Wednesday, April 29, 2015

Couldn't find a smaller tree?

The black rope going to the 3" diameter tree at right is the only active anchor. That may be the good news since the webbing is about to add a few more feet of slack when it slips off its perch. Of course both anchors are 3 feet up in the air when they should be at the base of the trees.

Why tie the anchor 3 feet up half of the tree? The figure 8 follow through is a bad choice to secure the end on a tensionless anchor. Given the appearance of the double overhand, they didn't have confidence in their ability to tie it right.

4 comments:

  1. Just wanted to say...as a relatively new climber who is expecting to learn how to set anchors in the next year or two, I really appreciate your comments about these setups. Sometimes I can spot what's wrong very quickly, but other times it's not as obvious to my newb eyes. The comments make this a great teaching tool! Thanks a bunch.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks for your feedback. It has been difficult to know how much to say about anchors since there are often so many things wrong. I did post one "how to" example but it didn't get as much traffic. The guiding principle is simplicity, the fewest links in the chain, and bombproof materials. Sadly, I can't recommend any book or video.

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  3. Yeah, I totally understand. I look forward to the day when I can break this nonsense down I to pieces and say, "this stinks because of x and that because of y", but most of the time I'm just throwing it all I to the " that looks waaaay too complicated to be safe" bucket and moving on. Until I get better at it, gym climbing for me!

    Thanks again,

    Kelly (original anonymous poster)

    ReplyDelete
  4. Yeah, I totally understand. I look forward to the day when I can break this nonsense down I to pieces and say, "this stinks because of x and that because of y", but most of the time I'm just throwing it all I to the " that looks waaaay too complicated to be safe" bucket and moving on. Until I get better at it, gym climbing for me!

    Thanks again,

    Kelly (original anonymous poster)

    ReplyDelete