Hi,

I film downhill mountain biking and am looking for free/cheap used climbing rope to make a cablecam.  The longer the rope the better!

The film I am making this year is going to be free-to-view and not-for-profit, so I'm trying to keep my costs down.  I'm based in Dundee in Scotland and am happy to pay postage if the price is right.

Thanks,

Stefan

Climbing rope (EN852) will sag and probably be useless for this application; you'd do far better to go for low-stretch semi-static (EN1891) but the new stuff (Beal spelenium gold) costs an absolute fortune. Perhaps the best option by far is wire cable, especially as you'll probably be wanting a LONG LONG run in a single shot.

Cheers for the advice.  I was just worried that for the guage of wire required, the weight would make it difficult to carry up dense wooded hillsides.  I thought rope would be a better lightweight alternative.

Sag is not a majot issue, as long as it does not bounce.  A wee bit of sag will help slow it down at the bottom as well.

Thin (3 or 4mm) wire rope would weigh about the same as rope. Whatever you use, tension it with a tirfor hand winch - which will weigh as much as the rope

Rope also would generate more friction (especially if its old rope) so unless its at a steep angle your camera may not move at the speed you want and could snag. Wire as the others suggested would be the best thing for this application.

Been thinking further about this. If you don't go bonkers tensioning it, plain wire would probably do as the camera will be very lightweight. Plain wire would be cheaper and even lighter than 3 or 4mm stranded wire rope.

If you do use a tirfor (or a tensioner for lorry tarp straps maybe), bear in mind that you can probably tension either rope or plain wore to breaking point and that if it were to snap, you'd be in line for a nasty whip lash. Try plucking the rope / wire and don't go beyond a low note!

You could control the rate of descent by letting the camera down the rope using a thin line (parachute cord or similar) - this would also enable you to pull it back up for the next run.

rope may be smoother though, a pulley may well 'rattle' on wire giving a vibrating image.

given the weights involved i.e. small light camera, not big fat bloke, static rope tensioned through a stop using a z rig would almost certainly be good enough I'd have thought. Access to the stuff and kit is also going to be far easier.

I'm sure someone on here will have some old rope you can have. I'll have an ask around in our club. The boys from the high access industry are always binning 200 odd meters of rope lengths at a time. Dan!! are you listening??