long-axis strength should be marked on the carabiner spine with an up-down arrow symbol, and is typically given in kilo-Newtons (one kN equals approximately 225 pounds of force).
Cross-loading ...
9
You have a few options:
Don't worry about the lease and accept the fact that you may lose your security deposit. You can take the board down before you move out, spackle over the holes, and hope the landlord doesn't notice. I live in the US, and that seems to be the preferred option here. Everyone I know who has a hangboard has done this, and they seem ...
9
I am a decent climber and a better scientist, and I strongly suspect there is no scientific answer to your question.
I have been on long climbs where I had to carry a pack. The most important factor in how much weight I (or my partner) carry was not my height, weight, or gender, it was my strength.
This is very similar to backpacking. Your strength, ...
8
David
I too prefer good old magnesium carbonate. My favorite is the block form (I haven't noticed a difference between brands), which usually can be found for a better price if you look through retailers who market to gymnasts rather than climbers. I'll list below the different kinds of chalk and grip aids that I have experience with and the merits/demerits ...
8
Shoes and a harness. Some places don't have belay devices or carabiners attached to each rope, so check on that beforehand, as you may need to provide your own.
That's it.
Chalk and a chalk bag is something you'll probably want pretty quickly and often comes packaged with the harness.
For climbing shoes, look for something comfortable to wear for a ...
8
It's pretty hard to check gear without some high-tech equipment. Metalwork really needs to be x-rayed to see if there are any hidden cracks, and rope can be checked by cutting a length off and sending it for destructive drop testing.
Neither of those your average climber would ever contemplate. So give everything a very careful visual inspection, for the ...
8
Oh friend, I have been down this miserable road just like you. I'll tell you what's at the end of it: swelling of the synovial fluid in the finger joints (which if not reduced leads to arthritis), bone spurs in the knuckles, and a year off the rock. Here's the good news, though: I'm happily climbing again and my fingers don't hurt!
The finger joint pain ...
8
I've been bouldering outdoors for a couple years now and let me ask you this question in return:
Why wear socks in your climbing shoes?
What is the possible benefit to wearing socks? Try it.
Your shoes will still stink, I guarantee. Your feet run the risk of slipping around in your climbing shoes. And if you buy tight, aggressive shoes, the fit will go all ...
8
On your descent, assuming you don't have an overhang, you simply place your heels against the wall, feet about shoulder width apart and lean back until your legs are horizontal, holding the rope above the knot and walk or bounce gently as your belaying partner lowers you.
The only things that will cause a swing are-
climbing a pitch adjacent to the one ...
8
Question: Should I girth hitch my main belay loop
Answer: No! You shouldn't girth-hitch a sling to your belay loop. The belay loop should only ever be in contact with a carabiner, as the trained instructor told you. As the instructor told you, girth hitching to the main belay loop will cause it extra wear, and make it wear out faster.
You can girth ...
8
Like with most climbing related questions, I personally find it hard to give a definitive rule that applies to all circumstances. There are a couple of safety factors to consider, as well as the perception of the climber. Don't venture out on your own if any of the following doesn't seem intuitive to you.
Keep in mind the following:
Rope stretch: Rope ...
7
First - Please do not only rely on answers in this site for creating top rope anchors. This is something that your life depends on, or the life of someone you care about, take it seriously.
Seek the advice of an expert in person: At the local climbing gym, or guiding service.
Creating climbing anchors is not something you learn simply by reading, you must ...
7
It represents a two major things. I'm not going to illustrate, but the core of it is:
Don't load carabiners across the gate or spine side of the carbiner (i.e. the side opposite the gate). This is pretty obvious, but happens sometimes when you make an anchor or whip out a quick draw and then load it without getting all the carabiners in-line with the ...
7
Plainly speaking, it makes sense to keep your rope away from any chemicals at all - battery acid, grease, oil, bleach, etc. Same goes for any objects that might harm it, chemically (car batteries) or physically (anything sharp or jagged that may dig in.) Take care of it, keep it dry, well coiled and well away from anything that might harm it.
Yes, it may be ...
6
If you haven't climbed in a while I would recommend staying away from doing fingertip pull-ups on hang boards. My assumption is that you are out of climbing shape and tendons and ligaments are easy to injure and take a long time to heal. This is coming from someone who has been climbing for around 8 years off and on and has made many mistakes, please learn ...
6
What ages a rope most is use, so if you have stored it for a couple of years it should not have degraded measurably.
Have a look at the UIAA's document on ageing of climbing ropes for some guidance from the experts (the UIAA is the International Mountaineering and Climbing Association)
I wouldn't worry about a couple of year's lack of use.
6
General fitness is the only technique you can employ without going to higher altitudes.
Acclimatization is the most common technique. Altitude sickness occurs at 2,400 m, so you go to a base camp (for example Cuzco if you're doing the Incan trail, or the South/North Base camps for Everest) and you let your body adjust to the altitude over a few days ...
6
I know that on the east coast, a couple of the park services have been pushing the climbing community to install bolt anchors as a replacement for nests of old slings around trees. This is in part because slinging anchors around trees can damage the bark, and sometimes eventually kill the tree. This shift from webbing anchors around trees to bolted rappel ...
6
Failure by cutting is a primary concern.
In terms of safety (rather than e.g. rope life) laboratory (UIAA) fall testing may not be the most important concern. Even a new, thick rope can be cut in a single fall across a sharp edge. This also applies to so-called "edge resistant" (defunct UIAA 108 standard) ropes. See this Yellow Spur fatality report.
...
6
Perhaps manufacturers advise on how much strain their ropes could take before retirement?
Yup, they do. The rating is given in terms of UIAA falls, which are pretty "major" falls. A UIAA fall is one with a fall factor of 1.77 and the weight is 80kg - or typically a pretty big fall with a pretty big guy.
This related question may also provide some ...
6
Safe? Yes. As in your life usually doesn't depend on them. Safe, as in a safe buy? Also yes.
When looking at used climbing shoes it really helps if you take someone along who knows what to look for and/or knows the shoes themselves. If you know what they look like new then you know what they should look like.
Specifically, check the seams and make sure ...
6
I don't know this particular brand, but there are two basic things I'd want to check:
Has the product been certified by the UIAA? You can look here to see. It looks like several Skylotec products have a UIAA certification.
For a harness, will the gear shop let you try a harness on, and hang in it (in the store) before you buy it? I'd want to know how ...
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