Alpine Tips
Rope anchors: the Alex Honnold anchor
Here's a fast and simple method to build an anchor using the rope, typically on two good bolts. (Alex says it's his favorite, so that's what I'm calling it. =^)
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Did you realize halfway up the pitch that you left your long anchor sling with your partner down below? Whoops! Better have a Plan B. This is an easy one, use the rope.
Did Alex invent this anchor style? No, climbers have been using this for decades. But, Alex said in an interview that this is his favorite style of anchor for roped multipitch climbing, so that's what I'm calling it. =^)
This anchor is a fine choice when you have a pair of decent bolts.
Note that the belayer is not on the equalized portion of the anchor. They’re clipped directly to one bolt, and indirectly attached to both. The belayer has redundancy, but not equalization.
With properly placed bolts that can each hold well over 20 kN, this shouldn’t be a problem.
Benefits of building an anchor with the rope:
Typically uses the minimal amount of gear. No need for extra slings, cords, or untying slings with knots when you’re done.
Uses the strong and stretchy rope, which you always have. Strong and stretchy are good things to have in an anchor! (Even if you prefer making anchors with a sling or cord, you might not always have those, and it's good to have some alternatives.)
Downsides to building an anchor with the rope:
It works best if you’re swinging leads on a multipitch climb. If one person is doing all the leading (aka block leading), or if this is the last anchor at the top of a climb and you’re transitioning to rappel, it may be better to craft an anchor from a sling or cordelette so you have both ends of the rope to work with. (Even if you plan on swinging leads, your partner might decide they don't want to take their turn and you might have to go again, so keep that in mind.)
Rope anchors can make many self-rescue techniques more challenging, because the end of the rope is a component of the anchor. Yes the belayer can can simply untie and they're out of the system, but then they may have a harder time using the rope for anything useful.
If the next (or previous) pitch is a real rope stretcher and you might need every bit of it, this may not be the best choice. (Rare, but it can happen.)
When the leader pulls up the rope on the second, the rope pull comes tight first onto the anchor and not directly onto the second climber. This can create a few meters of potentially unwanted slack when the second breaks down the anchor. The second can clip to one bolt or piece of solid gear with a tether before they remove the anchor, as a possible solution.
The Alex Honnold anchor, step-by-step . . .
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What’s a “series” anchor?
Traditional anchor building teaches trying to “equalize” the load. However, with solid bolts or ice screws, it may be faster and more convenient to build what’s called a series anchor, where all the load goes to one component and the other is a backup.
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Peer review on this article comes from Sean Isaac. Sean is an ACMG (Association of Canadian Mountain Guides) Certified Guide, a former professional climber, and author of the “Ice Leader Field Handbook” and “How to Ice Climb” (2nd ed.) Follow @seanisaacguiding for tech tips. Thanks, Sean!
Series anchor onto vertical bolts. Edelrid Aramid sling on left, rope on the right. (Belay connection to second omitted for clarity.)
On your first day of Climbing 101 class, you probably got the concept of equalization drilled into your head - always try to distribute the load (more or less equally) among all components of the anchor. This is still about the only technique taught in most every how-to book I’ve ever seen. Overall, this is still a valid approach, especially with trad anchors, made with stoppers, cams and maybe pitons.
However, it’s not an absolute rule when it comes to using two reliably solid pieces, such as bolts or ice screws.
There’s a whole other genre of anchors, known as a “series” anchor, where all of the primary load goes to ONE anchor component. The second component of the anchor is used only for redundancy, as a backup in the extremely unlikely event that the first bolt were to fail. There’s no attempt at equalization/load distribution. Redundancy, yes. Equalization, no.
So, how can we get away with ignoring equalization, one of the cardinal rules of anchor building? Because modern bolts and hardware are so ridiculously strong (well over 20 kN for each one when properly placed in good rock) that there’s no requirement to try to equalize forces. In many cases with good bolts, it can be faster and more convenient to build a series anchor.
Series anchor overview
As a general guideline: if you have two unquestionably strong bolts, consider a series anchor. Anything other than that, consider a distributed anchor.
Series anchors are best made with two components; three or more is tricky.
Series anchors work on horizontal, vertical or diagonal bolts or ice screws. The vertical or diagonal are preferred. These can be hard to find in North America.
Series anchors are more common in Europe. They are endorsed by the German Mountain and Ski Guides Association (“Verband Deutscher Berg und Skiführer” or “VDBS”). Here's a detailed article covering series, and other interesting anchor flavors.
If you have vertical bolts, make the master point on the bottom bolt. If the bolts are horizontal, make the master point on the bolt where your second will approach the anchor.
A series anchor does not provide a shelf, so all of your clip in points get kind of scrunched together.
You can make a series anchor with a sling tied with a double loop bowline on a bight, a double loop figure eight, or with the rope.
An advantage to using a sling is that you can easily transition to a fixed point lead belay on the next pitch. (That is a whole other topic, which I cover extensively in this article.)
How strong a ring loaded bowline in Dyneema?
Double loop bowline in Dyneema sling being ring loaded, breaks around 20 kN. From HowNot2 (about 6:30 in the video). A belay loop usually breaks around 15 kN, so think about that for a moment . . .
The series anchor is definitely not a new concept! Check out this classic photo from the early days of Yosemite climbing, which I caption as” “I’m so happy to still be alive after jugging this rope connected to a few RURPs strung together by clove hitches . . . (Photo by Dave Diegelman, climber, Dale Bard, Sea of Dreams, El Capitan, 1978)
Photo credit: Dave Diegelman
When considering how strong an anchor needs to be, it’s good to keep in mind the realistic forces it might be required to hold. Petzl did some very nice studies on this, showing what real world realistic forces are when you measure actual climbers instead of static weights in a drop tower. I have a whole article in that that, read it here.
Below is a great diagram from Petzl. If your French is a little rusty:
gray dot = force on the top piece of gear
blue dot = force on the climber
black dot = force on the belayer
The three different columns indicate different fall factors: 0.3, 0.7, and 1.0.
Even when catching a significant fall factor 1, the force on the bottom anchor is only about 2 kN, quite low! That’s good!
If you are belaying up your second and keeping the rope reasonably tight, the force should never get above 1 or 2 kN. Given this, trying to equalize that load between two bolts that can hold 40 kN combined may seem unnecessary.
FALL FORCES IN CLIMBING. IMAGE: HTTPS://WWW.PETZL.COM/US/EN/SPORT/FORCES-AT-WORK-IN-A-REAL-FALL
Let’s look at a few ways to make a series anchor.
Method 1: Series anchor with sling and double loop bight knot.
Typically made with a a 120 cm sling, with a double strand bowline on a bight, shown here. (A double loop bunny ears figure 8 works too.) Don’t worry about ring loading the bowline, it’s fine and it’s been tested. See the video below to learn how to tie the bowline on a bight. It’s a new knot for most folks. Can be on horizontal (photo 1) or vertical (photo 2). Vertical is better, but you gotta use what you have.
Using a sling:
makes block leading easier
simplifies self rescue
allows you to do a fixed point lead belay
Method 2: Series anchor with the climbing rope
You get some minimalist style points. You already have a nice strong dynamic rope, so use it if you like.
Downsides are the opposite of the 120 cm sling:
block leading is harder
self-rescue is more difficult
fixed point lead belay is trickier
Can be on horizontal (photo 1) or vertical (photo 2) bolts.
Here's a another version of the example just above. This one might work well for the very top of a route where there is a walk off, or a large secure ledge, because there's not much place for the second to easily attach when they arrive.
The set up as shown in the photo is not very ergonomic because the masterpoint is low. But you could extend the clove hitch from the harness, and the butterfly knot, if you want to conveniently stand at most any distance from the bolts that you want.
(Inspiration credit, IFMGA Guide Dale Remsberg, from his Instagram post.)
Method 3: Fixe vertical chain anchor
Horizontal hangers - clip the ring, not the hanger
Most bolt hangers are vertical, and it's fine to clip those. However, when you have a horizontal anchor hanger, such as this one from Fixe, it's good practice to clip the welded ring, and not the horizontal hanger.
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While by far the most common type of bolt hanger is vertical, you may find horizontal hangers (usually with a welded steel ring) that look like this. (These are from the Spanish company Fixe; other companies might make them too.)
The reason for the horizontal hanger is so the ring hangs perpendicular to the rock. This makes it easier to pull your rappel rope.
To be honest, I'm not a big fan of these. The rings can’t be easily replaced when they get worn out, and a downward load can put some strange leverage on the bolt and hanger. A vertical hanger, a quick link, and a welded ring or another quick link does pretty much the same thing and is much easier to replace.
But you will find this flavor of anchor in the wild, so it's good to know what to do with them.
With these horizontal hangers, it's best practice to clip the ring, and NOT the horizontal hanger.
While most of the time it's not a big deal if you do clip the hanger, with certain carabiners in some configurations, the carabiners can get twisted and torqued in a strange way.
I've never heard of one breaking, but it's not optimal. So clip the ring, and you’ll be fine.
More reasons to clip the ring:
Depending on carabiner shape, makes it easier to “clip it and flip it”, so you can arrange your carabiner gate facing down and out
Will never load your carabiner at a strange angle
Accepts a carabiner of any shape and size
Allows the ring to be used to more easily set up a rappel, either by you or someone else, (more on that below)
"Alpine Equalization" Don't clip the thumb loop
A common tactic in building fast alpine anchors with minimal gear is to directly clip one cam to another, without using slings between them. However, there's a right way and a less than ideal way to do it - don't clip the thumb loop. How bad is this? We broke some cams to find out!
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I first heard of this potential issue from AMGA Certified Rock Guide Ben Wu on this Instagram post. Connect with Ben on Instagram, @benwooster, or on his website.
While the “textbook” way to equalize a gear / trad anchor is to use slings or maybe a cordelette, there are some alternatives.
One of them is so-called “alpine equalizing”. Here, you try to share the load between two pieces of gear, typically cams, by clipping one directly to the other. If the crack is cooperative and you can move the cams up or down the crack slightly, you can often get pretty decent load sharing.
However, there's a right way and a not-so-right way to clip the cams to each other.
In the photo on the right, the top cam is clipped to the thumb loop of the bottom cam. If the bottom cam fails under load and transfers all the load onto the top cam, you’re now cross loading the thumb loop in two opposite directions, which it’s not designed to do.
So how bad is it?
Gear-breaking mad scientist Ryan Jenks from HowNOT2 and I tested this. We found that the thumb loop can start to deform at around only 2 kN! The ultimate failure point was around 12-ish kN, which means you're probably not gonna die. Check the video below for all the details!
But you ARE likely to mess up your cam, it's not good practice and there's definitely better ways to clip, so don't do it!
To quote Ryan in the video below, “It's not dangerous, it's dumb.”
The photo on the left shows a better way to alpine equalize: Clip the top cam into the SLING of the bottom cam, not the thumb loop. Another alternative, clip one carabiner into another.
Chain link fence for anchor practice
Looking for a convenient and sturdy place to practice climbing anchors in town? Look no further than the nearest chain link fence.
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Want a convenient and sturdy place to practice anchor building, or maybe cleaning and lowering from a sport route? Look no further than the nearest chain link fence.
Vertical anchors 101
While vertically oriented chain anchors are still uncommon in many areas, they offer a few advantages over side-by-side matched horizontal anchors. Learn some of the benefits of vertical anchors, and check out several possible ways to rig them for top rope, multi pitch, and rappel.
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This article was written with editing assistance from Silas Rossi, IFMGA Certified Guide. Connect with Silas at Alpine Logic.
Vertically oriented chain anchors tend to be more common in Europe and Canada than in many parts of the United States, but they are catching on. While they can be rigged for one pitch top rope climbs, they really shine on multi pitch routes, where the rappel (descent) is the same as the ascent.
The photo above shows a “all in one” vertical chain anchor made by the Spanish company Fixe. Note that the hangers, chain and ring are all welded together. While these are popular, they have the small drawbacks of a fixed length of chain, and no way to replace individual components.
An alternative is to build your own vertical chain anchor, using quick links to connect components. Doing this allows adjustment of the chain length to better fit any rock bulges or pockets, and allows easy replacement of individual parts as needed. If you do this, try to use CE climbing rated quick links, that test to about 40 kN, not hardware store links with a questionable lineage and no CE rating. Secure the links with Loctite and pliers. Here's an example of a vertical chain anchor made from separate components.
Fixe recently updated this anchor. There’s now a ring at the top bolt hanger, instead of the welded chain link. See photo below. The example shown in the rest of the photos on this page is the older model.
image: fixehardware.com/index.php/fixe-plx-duplex-ss-1-2-traditional-anchor.html
Where to clip?
It's best practice to avoid clipping the horizontal hanger on the bottom. Most of the time this will be OK. But in some cases with certain styles of carabiner, they can get twisted and torqued in some strange ways. I've never heard of one breaking, but it's usually better to clip the ring or the top vertical hanger.
(There is a long-standing climbing myth that Fi\xe actually recommends doing this. However I’ve looked through their technical documentation and can't find any recommendation, so I think this is not true.)
What are the advantages of a vertical chain anchor?
Simplifies clipping to an anchor that’s redundant and very strong. This is especially helpful when rappelling; clip your tether to any component of the anchor and you’re attached to two bolts instead of one.
Efficient use of materials. It can be less expensive (compared to two hangers, four quicklinks and two chains) and the route setter does not have to deal with cutting chain links or carrying unneeded heavy hardware to the crag and up the route.
Gives the route setter more flexibility in where the anchor goes, especially important in rock with pockets, protrusions, erosion, etc. Choosing to use a vertical anchor can depend on the rock structure and geology.
Zero twisting of the rope when lowering or rappelling, because it’s only going through one bit of anchor hardware. Plus, because the ring always hangs perpendicular to the rock, you're probably going to have an easier rope pull with less friction.
Lower visual impact. This is a concern in some areas.
However, using these anchors can be a bit of a head-scratcher for climbers who are used to a pair of horizontal matched bolts and chains. What should I use as a master point? Can I REALLY trust that ring? The doozy for many people, is it really redundant and/or equalized?! And sheesh, can I ignore all of this confusing hardware and just clip a quad or cordelette to the bolts?
Let's address some common concerns about vertical chain anchors.
“It's not redundant.”
Yes, you’re fully relying on the single ring at the bottom. But it's made of 10 mm welded stainless steel rod. Hownot2.com tested two of these rings. One broke at 90 kN and the other broke at 47 kN. You can see the ring results here in their YouTube video. (Steel ring testing starts at 6:00.)
You can hang (4? 5?) Toyotas from it, and it’s WAY stronger than all of the things you normally rely on that are single point and not redundant, such as your belay loop, your rope, your harness, all of your carabiners, probably the bolt that you just took several huge falls on . . .
Plus, both the ring is right there in the open and easy to inspect, as opposed to a bolt in the rock.
“The load isn’t equalized.”
Correct, it's not. When using the ring, all the load is pretty much on the bottom bolt, with the top bolt backing it up. A modern, properly placed ⅜” (10mm) bolt, or better yet ½” (12mm) bolts should hold more than 25 kN. There's really no need to try to equalize the load between bolts this strong.
“Clipping to the ring clogs it up, so another team can't use it to rappel.”
This often can be true in a more traditional anchor that might have a small chain link or quick link at the bottom. However, with this anchor, and the giant ring, it's not a concern. Even if you're clipped to the ring, there's plenty of room to thread the rappel over the top of your carabiner. Plus, there's a simple technique for a “down” team to pass an “up” team - the up team adds their locking carabiner to their anchor, and the down team clips their rope to it for a rappel. See a full article on that here.
“You’re clipping metal to metal. Clipping a carabiner to a rappel ring can damage it.”
Clipping a couple of locking carabiners to each other and an anchor when you're standing right there to monitor them is totally fine. Plus, your soft aluminum carabiner is never going to put any nicks or scratches on the much harder steel ring. (It's like using a plastic ice scraper on a car windshield; the soft plastic is never going to hurt the much harder glass.)
“What's up with that funky horizontal hanger on the bottom?”
The horizontal hanger allows the welded steel ring to sit perpendicular to the rock, which usually gives an easier rope pull after you rappel. If you had a normal vertical hanger at the bottom, the ring would lie flat against the rock which increases friction, not good.
“This causes tri-axial (3 direction) loading on the carabiner, that’s bad.”
Yes, technically the master point carabiner (see below) is being potentially loaded in three different directions. But, under realistic recreational climbing scenarios, any potential load is going to be very small, like 2-3 kN, and well within the capabilities of the carabiner.
I have a whole article on the issue of tri-axial loading, and Black Diamond did some testing on it. You can learn more here.
There are three basic uses for a vertical chain anchor: 1) rappel, 2) top rope, and 3) multi pitch. Let's look at a few possible rigging examples for each of these.
1 - Rappel
There are several ways to rig this. A convenient one is to clip a master point carabiner into the ring, and then have you and your partner clip to the master carabiner. This moves both tethers below the ring, which can make threading the rope through a bit easier.
That's a big benefit to vertical chain anchors. You don't have to build your own anchor with slings or a quad, or have any concern with clipping two tethers to two different non-redundant bolts.
Because of the single ring, you get zero twisting when you pull your rope. =^)
2 - Toprope
While vertical anchors are perhaps better suited for multi pitch and rappelling, you can of course use them for toproping. (While it's usually fine to lower the last person through the ring, typical climbing etiquette is that you don’t set up a top rope that directly weights the ring. Hopefully you know this already.)
Is someone rappelling the route while you're toproping? Consider this solution: be polite, take a break, and let them rappel on your rope. Generally, it's good practice to yield to the team that is coming down.
Top rope method #1: Clip two opposite and opposed carabiners onto the ring, clip the rope to the carabiners, and lower off. (If you're concerned about the whole load on the single ring, you could leave a quick draw on the next lower bolt, and run the rope through that as a backup.) But remember, that ring is rated at 50 kN.
Top rope method #2 (easy-to-clean): Clip the carabiner on the chain above the ring. Rig the rope through the ring and through the carabiner, and lower off. Here's a link to the procedure and videos on how to do this correctly.
All of the load goes to your carabiner, not the fixed hardware. The last person climbing the route cleans the carabiner and lowers off through the ring. This can be a good approach if the last person climbing doesn’t have the required experience to safely re-thread the rope through the ring and lower off. If you're doing this a lot, a steel carabiner can minimize the wear on your gear. Because the rope is already through the ring, the carabiner does not have to be locking.
Yes, the last person is being lowered through the fixed ring. This is generally considered the best practice, at least in most climbing areas in North America. But hey, if you prefer to rappel, you're welcome to do that instead.
Depending on anchor configuration, this could potentially twist your rope when you lower your partner. In the photo below, notice the carabiner is clipped to a chain link that lies flat against the rock. Doing this orients the carabiner 90°, so it's facing out, same as the ring. This minimizes twists when lowering.
With the whole anchor pretty much in a straight vertical line, you're unlikely to get much twisting no matter how you rig this. If the bolts were more offset, like around 45° angle, then twisting may be more likely to happen.
If you do have twists in your rope, here’s a great way to get them out.
3 - Multipitch
Note: In the next three photos, the extra rope between the leader tie in and the belay device is omitted for clarity.
One approach, maybe the simplest: clove hitch the leader to the ring and belay the second off the ring. No slings, no cordelette, no quad required.
“But wait”, I can hear some of you saying, “doesn't this obstruct the ring for anyone else who wants to rappel past you?” Not really. There's still room to thread the rope, and besides, the rappelling team doesn’t have to actually thread the ring. Learn more at this article.
The leader can also connect to one of the chain links.
Another option: clip a master point carabiner into the ring, and then add two additional locking carabiners to that for the leader’s connection and the belay.
If you have a spare HMS carabiner, this is a good way to go. It has a couple of benefits: 1) slightly less cluster and a bit more room to move around at the anchor; and 2) the ring is a bit more accessible for any other parties rappelling who may need to access it.
Finally, if you want to use the fixed point lead belay, this anchor is perfect for that. Here's one way to rig it.
And, after all that, if you’re happier with a quad . . . you can do that too!
Quad anchor - 240 cm sling with bowline on a bight
If you have a 240 cm length sling, it can be annoyingly long to use on a two bolt anchor, especially rigged as a quad. Here is a clever way to rig it so your master point is high, and it's very easy to untie after loading: tie it with a bowline on a bight.
The standard quad anchor works great for many anchor setups where you have two reliable bolts or ice screws. Why is the quad cool?
Good load distribution
Minimal extension
Fully redundant
Quick to set up and break down; no knots to untie at each anchor
Super strong (would you believe 40+ kN?!)
Two independent and load distributed master points, which can be very handy
To make a quad, you have several options of materials and length. The original material, suggested by John Long in his book “Climbing Anchors”, was a cordelette. While there's nothing inherently wrong with this, it is big and bulky.
Modern sewn slings are a better choice. There are three lengths you could use for a quad: 120 cm, 180 cm, and 240 cm.
120 cm: too short, unless the anchors are very close to each other.
180 cm: the ideal for most cases, not too short and not too long.
240 cm: tied in a standard configuration is usually too long, putting the master point down low by your waist instead of up by your chest.
However, a 240 cm sling is a very handy piece of gear for lots of other things, and many people choose to carry that instead of a cordelette. You can sling it around a tree, you can equalize multi piece gear anchors, and if you use the clever rigging method shown here, it works great for a pair of bolts.
Rather than the standard method of tying an overhand or figure 8 on a bight to make your loops, instead tie a bowline on a bight. Advantages:
It uses up more material, which usually gives you a higher and more ergonomic master point. In the photo above, notice there are four strands on each anchor carabiner rather than the typical two.
A bowline on a bight is much easier to untie after loading, so at the end of the day you can easily untie your sling and give the material a rest.
This isn’t a standard climbing knot, but it's easy to tie once you get the hang of it. Here's a nice video that shows one way to do it.
Does it matter which way carabiner gates face on an anchor?
Does it makes any difference which way carabiner gates face when you're building an anchor on two bolts? The short answer is no, it doesn't. Clip them in any direction that is convenient. The concept of “opposite and opposed” applies to carabiners on the master point, not when they’re clipped to bolts.
This might be the shortest article on my website. The answer is no.
Carabiner gates can face:
both to the left
both to the right
toward each other
away from each other
It makes no significant difference in the strength or security of your anchor for recreational climbing. The load in every case is along the spine of the carabiner which is the strongest configuration.
There are lots of things to pay attention to when climbing. This is not one of them!
The only time you need to be concerned about the direction of carabiner gates is when you put two of them together, which is called “opposite and opposed”. In that case you want to see an “X” made by the gates when they’re closed, and you want the spines on opposite sides. Just like the diagram below.
IMAGE CREDIT: HTTPS://WWW.INSTAGRAM.COM/P/CCXMVXDB58S/ / RICHARD DELANEY, ROPELAB, USED WITH PERMISSION
Snapgate or locking carabiners on anchors?
When and where is the best use of locking carabiners on an anchor? On the gear or bolts? On the masterpoint? Is it a multi pitch anchor, or a toprope? Can I use lockers on “half” of the anchor? It's a contentious and important discussion, so let's take a look.
This article was written with collaboration from AMGA Certified Rock Guide Max Lurie. Connect with Max on Instagram, @alpinetothemax and his website.
A common question for climbing anchors: should I use locking carabiners on the bolts/gear?
It's an important topic, and there are some strongly held opinions on this, so let's have a closer look.
Short version:
For multi pitch climbing, using snapgate carabiners on the bolts or gear is acceptable.
For top rope climbing, it's a generally accepted standard in the guiding and teaching world to use locking carabiners on the anchor and master point.
We all get to choose an acceptable level of risk. Try to understand the realistic, and not imagined, risks of your methods.
Before we get into the details, let’s look at some bigger-picture concepts:
If you have a single life-critical connection, then a locking carabiner is good practice. (For example, the rope and your belay device, and your rope or tether connection to the anchor.)
If your anchor is “unattended”, like for a toprope, then locking carabiners can be more important.
If your anchor is “attended”, like a multipitch climb with someone next to it the whole time, with hands and/or eyes on the anchor, locking carabiners are generally not required.
It's helpful to understand the difference between perceived risk reduction and actual risk reduction.
The argument of, “I want to reduce my risk as much as possible, so I use lockers everywhere on my anchor”, is a bit simplistic. How far do you take that? Do you use lockers on the first couple of quickdraws when you’re sport leading? Steel carabiners are much stronger than aluminum ones, so do you use steel carabiners? I'm guessing the answer to both of these is no for just about everybody.
It's good to have a solid understanding of the capabilities and limitations of your gear, and let those guide your decision rather than emotion, hearsay, and “that's-the-way-I-learned-it”.
Be aware of generally accepted best practices among guides and industry professionals. Also be aware that what might be standard practice in one industry, such as using triple action lockers for say tree/arborist work, does not necessarily mean it's also good practice to use that same gear for recreational climbing.
Here are some thoughts from AMGA Certified Rock Guide Max Lurie:
“We perceive a locking carabiner to be “safer” in the context of connecting an anchor leg to a bolt / cam / stopper / whatever. Can you articulate what specifically makes a locker safer? How do carabiners commonly fail, are lockers and non-lockers really that different in those scenarios? I am trying to get folks to think critically and articulate what exactly they think they are achieving with a locker vs. a non-locker.
From a physics perspective… non lockers can come unclipped if backclipped, that isn’t a concern here so we can dismiss it. Strength along the major and minor axis is pretty similar between lockers and non-lockers. So we can dismiss that as well. Being loaded over an edge and potentially snapped is a serious concern for any carabiner, but lockers tend to be a little beefier so they may be more resilient, but this is just a guess. I don’t have any data to back that statement up. The gate rubbing against the rock and opening could be a concern. With properly orienting the spine of a non locker against the rock it becomes equivalent to a locker. In conclusion, I don’t think a locking carabiner is physically any more resilient than an non-locker (with the context of our discussion).
Us, the human factor is where I think the locker makes more sense than the non-locker. All of the above makes one very strong assumption, and that is that we’ve done everything “right” with our anchor setup. There are too many times to count that I have stumbled upon a top rope anchor that was worse than dog shit. One leg of the anchor is attached to a dead poorly rooted shrub, with just a non-locker on the other side. Two strands of material but they are completely unequalized. Unfortunately endless examples exist.
The fact is that we are our own worst enemies, and we use lockers because we are Neanderthals who cannot be trusted with our own lives.”
The snapgate crowd says:
Totally fine to use them on the anchors.
The failure of any single non-locker would not cause catastrophe.
What's the realistic mechanism of failure for a snapgate carabiner? Any mechanism that could cause them to both fail at one time is so incredibly unlikely that using them is acceptable; each carabiner is connected to a separate independent strand of the anchor.
On a multi pitch anchor that is “attended”, any potential problem can be hopefully noticed and fixed right away.
Think of it this way: if you were building a trad anchor with, say, 3 cams, most people would be fine with using the snapgate racking carabiners on the cams. (If you wanted lockers everywhere, and built a three piece anchor, you probably have to carry about six extra lockers, which is a little ridiculous.) So, if you’re cool with using snapgates on your cams when building a gear anchor, logic says you should also be comfortable with them when building a bolt anchor.
On a related note, it makes no difference whatsoever which direction the carabiners face when clipped to the anchor points. They can both face right, face left, face each other or face opposite, it makes no difference. The concept of “opposite and opposed” carabiners applies at a masterpoint, not when clipped onto the the bolts.
The locker crowd says:
It’s a system that you rely on 100%. Even if the chance of failure is very tiny, why not use lockers and make it pretty much zero?
Modern locking carabiners are so lightweight and inexpensive that there's no reason not to use them. With the carabiners I'm using in the photo, the difference is about 10 grams in weight and $3 in cost more for each locker. You won’t notice either.
Having lockers everywhere gives some people a warm fuzzy feeling of confidence, which can be important.
You need to carry a few spare carabiners for your anchor, so why not make them locking?
What about lockers on the bolts for a top rope anchor?
For a top rope, using lockers on the bolts is something many people prefer. This is what I’d call an “unattended” anchor, because you build it, you lower off, and there's usually not anyone right there to keep an eye on things. Especially if you're using it for climbing multiple laps, or maybe having kids climb on it (who can be notorious for fiddling with anchor hardware), lockers can add a small extra level of security. Personally, I typically use lockers on bolts with a quad/sling for a top rope, but there are many very experienced climbers who do not.
Something to consider: many rock gyms simply have two opposite and opposed snapgate quickdraws at the top of their lead routes. If it's good enough for them, the liability attorneys and the insurance company, it's probably good enough for you too.
And let's remember there's a happy easy compromise in the middle: use one standard quickdraw and one locker draw as shown below. Pretty much no extra equipment and maybe a lot of extra peace of mind.
Remember the law of diminishing returns
A fundamental principle of economics (and many other aspects of life, including anchors) is the law of diminishing returns, which, in econ-speak, means that adding additional factors of production eventually results in smaller increases in output. Say that it takes one builder one year to build a house. So, if you have 365 builders, can you build a house in one day? Of course not, because after a certain point, the extra production (builders) result in lower output (less work getting done because they are tripping over each other).
This can apply to building anchors. Continuing to add “production” (backups, locking carabiners everywhere, etc.) at some point does not significantly increase your “output” (safety margin), so it's probably not so smart to keep doing it. Of course, the question becomes, where do you cross that point? There's no firm answer, but here's one way to think about it mathematically.
Say that the odds of a snap gate carabiner somehow becoming unclipped from an anchor are one in 1,000. The odds of the second leg of the anchor also becoming unclipped is also say one in 1,000. So, the theoretical odds of total anchor failure become 1,000 x 1,000, or one in 1 million. If you're feeling pretty good with these theoretical odds, then you probably don't need lockers on everything.
Closing thoughts . . .
Of course, it's good to know the realistic chances of potential problems and avoid unrealistic “gear fear”. However, if there's no penalty in weight, cost, or performance, there's not much downside in adding a small bit of extra security. Is your toprope anchor “overbuilt” with lockers on the bolts? Yeah, maybe. But who cares?
But if someone wants to slam you for making your anchor “overly safe”, then that’s a criticism you can probably live with. Don't let anyone else dictate your level of acceptable risk, regardless of their experience or credentials.
Would you make fun of your grandpa if he wants to wear a belt and suspenders? Picking just one would probably work fine, but if he wants to wear both, so what?
Alpinesavvy strives to offer information and ideas, not advice. I can share my personal preferences, but that in no way implies it's what someone else should do. Choose wisely, amigos!
Backside clove hitch: transition to "self-thread" lower
The “backside clove hitch” offers several options for efficient transitions from climbing to descending. Here's one way to use this tool: the second is lowered with an ATC on the anchor and the rope through the anchor hardware. This sets up the rope perfectly for the leader to rappel.
Note - This post discusses techniques and methods used in vertical rope work. If you do them wrong, you could die. Always practice vertical rope techniques under the supervision of a qualified instructor, and ideally in a progression: from flat ground, to staircase, to vertical close to the ground before you ever try them in a real climbing situation.
Transitioning from climbing up to rappelling down is often a complicated and time-sucking part of your climbing day.
The traditional method of each climber using a leash to connect in close to the anchor, each person untying from their respective ends of the rope, threading the anchor and then each person rigging for a rappel separately can be awkward at tight stances and often takes a lot longer than necessary, especially with less experienced folks.
There are several different techniques to increase efficiency. Here’s one of them: lowering the second climber to set up the rope for the first climber to rappel.
The leader arrives at the top anchor, builds an equalized anchor with a master point (say a quad).
The leader clips their climbing rope with a clove hitch to the master point.
When the second arrives at the anchor, instead of clipping to the anchor hardware with a tether, instead they clip to another clove hitch on the backside of the leader’s clove hitch connection.
This frees up the second’s end of the rope.
The second unties, threads the rope end through the anchor hardware, and re-ties into the rope.
Next, you rig a lowering system for the second, typically with an ATC on the anchor.
Now , when the second is lowered, half of the rope moves through the anchor hardware, which perfectly sets up the next person to rappel. Hence the name, “self thread lower”, schweeeeet!
(This is closely related to the backside clove hitch transition to rappel, which we cover at this article.)
Like many things in climbing, this is a much better show than a tell. Watch the two video clips below to see how it's done.
Why lower instead of rappel?
Low angle, blocky, rope grabbing terrain that makes throwing a rope problematic.
High winds, which could cause some big problems if you throw your rope.
You may not know exactly the distance to the next anchors. Lowering can ensure the first person gets there and does not find themself dangling in space at the end of the rappel. (Then you probably need to do the #CraftyRopeTrick of an extended rappel, which we cover in this article.)
Maybe a beginner climber who’s not comfortable with rappelling.
Many climbers are hesitant about being lowered from above. Interesting that these same climbers have no concerns with top rope climbing, when you are lowered from below, so what's the real difference? Yes the rigging is a bit different, and you need to practice that for sure, but in the end it's functionally about the same.
For this to work:
You need to know your descent and be SURE you're able to make it to the lower anchors or ground with at least half of the rope left. (If you just climbed the pitch and the belayer did not pass the middle mark, you should be fine).
On a multi pitch rappel, you need to be sure that the first person down can safely secure themselves to the anchor, which might be a concern with a beginning climber.
You need to have a good middle mark on your rope.
Assuming these requirements are meant, you can see from the videos below what an efficient technique this can be.
It might appear that this technique puts extra wear and tear on the anchor hardware, because it seems you're lowering directly through it, which is generally not best practice. Turns out, this is not the case. Almost all of the friction from the lowering is happening on your belay device, and the rope is simply redirected through the anchor hardware that's higher up.
From AMGA Rock Guide Cody Bradford.
Sadly Cody is no longer with us, but his excellent Instagram account is still up, highly recommended for many other climbing tips like this. Rest in peace, my friend.
https://www.instagram.com/reel/CbqClsZhOXc/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
Nice YouTube short from Summit Seekers Experience showing this technique:
Anchor forces from lowering
Say you’re lowering your partner from a top rope anchor, with the rope running through one carabiner. As your partner descends, what's the load on the anchor? Is it your partner’s bodyweight, 2x their bodyweight, or something else?
The illustrations in this article (shared with permission) come from the excellent website RopeLab, run by Australian rigging expert Richard Delaney. RopeLab has a ton of great material for anyone who wants to dive into ropes, rigging, and mechanical advantage, check it out! There's a fair amount of quality free information, but getting an annual subscription unlocks the entire website. You can also connect with Richard on Instagram and his YouTube channel, where he has loads of concise, informative videos.
These diagrams come from a RopeLab online mechanical advantage quiz, which you can find here.
You’re top rope climbing with your partner. They’re climbing, and you’re on the ground belaying. The rope goes from your harness, up to the anchor master point, and then back down to your partner.
In this common configuration, the load on the anchor can change depending on:
who is holding the rope
if the climber is resting and not being lowered
if the climber is being lowered, through typically a carabiner or two
For example:
Your partner finishes the climb, and calls for take and lower. You lock off your belay device, they lean back, weighting the rope, and you lower them to the ground.
What’s the force on the anchor when you're lowering them? Many people think it has to be twice the weight of the climber. Say the climber weighs 100 kg. You, the belayer, need to counterbalance that force with 100 kg of your own. So that means a 200 kg load on the anchor, right?
Well, turns out it's not quite that simple. Let's look at a few examples to see how this works!
Question 1 - A person (weight 1 kN) is holding their own weight, on a rope that goes through a 90% efficient pulley on an overhead anchor. What is the theoretical force on Anchor A?
IMAGE: ROPELAB.COM.AU
Answer: 1.0 kN
If you’re statically holding your own weight like the diagram, the anchor sees the force of your body weight. It doesn't matter if it goes through a 10% efficient pulley or 50% efficient carabiner, the force on the anchor is going to be the same.
(To add another interesting variable to this, if there's any sort of ledge or friction between you and the anchor, that will further reduce load on the anchor. But for now let's assume the climber is free hanging.)
Question 2 - A climber (weight 1 kN) is LOWERED with the rope running through a 90% efficient pulley. What’s the theoretical (including friction) force on Anchor B?
IMAGE: ROPELAB.COM.AU
Answer: 1.9 kN
The anchor sees the force of the climber, plus the force of the belayer to hold the rope, minus the 10% friction at the pulley. So, the force on the anchor is not two times the weight of the climber. (Yes, top roping through a pulley doesn’t happen in climbing very often, and it can actually be a bad idea if your belayer weighs much less than you do, but we’re using it here as an example.)
Question 3 - A climber (weight 1 kN) is LOWERED with the rope running through a 50% efficient carabiner. What’s the theoretical (including friction) force on Anchor C?
IMAGE: ROPELAB.COM.AU
Answer: 1.5 kN
When lowering, the anchor sees the force of the climber, plus the force of the belayer to hold the rope, MINUS the 50% friction at the carabiner. The friction from the carabiner significantly reduces the load on the anchor. This is why a belayer who’s a lot lighter than their partner (usually) doesn’t get lifted off the ground when they lower their partner from a toprope.
Here's another way to think about it:
When you’re raising something, friction can be your enemy.
When you're lowering something, friction can be your friend.
Here, friction at the anchor reduces the load on the anchor AND transfers less weight to the belayer for them to manage. That’s a good thing!
What are some practical uses for this in the real climbing world?
Rappelling, and lowering yourself, put the same load onto the anchor. If you top out on a 1 pitch climb and find yourself at an anchor you think is sketchy, rappelling might be less risky than being lowered.
Being lowered by your partner will always put more force on the anchor then rappelling or lowering yourself.
Any additional friction in the system, such as the rope running over rocks or ledges, will further decrease force on the anchor.
It's easy to test systems like this yourself. Just get a barbell plate of a standard amount (a round number like 10 lbs/kg helps) and an inexpensive digital scale like the one below. This scale is about $10.
Start your anchor with a quickdraw
Arriving at an bolt anchor with a small stance? A good first step can be to clip a quickdraw. Then, either clip or clove hitch yourself to the draw. This partially secures you while you build the rest of the anchor, and you can use the top carabiner of the draw as part of the anchor. Works for both multi pitch and top rope.
When you arrive at a bolted anchor, and the stance is fairly small, a good first step is often to clip a quickdraw.
If you have a decent place to stand, you might only need to clip the rope to the draw. if the stance is more marginal, you can tie a one handed clove hitch to attach yourself directly to one bolt. This gives you the temporary security you need to focus on building the rest of the anchor, whether it's for top rope or multi-pitch.
After clipping or clove hitching the draw, you stay on belay, still protected by your partner down below and all of the gear between you.
Here are two examples: 1) for a multi-pitch climb and 2) for a one pitch top rope.
For both examples, let's assume there's not much place to stand, so you secure yourself initially with a clove.
I'm using a pre-tied quad made from a 180 cm Dyneema sling, but the anchor could be pretty much anything you like.
After you build a proper anchor, you can use the bottom carabiner on the quickdraw as a place to hold your backpack, or maybe a sling with extra gear. It's probably NOT a good idea to use this as the first clip for the next pitch. That is a rather involved topic, and it's discussed a bit at the bottom of this article.
Method 1: Sequence for multi pitch anchor
What you need:
One quickdraw
Pre-tied quad, racked on one snapgate carabiner
One locking carabiner
Procedure:
Arrive at two bolt anchor.
Clip quickdraw to one bolt. For this example, the right bolt.
Clove hitch your lead rope into the bottom of the quickdraw. You’re secure at the anchor, but stay on belay, as you’re only clipped to one bolt. You are protected by your belayer and all of the gear you’ve already placed.
Clip the snap gate carabiner and the left arm of the quad to the left bolt.
Clip the right arm of the quad to the top carabiner on the quickdraw.
Clip the locking carabiner into two strands of the quad.
On the back side of the clove hitch connecting you to the quick draw, tie another clove hitch and clip it to the locking carabiner.
Take a breath and check everything: the locking carabiner is clipped to 2 strands, locked, and the clove hitch looks good.
Remove the first clove hitch you tied on the bottom of the quickdraw, and feed the resulting slack through the second clove hitch to adjust your position.
Schweeeet! Now you’re clove hitched to a locker that's on two strands of the quad. Add your belay device to the other two strands, pull up slack rope, put your partner on belay, and bring ‘em up.
Step 1: Clip a quickdraw to the bolt, and tie a one handed clove hitch to secure yourself temporarily. Stay on belay.
Step 2: Clip the quad to the left bolt with the snap gate carabiner it's racked on, and to the top carabiner of the quickdraw.
Step 3: Clip a spare locker to the quad, and tie a second clove hitch to the locker.
Step 4: Systems check - locking carabiner is clipped to 2 strands, locked, and the clove hitch looks good. Now you can remove the first clove hitch from the bottom of the quickdraw and feed some slack through the clove to adjust your position. Schweeeeet, you should be secured to the master point on the anchor. Give yourself a high five. =^)
Add your belay device to the other two strands of the quad, pull up rope, and bring up your partner.
Method 2: Sequence for one pitch top rope anchor
What you need:
One quickdraw
Pre-tied quad, racked on a locking carabiner
2 locking carabiners
Procedure:
Arrive at two bolt anchor.
Clip quickdraw to one bolt. For this example, the right bolt.
Clove hitch your lead rope into the bottom of the quickdraw. You’re secure at the anchor, but stay on belay, as you’re only clipped to one bolt. You are protected by your belayer and all of the gear you’ve already placed.
Clip the racking locker onto the left bolt and clip the left arm of the quad to this locker.
Clip the right arm of the quad into the top carabiner of the quickdraw.
Clip the two locking carabiners, opposite and opposed, onto the quad. Capture two strands of the quad with each carabiner. (It's even easier if these two carabiners are already in place before you start the pitch.)
On the backside of the clove hitch, clip the rope through both lockers and lock the gates.
Take a breath and check everything: Each locker should be clipped to 2 strands, gates locked, and rope running through them cleanly. If it all looks good, remove the clove hitch from the bottom carabiner of the quickdraw.
Schweeeet! You should now be clipped through both locking carabiners on the quad.
Call for “Take” and lower off.
Step 1: Clip a quickdraw to the bolt, and tie a one handed clove hitch to secure yourself temporarily. Stay on belay.
Step 2: Clip one arm of the quad to the left bolt with the racking locking carabiner. Note the two gold locking carabiners in the bottom of the quad. They are properly clipped with gates opposite and opposed, you can do this on the ground.
Step 3: Clip the other arm of the quad to the top carabiner of the quickdraw.
Step 4: On the backside of the clove hitch, clip the rope through both of the locking carabiners at the bottom of the quad. Lock the gates.
Step 5: Systems check - anchor looks good, all lockers are locked, each is clipped properly to two different strands of the quad. If it all looks good, remove your original clove hitch from the bottom of the quickdraw, call “Take”, and lower off.
You might be tempted to also use that quickdraw as the first clip for the next pitch. This is a common practice for many people, but there are some reasons why it’s not such a good idea.
It doesn’t really protect against a factor 2 fall.
It creates a 2:1 pulley effect, here on the right bolt.
It will probably mean the belayer is going to be yanked HARD into that gear if a big fall happens.
So it really doesn't help much, and may actually create some additional problems.
Here’s an interesting article by expert Canadian climber Will Gadd that covers the pros and cons of this. Summary: doing this makes sense only in a fairly specific situation (unquestionably strong piece, and belayer clipped in a way so they can't get pulled into it). Will concludes it’s probably not a good idea to do it as a common practice.
If you’re concerned about the leader taking a big fall right off of the belay, probably a better approach is to use a fixed point lead belay. With this method you belay directly off of the anchor rather than from your harness. There's no pulley effect, and much less force put on the belayer. I have a detailed article about that, you can read it here.
Anchor hardware systems: "closed" vs. "open"
Anchors with a “closed” metal chain or ring at the bottom require MANY steps when transitioning to a lower or rappel. For single pitch routes, “open” anchor hardware like a hook or carabiner lets the last person to simply clip and lower off; more efficient and lower risk. See some examples, and learn why a major American climbing organization favors the open anchor.
Traditional anchor hardware, at least in most parts of North America, has typically been some combination of chain links, quick links, and/or welded rings.
One term for these is a “closed” hardware system, because the bottom link (where the rope needs to go for you to rappel or be lowered) is closed.
Examples of CLOSED anchor hardware:
Quicklinks with chains
Quicklinks with rings
Fixe vertical anchor. These are great for multi pitch climbs, but not necessarily for single pitch routes. Strong though it is, when that big ring at the bottom wears out the entire anchor may need to be replaced.
However, for single pitch routes, an increasingly popular anchor is an “open” hardware system, also known as a “clip & lower”.
Examples of OPEN anchor hardware:
Anchor (aka “Mussy”) hooks.
“Captive eye” carabiners, which are theft proof (unless you’re a scumbag with pliers.) Many rock gyms have these on all the perma-draws. Those are galvanized steel for indoor use. Stainless steel is strongly preferred for outdoors.
To be clear: generally, it’s best practice with any kind of anchor hardware, closed or open, to toprope on YOUR gear and use the hardware to lower off only for the LAST person. More on that below.
Because the anchor points are “open”, and often facing away from the rock, it is remotely possible to unclip the rope if you were to climb above them and fall at some weird angle. It appears that this was a factor in a tragic accident in the United States in 2023; more on that below. If you stay below the anchor and put a steady load on it as you would when lowering, it should not be a problem.
The best use of open hardware: lowering off one pitch routes. A multi pitch route, closed hardware is preferred, because you were only attaching to the anchor or rappelling down. To rappel you need one end of the rope available, which you thread through the anchor and pull rather than clipping. So, there's no reason for open hardware on a multi pitch.
Note the anchor hooks and carabiners both face outward, not opposite and opposed. There’s a reason for this, more on that below.
Close up of stainless steel captive eye carabiners. About $6 each. Not CE rated, but 3/8 inch / 10 mm marine grade stainless steel, with a breaking load of nearly 5,000 pounds / 2,250 kG. That’s #SuperGoodEnough for a lower off anchor! These particular ones have gates that are quite stiff, which makes accidental backclipping much harder. That’s good!
I got these from usstainless.com.
Ram’s horn / pigtail open anchors
Another style of open anchor hardware is a “ram’s horn”, aka pigtail. More common in Europe, but still quite rare in the United States. They are being used in a few areas, so I thought I’d mention it.
These are typically made from 10 of 12 mm stainless steel rod, and cost about $10 each. They also come in titanium, which wears out faster than stainless steel, but is good for coastal areas. And no, it doesn't twist your rope.
You can get them from team-tough in the US or in Europe from bolt-products. (Reminder: there are no affiliate marketing links on my website. I post links like this as a convenience.)
Simply flip the rope and around each horn and lower off. Does it look sketchy to you? Could the rope magically unclip itself from both horns at once? Pretty much impossible; it’s close to getting-hit-by-lightning unlikely.
Apparently in Europe it's quite common to have just a single horn to lower from, but personally I'm not too excited about that. Here's an accident report from the Austrian Alpine Club about this failing during a rappel, which I'm pretty sure was from just a single point, and not two separate pigtails. The club mentions there have been several accidents related to these but I don't know any other details. Remember, Americans like moi prefer redundant anchor points.
Again, the best use of these is LOWERING from single pitch routes, not as rappel anchors. (Using these doesn’t make much sense to me on multi pitch rappel anchors, because you're already untied from the end of the rope, so a closed ring seems lots more secure.)
From the article:
“After a few serious climbing accidents, we (Austrian Alpine Club) have to advise against using pig tails (see picture) for abseiling. In the event of jerky loading and unloading, the rope can detach completely from the steel bracket!”
Here's another accident report from Austria, not sure if it covers the same incident or not. It's in German.
“The sow tail, which is designed as a deflection hook, is a system that is open at the top and requires correct insertion of the rope as well as the subsequent downward load. If the rope is moved up over the sow tail, it can be unhooked. This danger must be taken into account, especially if the belay with pigtail is positioned below the climber's tie-in point.”
Note the photo below where these are used as a pair. This makes it more secure than just a single one.
image: https://climbingboltsupplies.com/products/bolt-products-rams-horn
Here's an outstanding video from our friends at HowNot2.com showing different ways to rig anchor hooks, some potential problems, and lots more. A good instructional segment starts at 8:30.
Check out this YouTube video by Bobby Hutton (part of the team at HowNot2.com) for more on the ram’s horn. Note in this video he has a very interesting vertical arrangement to the anchor points, rather than two horizontal components. Check the video to learn the benefits of this system.
OK, got it. So what? What’s cool about open hardware for single pitch routes?
My buddy Ryan Jenks at HowNot2.com has a great blog post on this, so I'm gonna borrow a few paragraphs from him (used with permission, of course.)
“Closed systems require climbers to untie their tie-in knot to connect the rope to the anchor to clean a route. This can be dangerous if a climber misses a step or gets confused. Speaking of steps, closed systems require a lot of them. Cleaning a route with a closed system anchor demand knowledge, focus, memory, and organization. Missing any step can be catastrophic. Closed systems make it impossible for the rope to come out of the anchor, this is their main benefit.
Open systems require less knowledge and memory because they remove at least 8 steps when cleaning a route. We think that makes them safer. Open systems also ease traffic jams on popular routes because it is much faster to clean them. The disadvantage of open systems is that it's not impossible for the rope to come out, it's only extremely freakishly unlikely.”
Ryan also put together this great spreadsheet/list on his blog post of comparing the steps involved with different systems. Hint, fewer steps are usually better!
image: https://www.hownot2.com/post/mussy-hooks
Let's talk about anchor hooks, the most common flavor of open anchor.
Below is a photo of some hooks recently retired from one of the most popular single pitch routes probably in all of the United States, “5 Gallon Buckets” at Smith Rock Oregon. Yikes, those look pretty scary, don't they? (Sidenote, I‘ve lowered off these exact same hooks.)
I'm using the term “anchor hooks”, because that’s preferred by the American Safe Climbing Association, rather than “Mussy”. See their comments on this below.
Here's why anchor hooks are great.
They cost about $9 each.
They’re attached with a simple quick link to the bolt hanger, so the bolt never needs to be touched. Just open the quick link and put in a new hook. Fast and easy to replace.
Even these worn out hooks both break tested over 60 kN!
Very long lasting. I have no idea how many thousands of people have lowered off these hooks, but they lasted for many seasons on a very popular route.
Side note: Anchor hooks are typically placed so both gates are facing OUT from the rock. Yes, this means they are not opposite and opposed. Why? See next paragraph.
photo credit: https://www.mountainproject.com/photo/122999681
A cautionary note on anchor hooks
In autumn 2023, there was a fatal accident in Alabama. It involved a beginning climber who was cleaning an anchor hook anchor, that had a locking carabiner added to minimize wear on the hooks. The carabiner was removed, somehow the rope unclipped from the hooks, and she fell.
Short version: for anchor hooks, do NOT add a carabiner on the anchor for the rope. If you do toprope through your own equipment, extend quick draws or slings BELOW the level of the hooks, and put the rope through your own gear that way. This reduces, but does not eliminate, the risk of the above accident happening again.
Also, NEVER have someone clean an anchor who is not 110% solid on the correct procedure. The proper learning sequence should be: 1) instruction on the ground, until the person can demonstrate several times in a row the correct sequence. Then, 2) doing it with an instructor off the ground, hanging at the actual anchor, where they can be directly supervised. (This means NOT yelling instructions from the base of the cliff!)
Here’s an analysis of the accident from IFMGA Certified Guide Karsten Delap.
Here's another video from Karsten showing a few different methods of building an anchor with your own gear, and transferring to the anchor hooks when it's time to lower off for the last person.
So, why are anchor hooks usually placed with both gates out, and not opposite and opposed? I asked the American Safe Climbing Association, and they said:
“Anchor hooks are placed with gates out for a couple reasons. If opposed the inward facing hook tends to gouge into the rock and scar it up, along with orienting strangely to wear much faster on the nose or even get pushed into the bottom of the wiregate. If they are extended with chains to lay flat and opposed the rope gets pinched behind the hooks and wears unnecessarily/grooves the rock.
If the hooks are placed in very overhanging terrain this ceases to be a problem, but the opposition of the hooks still causes more friction on ropes and the hooks themselves, so we feel that because they are being used for lowering and the climber will always be beneath them gates out is the ideal configuration.
Obviously this all is dependent on the climber never being above the hooks - trying to clip into the system from the top of the cliff then downclimbing to set a toprope being a particularly dangerous scenario. There are many ways to dangerously misconfigure any anchor system and there will be no way to protect against all of them, but it is important that when a equipper places any type of anchor they consider how they are normally accessed. We have some guidelines on our Lower Off Initiative page detailing what to do if climbing above, etc.
Also, just as a matter of language, we refer to the CT wiregate hook as an "Anchor Hook" and the old style ones with the crappy gate as a "Mussy Hook", this is commonly misused but we stick to it as there is a difference and the Anchor Hook is purpose built for climbing applications with a stainless steel wiregate.”
Since we're talking about strength of horrendously worn out anchor hooks, let's look at the breaking strength of a NEW anchor hook, a steel carabiner, and a ram’s horn. (Data from HowNot2.com)
Keep in mind this is for a single pitch top rope anchor, where the forces will hardly ever be more 4kN.
New anchor hook: about 72! kN
Steel “gym” carabiner: about 49 kN
Ram’s horn: about 22 kN
Your climbing rope will break in about 14 kN, so anything stronger than that and you're good. In summary: way more than #SuperGoodEnough!
Here's a visual I like. 1 kN is about 100 kg, or 220 pounds. The way I like to think of it is the average weight of an NFL football player. There are 11 players on offense and defense playing against each other, so any point during the game there's 22 players on the team. Imagine 22 NFL football players all hanging from ONE 8 mm Dyneema sling that's rated to at least this amount. Or in this case one Ramshorn. To really get ridiculous, think of 72 football players all strung together, hanging off of an anchor hook.
Yep, that's plenty strong enough for your climbing.
The American Safe Climbing Association (ASCA) fully supports open anchor hardware for single pitch routes.
“The ASCA is committed to standardizing clip-and-lower style anchors on high traffic, single pitch routes across the country. In 2022 we provided over 5500 Lower-Offs through our Lower-Off Initiative. The majority were ClimbTech anchor hooks, but some ss and titanium went to wet/coastal areas. Along with the hooks, we supplied over 6000 quicklinks for attachment to existing anchors.”
Here's a photo from their website. (Note the hooks are both facing OUT away from the rock.) The ASCA started what they call the “Lower-off Initiative”. Hint hint: donating to a great organization that's actively trying to save your life is a great idea.
I asked them on Facebook to clarify their stance on lowering on open anchor hardware. Is it for everyone or just for the last person? Here's what they said:
“Our general recommendation is that everyone except for the last climber toprope/lower off personal gear, and the last climber in the party lowers off the fixed hardware. That being said - the gear we provide is robust and long lasting so don't feel bad if you go straight through the steel because you have concerns about a toproper not making it to the anchor or being proficient enough to move the rope over to the fixed lowering hardware. Our goal is less accidents.”
image; https://safeclimbing.org/lower-off-initiative
Use a rigging rope for top rope anchors
Are you setting up a top rope where the anchor points are far away from the edge of the cliff? Using a second rope, called a rigging rope, to set this up is an excellent choice. Here are a couple of different ways to set it up, and lots of reasons why this is better than using old-school tubular webbing.
You’re setting up a top rope at a single pitch climbing area, where you have easy access to the top of the cliff. The anchor points (a solid tree and a boulder with some good cracks for gear) are about 5-10 meters back from the edge of the cliff.
How can you quickly rig a simple, strong and speedy top rope anchor with a master point that extends over the edge?
The old-school way method for many folks was to use webbing; usually a big length of 1 inch tubular, or maybe even start girth hitching or connecting every sling you and your partner have, to extend the master point over the edge.
This is also known in some circles as the “Joshua Tree System”. Joshua Tree is a wonderful climbing area where this rigging is especially handy, because good anchor points are often far back away from the actual edge of the cliff.
A better solution: have a second rope with you that you only use for anchor rigging and safety near the cliff top, aka a “rigging rope”.
A typical rigging rope is static (minimal stretch), 9 or 10 mm, between 20 and 30 meters in length. Even so-called “static” ropes have a little bit of stretch; they are actually about 25 percent dynamic. So it’s not like you’re climbing on a steel cable, a common misconception.
You‘re not likely to find static rope sold by-the-foot at your local climb shop, so ask ‘em if they can special order it for you. (Support your local climb shop before you buy online.) Consider buying a 60 meter static rope, cutting it in half and sharing the other half with a climbing pal.
Another option is to get two different lengths of maybe 12 or 15 meters each. If you only need a shorter length, you can bring one. If the anchors are farther apart, you can tie the ropes together to extend them. That way, you don't need to bring an extra 30 m of rope in your pack for every rigging project.
Consider a canyoneering rope. They are static, and come in various shorter useful lengths, like 30 meters.
Cost is approximately $3 per meter, so you’re looking at $70- $100. Yes, it's expensive, but as they say, buy once, cry once. Every time you set up a top rope like this, it’ll be well worth it.
Why use a static rigging rope instead of 1” webbing?
Overall, using a rigging rope is faster to set up, easier to inspect and adjust, and has fewer individual components.
Static materials are good to use here. With a standard dynamic climbing rope, as the rope is weighted and unweighted. it stretches and unstretches under load over the cliff edge, which could potentially damage it.
Static ropes usually have a very durable sheath. Webbing has no sheath.
Kernmantle (German: “kern”= core, “mantel” = sheath) rope is generally quite abrasion resistant, while tubular webbing is definitely not. When loaded over an edge with a sideways sort of pull, rope will tend to roll, whereas webbing tends to slide. Sliding is going to lead to more potential abrasion.
Static rope works with a Grigri, which is a great tool to reduce your risk when you're working around a cliff edge. Can't use a Grigri with webbing. With a Grigri, always have a stopper knot or hard backup bight knot below the device, as a Grigri can creep downward under a light load.
You can tie many more knots (and use friction hitches) in rope than you can in webbing. With webbing, you're pretty much restricted to a water knot or an overhand on a bight.
Here's another slightly different way to set up a rigging rope. Here, each END of the rope is tied to a solid anchor. You walk to the edge, tie a BHK in two strands, and use that for your top rope master point. You will have an extra loop of rope. Just set this on the ground or coil out of the way and don't use it.
Notes . . .
Don’t stress out about getting perfect equalization between the two arms. Most of the time, you’ll have a stout rope with each strand attached to an unquestionably strong anchor. Try to get each arm of the anchor as close to equal load sharing as you can, but there's rarely a need to make them an exact match.
It's good practice to always secure yourself if you are within 2 meters of the edge of a cliff. After you set up one leg of the anchor, you can put on a Grigri or friction hitch to approach the edge and tie the BHK.
It's good practice to tie a hard backup bight knot below your Grigri or fiction hitch, and clip this backup knot to your belay loop with a locking carabiner.
Be nice to trees. Try to avoid damaging the bark, especially if the tree is regularly used as an anchor. Consider padding the tree with an empty backpack, or maybe an old piece of carpet. If you have an option to use a rock, you might want to do that instead.
If the rope is being loaded over a rough or sharp edge and you’re concerned about it getting damaged, you have a few options. Quick and dirty, put a backpack under it. If you plan ahead a bit, you can take a section of cut up garden hose sliced lengthwise, and put that around the rope as a protector. What works best, and are still fairly inexpensive, are commercial rope protectors. If you find yourself setting up top ropes a lot, these can be a good investment.
If you still don't like the rope being loaded over a sharp edge, then maybe you should go climb somewhere else. =^)
Here's an example of a specially made rope protective sleeve. If you top rope a lot on rough rock, this can be a good investment. Under $20.
image: https://www.amazon.com/MONSTER-Rope-Protector-Armor-1-6/dp/B08NPNYN82
Finally, here's a great video from our friends at Smile Mountain Guides with a more detailed tutorial of how to set it up.
The “meat anchor”: what is it, how do you use it?
If you’re ever in the mildly desperate situation of having to rappel in moderate terrain that one person can hopefully downclimb, and there's no anchors on top, it might be time to pull the “meat anchor” out of your bag of #CraftyRopeTricks.
Photo credit: diagram by Andy Kirkpatrick, used with permission. From his excellent book “Down”, highly recommended!
This article was written with assistance from my expert canyoning friend Kevin Clark, author of “Canyoneering in the Pacific Northwest: A Technical Resource” Lots more on meat anchors in his book.
If you’re ever unfortunate enough to find yourself at the top of some terrain that needs to be rappelled, but has zero anchor building possibilities, you might want to pull the “meat anchor” out of your bag of tricks.
A meat anchor is where a person(s) is the actual anchor, so other people can rappel (or maybe be lowered) directly off of them.
The meat anchor is also known as a “human anchor”. It’s a variation of the classic sitting hip belay.
A meat anchor is often used in canyoning, where you often encounter a wide variety of terrain, with much of it possibly down-climbable and relatively short by alpine climbing standards.
The least skilled and/or heaviest person goes first. The most skilled climber (and hopefully the lightest climber) goes last. In a larger group, the anchor can be backed up by other team members when the first/heavier people are descending.
A meat anchor can also be used to belay someone who is downclimbing, or lowering, if necessary. (You’ll have a lower load on the anchor if they rappel.)
Of course, if you’re able to brace your feet on something, or sit your butt down in the snow, this can be remarkably strong and improves the security of your anchor.
Got more than two people? Share the load. Have them sit in a “train”, clipped to each other's harnesses, and have them back each other up. They can also sit side-by-side, and equalize the load off of each other's harness.
What else helps to decrease the load? Having the rope go over a ledge (which can decrease forces on the anchor up to 66%), having the rappeller go slowly with minimal bouncing, and have the rappeller begin as low to the rock as possible.
Here's a scenario that might be used with a larger group.
You come to a drop that you think is downclimbable, but aren't 100% certain. Set up a meat anchor (backed up), then an experienced party member downclimbs on belay. One of three outcomes:
They report back that it's an easy downclimb, so toss the rope down for them to coil, and everybody downclimbs.
They report that it can be downclimbed, but it's spicy - and might be better for the newbies to rappel. Newbies rappel off the human anchor and best climber goes last.
They have to be lowered, so it's a rappel for every one. Maybe the human anchor stays in position and have people start rappelling, while another person starts rigging an anchor nearby.
You're probably thinking, “What about the last person, what do THEY do? Of course, this doesn’t give many good options for the last person going down. Hopefully they’re able to downclimb. This often might be the case with a guide-client scenario, or a more experienced trip leader with beginners.
The first person down can place protection anywhere they can find it, and clip one rope strand to it. Then the last person can downclimb and clean the gear, while being belayed from below.
This technique is known in some circles as “downleading”, and it can be a good strategy whether or not you’re doing a meat anchor and want to safeguard the descent for the last person. Here’s an article on downleading.
So, this is a Crafty Rope Trick you’re hopefully not doing on a regular basis, but it might get you out of a sticky situation.
Photo: meat anchor with multiple “anchor points”
image: https://www.mountainproject.com/forum/topic/114012583/transition-to-canyoneering
Friction can lower forces on an anchor
When rappelling, often the rope is going over a ledge. This added friction can make your rope pull more difficult, but it also reduces the force on the anchor, which can be a good thing. The greater the angle, up to about 90°, the less force is put on the anchor.
This tip comes from my pal and canyoning expert Kevin Clark and his book, “Canyoning in the Pacific Northwest: A Technical Resource.”
I did a live body test of this at the rock climbing wall in Marymoor park in the Seattle area. My friend Ryan from @hownottohighline shot the video. See the short Instagram reel and the results here.
Results:
me hanging fully on rope: 190 lbs on anchor
Rope angle from edge to anchor about 50°: 135 lbs on anchor, or about 30% less load
Rope angle from edge to anchor about 10°: 80 lbs on anchor, or about 58% less load
When rappelling, the maximum force on the anchor usually occurs just as the rappeller is passing over the edge on top of the pitch. Once below the edge, the load on the anchor is reduced by the friction from the rope passing over the edge. The more contact with rock the rope has, and the larger the angle, the lower the force on the anchor.
There are lots of factors involved, such as how slippery the sheath of your rope is, if the rock edge is rounded or sharp, whether the rock is wet or dry, the type of rock, etc.
With a rope that runs over the edge at a 45° angle, the load on the anchor can be reduced by as much as 50%.
If the rope passes over the edge at a 90° angle, the load reduction can be as high as 66%.
If your anchor is questionable, that's probably a good thing. The trade-off is your rope is going to be harder to pull.
Let's look at some examples. Let's assume our rappeler weighs about 100 kg.
Example 1: The rope is anchored to bolts hanging over the edge of the cliff top. There is zero friction from the cliff edge. Our 100 kg rappeler puts a 100 kg load on the anchor. Hopefully that should be pretty obvious. (And yes, starting your rappel from a position like this might be a bit difficult.)
Example 2: Instead of using the bolts, the climber is now rappelling from a sling they put around the tree about, say, head height. Yes, this can increase leverage on the tree, but if the tree is stout, it doesn't really matter. A higher anchor point is more convenient to get rigged and start your rappel.
(Sidenote, it's best practice to avoid rapping with your rope around the tree. Doing this can damage the tree, get tree sap on your rub, and make for a very difficult pull. Add a sling instead.)
This makes an angle of about 45° over the edge of the cliff. Once the climber is over the edge, how much force do we now have on the anchor?
Using that best case scenario of 50% force reduction, the load on the anchor is now about 50 kg.
Example 3: Instead of anchoring higher up in the tree, our climber decides to use the base of the tree. (This decreases the leverage on the tree, but might make it harder to rig your rappel.)
This makes an angle over the cliff edge of around 90°. Once the climber is over the edge, what kind of load do we now have on the anchor?
Assuming a best case reduction of about 66%, the tree only sees a load of 33 kg. Good trick if your tree (or other any other sort of anchor) is marginal!
Here are some other techniques to minimize the load on the anchor:
Interestingly enough, you can significantly increase the forces on the anchor in that brief second or two when your feet are on the edge of the rock and you are leaning backwards. This has an interesting force multiplier, even if it's just for a moment. If your anchor is marginal, you probably want to avoid doing that.
To counter this, you can get as low as you can when starting the rappel, perhaps even sliding over the edge. Canyoneers call this a "soft start.”
Pushing the rope down into the rock surface as you go over the edge to help maximize friction.
Keep a consistent load on the anchor, good rappel technique, etc. Don’t jump down the rock like a special forces cowboy.
Use footholds if possible to keep load off the anchor.
A closer look at the “American Death Triangle”
The so-called “American Death Triangle” admittedly is a catchy name, is not best practice for anchor rigging . . . and is not as bad as it’s reputation. Learn about why it's stronger than you might think, and the pros and cons of related rigging methods.
This article has contributions from Over the Edge Rescue, IFMGA Certified Guide Karsten Delap, and HowNot2.com
Short version: the American Death Triangle (ADT) is not a preferred method for rigging anchors, but it's not as bad as you might think. With anchor angles typical in climbing (under 90 degrees), the ADT puts about 100% of the load onto each anchor point; the exact amount depends on the angle. The main problem with it is zero redundancy; if the sling fails, so do you. If you have to use one in the wild, provided the sling is in good shape, you're probably going to be fine.
American Death Triangle: top rope setup
American Death Triangle: rappel setup
The so-called “American Death Triangle” (“ADT”) in the early days of climbing, was a fairly common way to build anchors. It uses a minimum amount of webbing, and offers good equalization. At first glance it appears to be serviceable, even if it ignored a few basic rules of physics. Plus, you have to admit it's a catchy name!
However, for a long time it’s been roundly slammed in just about every climbing book ever written. “Don’t use it! Load multiplication! It creates dangerous forces on the anchors!” is usually about the extent of it.
Overall, that’s good advice. There are almost always better options for rigging that are redundant and put lower force on the anchor points.
But, you might wonder, how bad is it, really?
Before word got out that they weren't so great, ADTs were used for probably tens of thousands of anchors over decades. Did you ever hear of one failing? Are “catastrophic” forces really being created? If someday you have to use one in the wild, is it a YGD (Yer Gonna Die) scenario? What about other related configurations, like rappelling off of side-by-side rings, or lowering off of an adjacent route, or slinging a big boulder, that are sort of the same thing?
While the ADT may not be as bad as you might think, there are some reasonable concerns (listed in rough order of importance)
It’s not redundant. In the photos above, any failure of the sling/cord means the whole anchor fails. That's the primary problem!
It can put a inward / sideways pull on your gear, which could be an issue. For example, a piton in a horizontal crack could be plenty strong enough for a downward pull, but maybe not for an inward pull. More on that below.
It can increase the load onto the anchor points. The amount of this increase is related to the angle at the bottom of the triangle. It's rarely more than 1X the actual load onto each anchor point. More on that below. If the anchors are reasonably solid, this is probably not a concern.
You're only using the strength of a single strand of the material, instead of doubling it up, which increases the strength.
If one anchor point failed, it's likely you’re going to have some extension onto the the remaining piece, no bueno.
Since load multiplication is the main concern most people have, let's look at that first. (We’ll keep the physics and math as simple as possible, I promise!)
Pretty much every “Climbing Anchors 101” class has a diagram something like the one below. The smaller the angle between the two legs, the better the load sharing on the anchor points. As you get close to 180°, like on a slackline or Tyrolean traverse, the load multiplication gets ridiculous. This is for sure a good principle to keep in mind for standard anchor building.
Do you remember a vector force diagram like this from your anchor class? I suspect that this is at the root of the idea that the ADT causes high forces: “Horizontal rope in anchor ALWAYS equals super duper load multiplication.”
However, this does NOT apply to the ADT, where are the load direction is completely different from the diagram below.
image: https://www.ropebook.com/information/vector-forces/
Let's check the numbers
Here’s a nice chart from “Rock Climbing: The AMGA Single Pitch Manual” by Bob Gaines and Jason Martin. This is the only book I’ve seen with actual data on the ADT.
The second column, “V rigging”, refers to a standard way of clipping a sling to each anchor, making two arms, and then tying it off with a bight knot.
source: “Rock Climbing: The AMGA Single Pitch Manual” by Bob Gaines and Jason Martin
Turns out, with a 100 lb load and a small bottom angle of approximately 30°, there’s only 82 pounds of force being put on each leg of an ADT anchor. That’s a bit more than the 52 pounds or so on each leg with standard “V rigging”, but nothing close to catastrophic.
Even at a 90° angle, about as large as you would normally want to go, the ADT only puts 130 pounds on each anchor. Again, not close to catastrophic. (If your anchor placements can't hold 130 pounds, you've got some much bigger problems!)
So check that out, load multiplication is not really a problem!
For you engineers and more visual folks who want to see the math behind this and some nice diagrams, check out this webpage from our New Zealand friends at Over the Edge Rescue.
Rappelling on adjacent rings?
I've heard this question a few times: What about rappelling on adjacent rings? Does that create any sort of a dangerous death triangle? Short answer is no. The angle created by your rappel device in the photo is quite small, 30° or less. This creates a load on each anchor point that's just a bit more than your body weight. The bolts can easily handle that, plus they can take a load in any direction, so no worries. (Check out the HowNot2com video link at the bottom, at around 12 minutes, to see some testing on this.)
Stone hitch?
Here’s a similar situation. There’s a Stone hitch tied below the anchor, which isolates each strand of rope, typically so you can rappel on a single strand.
Does this create a dangerous ADT on the anchors? Yes it's an ADT, but with those bolts it’s certainly not dangerous. For rappelling, where the load is never going to be more than 1-2 kN, load multiplication is of no concern.
Lowering from an adjacent route?
Scenario: Say you have two different bolt anchors that are the same height at the top of the climb. If you climb the left route, clip 1 anchor, traverse to the right, clip the other anchor, and then lower off without pulling your rope through the first anchor, are you making any sort of dangerous ADT?
Answer: no. A clever engineer friend of mine calculated that the force on each anchor is just a little over the climber’s body weight. (To be more specific, the right anchor takes about 1.25x the climber’s weight, and the left anchor takes about 0.9x the climber’s weight.) So the takeaway: no problem!
If you do this, be aware that you’ll need more rope to safely lower your partner to the ground, so be SURE your rope is long enough!
What are the real world forces?
In the “rappel setup” photo near the top of the page, the joining knot is on the legs of the triangle between the load and the anchor. What if we put the knot on the base of the triangle instead, horizontally between the anchor points? Would the knot see increased forces, or decreased forces?
In the photo below, we have an approximate equilateral triangle, with 60° in each leg, and the joining knot, a Flemish bend, between the two anchor points. Say we have a load of 100 kg hanging off of the rappel ring. Will the knot see less than, equal to, or greater than 100 kg? Take a guess!
Answer: quite a bit less. That's because the friction on each of the anchor points absorb some of the load. The actual amount depends on the slickeriness of the material you're using, and what it's actually running through at the anchor, but the takeaway is that the base of a triangle sees the lowest amount of force. Is that surprising? It was to me!
(Note on the photo below: yes I know you could put your rope directly through the rappel rings and ignore the entire ADT rigging, but I needed to set up like this to get a equilateral triangle with the length of cord I had . . . =^)
The theoretical force on each bolt would be the same as the load, or 100 pounds. But because the cord is running through the rappel rings, this friction actually reduces the force going to the hangers, which is a good thing. With a 60° equilateral triangle, about 80% of the load goes to the bolt, and about 36% is seen by the knot (a Flemish bend, in case you’re wondering).
Below is a screen grab from our friends at HowNot2.com who tested pretty much the same set up.
With a load of 2.4 kN at the master point:
the base of the triangle between the anchor points saw a load of 0.9 kN, about 36% of the load.
each bolt saw a load of 1.96 kN, about 80% of the load.
(There's a link to the whole video at the bottom of the page.)
image: HowNot2.com, screeng rab from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7sQNpjnJe40
Changing the direction of force
Here's a diagram that shows a bit how that works. (Original diagram credit: Over the Edge Rescue).
In the diagram, we have an ADT with angles of 60° on each side, an equilateral triangle. “A” are the two anchor points, and “L is the load.
Check out the blue arrows pointing inward from the anchors. This is known as the “resultant”, and it's the change in direction of force caused by the ADT. This means that instead of having the force going down the legs of the anchor directly to the load, it's instead directed inward, halfway between the base of the triangle and the two legs.
In this example, if we have a load of 100 kg at the bottom, 0.6 of that load (red circles, 60 kg) goes to each leg of the anchor. This results in a theoretical force of 100 kg on each of the two anchor points, pulling in the direction of the blue arrows. (As we saw above, in the real world because of friction, this force on the two anchor points would be reduced, but for here let's use the theoretical model.)
Here's an example of how this “resultant” force might cause a problem: two pitons in a horizontal crack. Either of these would probably be good for a more downward pull, which we would have with a “V rigged” anchor.
However, the ADT puts a larger INWARD force on the pitons, which could cause them to fail. This is another problem with the ADT, loading gear in a direction you may not have anticipated.
(image credit: Karsten Delap
image credit: karsten delap, from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bW15yKu1ATM
More resources . . .
Sheesh, the ADT even has its own Wikipedia page!
Our New Zealand friends at Over The Edge Rescue have an article that will appeal to the engineers.
IFMGA Certified Guide Karsten Delap has a nice article on his website, along with the video below.
HowNot2.com has a detailed video on the ADT.
Retreat anchors - sport climbing
If your ambition sometimes exceeds your ability, a sudden storm is rolling in, or you discover your rope is too short to reach the anchor, it's probably time to think about bailing off of that sport route. There are a few considerations for gear, and one crafty rope trick you can use to reduce your risk.
Note - This post discusses techniques and methods used in vertical rope work. If you do them wrong, you could die. Practice vertical rope techniques with a qualified instructor, and ideally in a progression: from flat ground, to staircase, to vertical close to the ground before you ever try them in a real climbing situation.
Takeaway:
Dos: Lowering off of a single snapgate carabiner is probably gonna be fine. If you're not comfortable with that, use a locker or put some tape on a snapgate.
Don’ts: Avoid using quicklinks, because they can be hard for the next person to open and complicate others using the route. Don’t lower off the hanger, nad for sure don’t lower off a sling!
Not comfortable lowering off of a single snap gate carabiner? Make a “cheapskate locker” with a few wraps of tape securing the gate. Stick the tape end to itself to make a tab for the next person to clean more easily.
Is this a little harder for the next person at the route to clean? Yes.
Is making it convenient for the next person more important than your comfort and level of acceptable risk when lowering off one bolt? No.
Ever bailed from a sport route? If not, it's probably going to happen someday, and when it does, you’ll need to have a retreat strategy.
When you bail from a route, be at a one pitch sport climb or an alpine multipitch, the objectives are similar: Get to the ground in one piece, with each anchor point strong enough but not overbuilt, and leave a minimum of gear behind.
Reasons to bail on a sport climb include:
“Ambition exceeding ability” - the climbing is too hard for you to complete
It’s getting dark, rainy, lightning, etc.
The route is longer than the rope you’re using, meaning for a one pitch sport route, the middle mark of the rope goes through your belayer’s device before you make it to the anchor. Hopefully you have both an attentive belayer who notices this, and a good middle mark on your rope. (Next time, bring a longer rope and read the damn guidebook!)
Hopefully, you’re on a modern sport route that has properly stout bolts and hangers. If you trust a bolt to take a lead fall on, you should certainly trust it to be gently lowered from, right? One encouraging thought: the maximum force possible on an anchor when lowering is not much more than double your body weight, 2 kN (about 450 lbs), which should be well within the strength rating of even a poorly placed bolt.
If you happen to be on a bolt that looks sketchy, you can reduce the force on the bolt by rappelling instead of being lowered. This puts only your bodyweight on the bolt. Because of the pulley effect, lowering puts approximately two times your bodyweight onto the anchor. Hopefully the next bolt lower down inspires a little more confidence.
What if you’re bailing from one pitch sport route, and more than half of the rope has already been used? Well, that means you can’t lower off from that point and make it to the ground or the previous anchor.
First, make SURE your belayer is tied into the rope end or at the very least has a knot in the very end (aka a “closed rope” system) so they can't drop you. There are a few different ways to handle this, but this is probably the easiest one: Lower to one bolt fairly close to the ground, tether yourself to that bolt, pull your rope, and then lower off again from that lower bolt. Yes, this requires you donate one more carabiner.
Are you bummed you're leaving gear behind? Of course you are. Think of it as the price of a lesson in humility and judgment, and try to do better next time.
Safety note: Do not thread the rope directly through a bolt hanger for either lowering or rappelling! The sharp edge might damage your rope, and if you rappel, the extra friction might make it impossible to pull your rope down. Please, never consider doing this and always leave behind a $5 carabiner instead. (Scroll to the bottom to see one possible solution if you come across anchor bolts with no hardware.)
You can lower from basically four gear options:
regular carabiner
locking carabiner
quicklink / maillon
taped gate carabiner
1) Regular carabiner. Most of the time you can pilfer a carabiner from one of your quickdraws, leave it on a bolt, and lower off that.
This is probably going to be fine most of the time, because if you have a smooth lower under a constant load, it would be quite difficult for the rope to do anything weird in the carabiner. But the load may not be constant: you may have to start/stop, bypass ledges or vegetation, stop and clean gear, etc. All of these could cause some strange carabiner jiggling, cross loading, or some other unwanted some rope/carabiner weirdiosity. So because of this, many people are more comfortable with something that can be locked.
If the bolt you’re lowering from doesn’t give you a warm fuzzy feeling, then leave another carabiner on the next bolt down. In the highly unlikely event of the top bolt failing, you should be caught by the next one. Yes, this does involve leaving behind a second carabiner. (That's never happened in the entire history of climbing as far as I know, but hey, it's cheap insurance.)
2) Locking carabiner. Not only is this a secure option, it makes it easy for the next person up to clean and remove it. That's a big bonus, so this is a fine choice. (Don't crank the gate down too hard.)
3) Quicklink / maillon. These offer an inexpensive locking lowering point, but they have a couple of downsides. The locking sleeve on the quicklink is probably going to cinch down, maybe get rusty, and be hard to open without pliers, which makes cleaning it problematic. It's more courteous to leave the route in better shape for the next person by lowering from an easy-to-clean carabiner instead.
Plus, depending on the size of the hanger, the next person on the route may have a hard time clipping their quickdraw past the quicklink. If you come across a quicklink (or something similar) on a hanger and you can't remove it, it's best practice to clip your quickdraw directly to it or under the link, as shown below.
Plus, quicklinks are a bit heavy and a single use piece of gear, and for that reason alone many people choose not to carry them.
If you clip a quickdraw on TOP of a quicklink in the same hanger, it can lever the carabiner and actually break it yikes! See this Instagram video of it actually happening in real time.
Photo from instagram.com/zacwronski/ showing a carabiner that broke after being clipped on top of a quicklink, yikes!.
image: instagram.com/zacwronski/
4) Taped gate carabiner (aka cheapskate locker). Here's a simple and inexpensive option that only requires a bit of forethought. If you have a tiny roll of tape on your harness, a strip or two stuck inside your helmet, or a premade “bail carabiner” with some tape already wrapped around the spine, you can tape the gate of the carabiner closed. This is known in some circles as a “cheapskate locker.” (Thanks to IFMGA Guide Jeff Ward for the “pre-made bail carabiner” idea, wish I thought of that one!)
Although you might think this looks a little sketchy, the cheapskate locker has been used by big wall climbers for decades, and is “super-good-enough” as an improvised lowering point. Provided you have the tape, this is a low cost, secure, and easy-for-the-next-person-to-clean method.
Please be courteous for the next person up the route who is going to clean this: fold over the end of the tape on itself to make a little tab, so it’s easy to unwrap.
When I posted this on Instagram, I had a fair number of comments criticizing it for being “hard to clean”. To those people I say:
Someone’s right to choose the method and level of risk tolerance when lowering off a single bolt is more important than slightly inconveniencing the next person up the route, IMHO.
If you seriously think this would be hard to clean, perhaps you need to work on your clipping skills.
Dealing with this carabiner should not be a surprise in most cases, because you hopefully spotted this from the ground before you started.
I’ve come across a taped gate, quicklink, etc. on hangers many times. I’ve never had an issue. Simply clip a quickdraw under the quicklink / carabiner (most all modern bolt hangers have room for two carabiners.) Keep on climbing, and clean it when you lower off and have two hands free.
If you want to clean it on the way up, clip the rope to your draw, and call for a take. Remove the tape or locking carabiner. Again, hopefully the previous person was courteous and left you a little tab of tape to easily unwrap it.
Did your redpoint get ruined? Boo-hoo. (Look on on the bright side, you bootied a carabiner. =^)
Pre-made bail carabiner: Wrap a few inches of athletic tape around the spine. Use it as a regular carabiner for any purpose; the tape is always there when you need it for a cheapskate locker.
Make it easy for the next person to remove it by folding the tape onto itself to make a little tab.
A suggestion from Petzl:
While a bolt failing during a body weight lower is very, very, unlikely, here's one way to reduce your risk if you're concerned about it.
If you add a friction hitch to the rope going down to your belayer, and slide this along as you’re lowered, it might prevent you from taking a ground fall if the top piece fails (extremely unlikely) in some way. If you're doing this, you should only take a fall down to the next piece/bolt below you, because it isolates the increasingly larger loop of rope that’s being created as you descend. One more reason to carry a prusik when you lead.
Would a fall on this be terrifying? Yes!
Might the prusik melt and damage your rope? Possibly yes!
Are both of these better than the alternative? Yes!
This may be little hard to visualize, so have a look at the nice illustration below from Petzl and hopefully it’ll make sense. According to the diagram, Petzl has tested this, and it works. (Note the diagram shows a quick link on the top bolt, but as mentioned above, a carabiner is recommended.)
image: petzl.com
Finally, a tip on not exactly bailing from a sport route, more about what to do if you come across a pair of bolt hangers that don't have any rings / chains / rappel hardware.
This happened to me at Smith Rock. My partner and I climbed a route that was brand new; so new that the route developer had not yet put chains at the top. We finished the route, and found just a pair of bolt hangers. After some head scratching, we decided to clip one carabiner to each hanger and lower off. This got us to the ground, but the rope was very difficult to pull, and we had some nasty rope twisting, because the carabiners were lying flat against the rock instead of perpendicular. Lesson learned! (Here's a longer article that explains this phenomenon.)
Here's one of many ways to deal with this, assuming you have a cordelette.
Pass a bight of your cordelette through each of the bolt hangers, making a big letter “M”.
Bring the loops together, tie them off in an overhand knot, and add a cheapskate locker. The cord is doubled up going through the hangers, which should give a little more peace of mind. While certainly not ideal for a long-term anchor, it’s definitely strong enough, and fully redundant, to rappel on. The cost is about $10 for the cord and $5ish for the carabiner; less than leaving behind two quickdraws.
Here’s a close up of the cheapskate locker.
Retreat anchors - alpine climbing
Retreat (aka bail) anchors need to be strong enough for a rappel, use a minimum of gear and cordage, and be simple to rig so you can do it under potential stress. You also get to bend the normal anchor building rules a bit. Learn where you can maybe cut a few corners and see lots of examples here.
Note - This post discusses techniques and methods used in vertical rope work. If you do them wrong, you could die. Always practice vertical rope techniques under the supervision of a qualified instructor, and ideally in a progression: from flat ground, to staircase, to vertical close to the ground before you ever try them in a real climbing situation.
Be it challenging weather, poor route conditions, route finding errors, or just general loss of mojo, there can be lots of valid reasons to turn around on an alpine route. It may not be something you actively planned for, but it needs to be handled with the same level of focus and detail as any other part of your climb.
When you retreat / bail (and yes, it’s “when, and not “if”), be it a one pitch sport climb or a major alpine adventure, the objectives should be similar: get to the ground in one piece, with each anchor point simple to build and strong enough to rappel on, and leave a minimum of gear behind.
Let's be clear on one thing: this is no time to be a cheapskate. Yes, we hate to leave gear behind, but if you HAVE to leave your beloved #3 Camalot for a rappel anchor, then do it without hesitation. The simple question is, what's your life worth? At the same time, you don't want to over build your anchors, and leave behind gear that you might need lower down if multiple rappels are required.
Alpinist Steve House has a terrific video on “Failing Well”. “Success on a climb is going up, making good decisions, and coming back. That's the outcome we should be attached to. To me, that’s what ‘fail well’ means.”
Six minute YouTube video, highly recommended. Takeaways:
Strategic retreat is an inherent part of alpine climbing. It’s a skill that improves with practice.
Having solid retreat technique can give you the confidence to try harder routes, knowing that you can retreat from just about anywhere.
Maintain awareness when ascending. The way up might also be the (unplanned) way down. Remember potential anchor points, problem areas and the right way to go.
Retreat is often done under stress, tiredness, darkness, bad weather, etc. All the more reason to turn up your focus and awareness to counter these compounding factors.
Some general guidelines for retreat anchors . . .
Use two equalized pieces whenever possible. Sure, the classic climbing books are full of epic stories of rapping off of a single stopper or piton. One that’s perfectly placed should be sufficiently strong, but that shouldn’t be your first choice unless things are really desperate.
This anchor is only for rappelling, so the “rules” change a bit. The belay anchor general principle of striving for “three good pieces“ doesn’t necessarily apply to a rappel anchor. If you rappel smoothly on a dynamic rope, the anchor will only see about 1-2 kN, and the direction of force will always be down. So good news, your anchor doesn’t need to be multi-directional or tremendously strong. However, we're still aiming for some other core anchor principles of strong (enough), redundant, load distribution, and no extension.
The examples below don’t use carabiners on the gear. You’d never make a proper belay anchor like this as regular practice, but it's acceptable for an emergency rappel anchor. It's fine to run cord or webbing through stopper wires for a rappel anchor; it holds 8+ kN. (See previous point, the rules change a bit.)
To minimize forces on your anchor, rappel smoothly and don't jump / bounce around.
Keep your rigging simple. You should really only need one or two variations on the basic theme, so no need to get overly fancy. You're probably going to be doing this under a bit of stress, and bailing on marginal anchors is not something most people practice very often. Keeping your rigging clean and simple makes it easier to check and to remember.
You're going to need a fair amount cordage (and maybe a few slings) so plan ahead. 5 mm cord (rated to about 5.5 kN) is light and easy to carry, so consider that if you anticipate making a lot of anchors. Tying those pesky knots always seems to take up more cord than you think! Plan on about 2 meters of cord per anchor. You can get away with a bit less if the gear placements are right next to each other, or if you use some clever knots like maybe a fisherman’s.
What about webbing? Tubular webbing can work as a retreat anchor, but it has a few downsides compared to cord. 1) Webbing strength drops off quickly if it gets damaged, unlike cord that has more of a protective sheath. 2) Webbing is more easily degraded by ultraviolet light. 3) Webbing usually requires tying a water knot, which can be a little finicky and a hassle to tie if you have gloves and/or cold fingers. For these reasons, cord is usually a better choice. (See an example below of how to use a sewn sling.)
Use your cordelette. Six meters or so of cord (7mm is the standard) makes a cordelette for the way up; you can think of that is equal to about three potential anchors if you need them for the way down. If you and your partner each carry a cordelette, together that should be good for about 5-6 anchors.
Carry a knife, so you can cut up your cordage (or maybe even an end off your climbing rope) to make an anchor. Also, a knife is useful for cleaning up any rat nest of old sun-crusted cord and webbing you often find at alpine anchors. Good rule of thumb, if you add cord to improve an existing anchor, remove the oldest piece(s) and take it with you.
Don't have a knife? It’s remarkably easy to cut through rope or webbing with a small length of 2 or 3 mm cord. Tie a bight knot in each end, clip the loops to a pair of carabiners for handles, and then rapidly saw back-and-forth through the material that's under some tension. You’ll cut it through in a few seconds.
Look first for a tree or rock horn. Give it a good kick first to assess its strength. You can drape a sling or tied loop around this and use it for a rappel, with no gear left behind. Note: use caution with putting the rope directly around/over a tree or rock horn; the friction could make pulling the rope difficult or impossible.
Stoppers and maybe a knife blade piton or two are good choices for retreat anchors. Stoppers are inexpensive, strong, easy to check if you have a good placement (well, the bigger ones, anyway) , easy to bounce test, and can be set in rock that’s dry, wet, icy, or muddy. If you happen to have a hammer, such as on an ice tool, feel free to use it to smack on the piton as well as the stopper. To weld in a stopper placement, you can beat on it Neanderthal-style with a fist size rock (and maybe your nut tool). But a hammer is always going to be better. No one's going to be cleaning it, so don't be shy. If you find a fixed piton, see if there’s a nearby stopper placement you can use to equalize the two pieces.
Time for a Tricam? Tricams sometimes don't get a lot of love, but they can be pretty sweet for retreat anchors. They can fit in parallel cracks, you can use them as a stopper, and they are inexpensive.
If you anticipate doing many rappels, you may want to take a few older carabiners with about 3 inches / 5 cm of athletic tape already wrapped onto the spine. This lets you make a “cheapskate locker”, which adds extra security to your rappel with zero extra cost. You can use the carabiners when climbing, and also have them as a convenient and secure anchor point when rappelling. Always good to get double duty out of your gear. (Thanks to IFMGA Guide Jeff Ward for this crafty “pre-wrap tape on a carabiner” tip.)
It's good practice to backup the rappel anchor with another solid piece or two when possible. Then, bounce test the anchor, and send the heaviest person down with the biggest pack first. If primary anchor holds fine for them, it should also hold for the lighter person going down second. The second cleans the backup gear and descends on the primary anchor. (This climbing axiom seems to have been made by large, heavy people . . . =^)
Add a metal connection to the master point, or not? If you carry quicklinks (5mm is a good size for a bail anchor) or rappel rings, this is a fine time to use them. Quicklinks have the advantage of having a very small opening, so it's impossible for a knot to pass through, which makes setting up a double rope rappel a bit easier. This is also a good time to donate your least favorite carabiner.
It's also okay to run the rope directly through the cord. Just know you're going to have some extra friction (and potentially damage the anchor cord) when you pull your rope. Normally you wouldn’t do this because it's best practice to leave the cord in good condition for someone else, but if you’re retreating, hopefully no one else is going to be using that anchor for a long time, if ever.
Be wary of the “bail trail”. Don't be tempted to depart from your route to go towards a retreat anchor that someone else has left. If your route description says “belay from the ledge”, and you see some sketchy looking stoppers equalized with a shoelace on terrain that looks clearly off route, that probably means it's a bail anchor and not a belay anchor intended for ascending.
Leave a cam if you have to. Yes, your life is worth it. If you have a perfect placement for a larger cam, versus fiddling around trying to equalize several different stoppers, go for the one cam and get the hell down, especially if you have multiple pitches to go and it's starting to rain, getting dark, etc.
There are some approaches to building retreat anchors that can be definitely strong enough for rappelling, yet require a minimum amount of gear - and maybe no carabiners at all.
Let's look at a few.
Place two good stoppers. Thread some cord through both of them, and tie a flat overhand bend to make a loop.
Pull down the cord, making a “U” shape.
Girth hitch a carabiner (here another cheapskate locker) or a quick link.
This approach is fast, requires minimal fiddling with knots, and uses a small amount of cord.
Potential downside, you need to leave behind some hardware to make the girth hitch. (If you had another foot or so of cord, you could tie an overhand on a bight here rather than the girth hitch.)
If you're new to the girth hitch master point, yes, it's legit and yes, it’s redundant. Read a more on the girth hitch anchor here.
A note on stopper placement: In these examples, the gear is placed close to the outside of the crack, because that's where they fit. But feel free to bury them deeper if you think it gives you a stronger or more secure placement. No one is probably ever going to clean these, so don't let that be a concern.
Below left: girth hitch around a “cheapskate locker”; below right: around a quick link. (If you had another foot or two of cord, you could tie an overhand on a bight instead.)
Next: instead of a girth hitch we have an overhand knot tied in both strands. This takes up another foot or so cord than the girth hitch, but gives a redundant two strand loop at the master point.
Want the ultra-minimalist approach? Run the rope directly through the cord. Yep, an anchor with zero carabiners! =^) The rope pull may be slightly more difficult because of the extra friction, but it should pull just fine.
Note, don’t make a regular habit had a building rappel anchors like this, especially if they're going to be used by anybody else, because pulling the rope will likely damage the anchor cord. But here it's an emergency retreat anchor, so it's acceptable.
How about a sewn sling? Yes, you can girth hitch a Dyneema sling directly to a stopper wire like in the top placement. Believe it or not, that’s been tested to about 8 kN! (Again, don't get into the habit of making regular anchors like this, always use a carabiner if you have one. Remember, this is for a rappel anchor.) The connection point once again is a cheapskate locker with a girth hitch.
Here's another way to use a sewn sling. Girth hitch each strand through your gear, tie an overhand knot to roughly equalize the load (aka SWAMP anchor), and add a cheapskate locker.
(Extra credit if you use fun skull & crossbones hockey tape like this. =^)
I think you get the idea. To summarize:
Distribute the load to two good placements whenever possible.
The anchor only needs to hold 2-3 kN maximum; strength is not the top priority.
Choose a rigging method that allows for “no extension” if one piece fails.
You’ll need about 2 meters of cord for each anchor. Bring extra cord if you anticipate multiple rappels.
Keep rigging consistent and simple.
Back up the anchor when possible for the first person down.
Bring a knife.
Pre-tape a few cheapskate lockers to leave behind.
PRACTICE on the ground before you have to do it for real!
Quad anchor with two 120 cm slings
The quad anchor is a popular choice, but usually requires a 180 cm doubled sling or bulky cordelette. What if you don't have that gear with you? Here's an alternative: Simply use a pair of 120 cm slings.
The quad anchor is an increasingly popular choice for many climbers. (See a detailed article about the quad here.)
The standard way of tying it, with a doubled 180 cm or 240 cm sling, works great, provided you have that gear with you. However, those slings are unusual sizes, and can be hard to find.
What if you want to make a quad anchor and all you have is a pair of 120 cm slings? No problem. Put them together, tie two bight knots, and you’re good to go. Tip: Try to tie the bar tack sewing in one of the two loops (above, it's in the left.)
In the photo, notice we have a figure 8 on a bight rather than an overhand knot. This has a couple of benefits:
It uses up a bit more cord, which makes your master point higher, which is usually more ergonomic
The extra bend in the figure 8 makes it easier to untie after its been loaded
The photo shows a newer Metolius 11 mm Dyneema sling, paired with an Edelrid Aramid cord sling (one of my favorites for anchor building.) Strong anchor, simple (easy to inspect) completely redundant, fast to tie, zero extension if a sling were to fail, and a pair of (pretty darn well) equalized connection points. Bonus: using the blue Aramid cord it makes it much easier to untie as well.
If the bolts are very close together, you might be able to tie a quad anchor with a one 120 cm sling. However, doing this takes a fair bit of fiddling to get the knot and bar tack in exactly the right place, so I much prefer to use a 180 cm sling, or this method.