Single Hand/Rope climbing

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myoldsailor

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Hi,

Trying to find a climbing school/instructor who will train me to ascend and decend a single rope. ie. cave diving. - To help me with single hand mast climbing safely, equipment selection, knots etc

Have tried shoreham, but they can only train up walls and belay!?

Any ideas? I am based in chichester.

Cheers

myoldsailor
 
myoldsailor said:
Hi,

Trying to find a climbing school/instructor who will train me to ascend and decend a single rope. ie. cave diving. - To help me with single hand mast climbing safely, equipment selection, knots etc

Have tried shoreham, but they can only train up walls and belay!?

Any ideas? I am based in chichester.

Cheers

myoldsailor
Click to expand...

Buy one of the climbing mags there are loads of instuctors just waiting for your call
 
Mr U Tube was a useful starting place for me. There have been several threads on this topic in recent months covering the many different systems you can employ - prussik knots , mast climbing ladders, Petzel ascenders, some even use rigid ladders fixed top and bottom! :):)
 
Where's your sense of adventure and risk? ;-)

Got ot local kit shop

buy prussic loops (two short, one long)
buy climbing harness
buy locking caribiners
and if you are lucky the guy in the shop may just show you how to use them

OR

go online and work out how to tie the knot (really easy)

go to boat and try it

I use one short for the top prussik, one long for the foot prussik, and the second long on the spare hapyard as a safety


It adds an extra degree of "fun", but really it isn't hard.

Of course the H & S brigade will tell you that you really need to go to night school for 14 years before trying it, but it isn't as hard as you think.

You could also try it in a local park with a rope over a low (thick) tree branch and just try getting yourself up a few feet.

rgds
chris

PS Don't try this at home children.
 
Last edited:
reddragon2 said:
Where's your sense of adventure and risk? ;-)

Got ot local kit shop

buy prussic loops (two short, one long)
buy climbing harness
buy locking caribiners
and if you are lucky the guy in the shop may just show you how to use them

OR

go online and work out how to tie the knot (really easy)

go to boat and try it

I use one short for the top prussik, one long for the foot prussik, and the second long on the spare hapyard as a safety


It adds an extra degree of "fun", but really it isn't hard.

Of course the H & S brigade will tell you that you really need to go to night school for 14 years before trying it, but it isn't as hard as you think.

You could also try it in a local park with a rope over a low (thick) tree branch and just try getting yourself up a few feet.

rgds
chris

PS Don't try this at home children.
Click to expand...
Wherever you try it (if you do), don't go too high before you figure out how to get back down.....
 
I'm in my 60's and regularly climmb a 15m mast to check rigging etc, its easy and providing your fit and not overweight safe. I use, two 4mm dyneema lines tied into loops and attached to a tensioned mast head halyard with prussic knots. The upper loop is tied to my bosuns chair, the lower as a foot loop. Just stand up in the foot loop and raise the chair loop untill the slack is taken up, sit down and raise the foot loop to a comfortable height, repeat until you reach the masthead. I usually have a spinnaker halyard tied to my chair in case anything fails, my wife just needs to take up slack. She is able to lower me after removing the foot loop, I keep the chair loop attached but slack enabling it to slide freely just in case she drops me! You can reverse the climb but I find this harder for some reason.

Cheap, simple and safe, I've been given a set of climbers accenders but they look to complicated to me.

Just remembered, the last time I wrote this explanation some ****** on this forum accused me of being a purist.

Peter
 
reddragon2 said:
Where's your sense of adventure and risk? ;-)

Got ot local kit shop

buy prussic loops (two short, one long)
buy climbing harness
buy locking caribiners
and if you are lucky the guy in the shop may just show you how to use them

OR

go online and work out how to tie the knot (really easy)

go to boat and try it

I use one short for the top prussik, one long for the foot prussik, and the second long on the spare hapyard as a safety


It adds an extra degree of "fun", but really it isn't hard.

Of course the H & S brigade will tell you that you really need to go to night school for 14 years before trying it, but it isn't as hard as you think.

You could also try it in a local park with a rope over a low (thick) tree branch and just try getting yourself up a few feet.

rgds
chris

PS Don't try this at home children.
Click to expand...

agree totally

prussic knots or bachmann knots

http://www.marinews.com/Bachmann-Knot-522.php

http://www.instructables.com/id/Tying_a_Prussic_loop/

theres a pic of me up the mast with 2 prussic knots on my sig.

not hard if not confident second halyard with someone on it tieing it off
to keep you up there if its your swmbo dont have an argument before you go up !!! or you might be up there longer than you want
 
NDG said:
needs to be looped around a tight line.
Click to expand...

needs to be round a tight halyard .Check the halyard along the used length for weakness.On our cat I use the topping lift and pull the mainsheet in to get it tight , our topping lift is by far the heaviest. I wear boots and put both feet in a a smaller loop neat the bottom, just my preference, but I can put both feet/toes one on each side of the mast when your weights on, the the loop pulls them close and tight to the mast .Boots as the line is tight and more comfortable than deck shoes for any length of time .
 
If you fancy spending some money on some good equipment you could try a 'Top Climber'. It has a well designed harness/bosun's chair that is very secure, and foot loops for inch-worming up a halyard.

I've had one for ten years ..... and used it probably 20 times a year. Excellent quality ...... and very simple. It stands up to the marine environment very well.
 
As a former Climbing Instructor from many years ago and now turned sailor I thought I might add my tuppence worth to this debate.

I have used the Prussic Rope method often for halyard climbing and agree that it is essential that an experienced person needs to go through it with you before you try it single handed. It might be safer to use a proprietory device which is called an Ascender or Jumar. These can be bought for about £30-40 each.

I also favour using a bosun’s chair in preference to a climbing harness which is very uncomfortable. A climbing harness is only used in vengeance after a fall or when abseiling.

In fact I feel that most sailors could benefit a lot from the ropework experience of rockclimbers. If you can persuade a climbing instructor to come down to your boat you will learn a lot. They probably won’t even charge you (they are very partial to beer).
 
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