“Cheapskate locker” - use tape on a carabiner gate
Note: This is not standard climbing practice. Whenever possible, use a locking carabiner or two normal carabiners, opposite and opposed. This technique is for improv, emergency, and backup situations only.
Eventually you’ll find yourself in a climbing situation where you might need a secure carabiner setup, but you don’t have any more locking carabiners nor an extra regular carabiner to rig the “opposite and opposed” set up. When might this happen?
Building multiple rappel anchors with your own gear, where you may need to conserve your equipment and want to leave only a single carabiner behind at the anchor.
Building any kind of rappel anchor with your own gear; after all, you’re a proud and frugal dirtbag climber! Why leave behind a $15 locker when you could leave behind a $5 regular carabiner with a taped gate? Some people are comfortable rappelling from a single non-locking carabiner. I’m not.
Some kind of unusual, improvised situation (swift water rescue, backcountry scrambling with minimal gear, etc) when you may not have a locking carabiner.
Big wall climbing, where it seems like you're always short on lockers. Wall climbers have used this “tape on the gate” trick for decades.
Provided you don’t need to open and close the carabiner, a simple solution might be called the “cheapskate locker”. Use a regular carabiner and tape the gate closed, with whatever tape is (hopefully) handy.
Cheapskate locker tips:
If you plan on removing the tape, fold the tape and back over itself to leave a little tab for you to grab.
Typically for a most anchors, you have the gate down and facing out, aka “clip and flip”. But for a retreat rappel carabiner, you may want the gate “up and out” with the opening at the top, which means it's farther away from the rope. This may add a slight bit of extra security; if it gives you a warm fuzzy feeling, then go for it.
I've certainly heard from a few people on social media that this is a wacky and unsafe practice. Unusual, maybe. Unsafe, absolutely not.
Still skeptical? Read this article in Rock and Ice, written by IFMGA Guide Jeff Ward. He shares the crafty tip about pre-wrapping a bit of tape onto a carabiner so you're already set to make a cheapskate locker. This tip is especially clever, because you’re unlikely to have a roll of athletic tape on a long alpine route. Prep a few carabiners ahead of time if you think you might need them, and you 're ready to go. See photos below.
Jeff writes: “I also like to have a few carabiners with tape wound around the spine. Once the anchor is rigged for the rappel, you can unwind some of the tape to “lock” the carabiner gates closed. Taped biners are more useful than quick links since you can also use them for climbing, and they are less likely to be stolen by the next team. Having a metal point on the anchor prevents the ropes from sawing and damaging it, and makes the ropes easier to pull.”
Here’s a second article from Climbing magazine, where they advocate doing it.
(Sorry, the article links below are now apparently behind the Outside media conglomerate paywall . . . )
There was an awful accident on El Capitan, when a haul bag somehow came loose and fell onto someone. Connecting the haul bag to the haul rope needs to be an absolutely bulletproof connection. This seems like a fine time to use a locker, and further secure it by wrapping that sucker with tape. I don't know all the details on this accident so I can't say for sure if a secure carabiner might've prevented the problem, but for everyday hauling, it can add some peace of mind.
Here's a photo from big wall ace Kevin DeWeese / @failfalling. Yep, that’s a portaledge hanging off of a single dodgy looking bolt/rivet, quite a spicy way to spend the night! Kevin backed that up with the taped gate carabiner and a butterfly on the blue rope.
1 - Take one of your least favorite carabiners. Tear off about 4 inches/12 cm of athletic tape. (I like hockey tape.)
2 - Wrap the tape around the spine of the carabiner. Don't wrap it too tight, it'll be harder to get off.
3 - When you need a cheapskate locker, unwrap the tape and rewrap it around the gate opening. To make it easy for you or someone else to remove, fold the last bit of tape back onto itself, as shown.
