ian.p said:

alkapton:
im just guessing but have you taught yourself SRT out of a book?

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mostly, but also a formal weekend course. instructor was happy with my tecnique so he gave me good rigging skills. bootlaces have no place in srt.

ian.p said:

there is no corect way round for your cows tails im fairly sure ive used mine in just about every oreintation and location

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well perhaps you should read more. it is not a good thing to have your tails cross the climbing rope or the footloop you are warned but its up to you.

ian.p said:

Having the croll on your D ring is important for a number of reasons

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there are those who do as i do and experience none of the problems you describe. maybe you think the croll gets twisted 90 degrees? that does not happen and it is always flat against my chest. actually i have a short mallion that is just riight for me.

ian.p said:

with regards to ataching your hand jammer with a maillon

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by attaching basic to footloop with a mallion you can change from using long cowstail to short as your safty without getting into a situation where for amoment you have no safety as you might if you need to change direction.

ian.p said:

and I strongly strongly sugest you concentrate on getting youre basic technique sorted out before you ever consider hauling anyone up anything youre more likley to get that person killed if you dont realy know what youre up to.

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well my butty (name withheld to protect the innocent, but a very experienced competant caver) was more than happy for me to haul him when he got in trouble once. i improvised with what i had and would do it differently today but difference only concerns my comfort/efficiency not his or my safety - which was never in question.

Alkapton said:

ian.p said:

with regards to ataching your hand jammer with a maillon

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by attaching basic to footloop with a mallion you can change from using long cowstail to short as your safty without getting into a situation where for amoment you have no safety as you might if you need to change direction.

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Without doubt the single best reason for adopting the Marbach & Tourte/Petzl SRT rig layout* from Alpine Caving Techniques (the default layout from this comprehensive reference manual which has rightly dominated for over a decade). The ability to swap/chop cowstails with the hand jammer/footloop instead of a cord of shame [tm] resolves knitting problems - it also does away with the clusterness created by the CoS attaching to the central D - and the CoS isn't as good in mid rope rescues as a 2:1 as people have unquestioningly been led to believe.

* But without the Spelegyca C44 'cowstails' which generate injurious levels of shock in the event of a slip/fall when clipped direct into an anchor; use the MT/P SRT layout but substitute a Spelegyca for EN852 dynamic rope cowstails, imo.

So, just to clarify things, as I understand it, Alkapton and cap 'n chris, you're advocating the rope-climbing system in which one of your cow's tails is clipped into the foootloop  jammer ? either directly or via an intermediate krab ? so that the cow's tail can be removed at will, rather than using a separate safety cord that is always connected?

That's my preference; if you've got a rig you're happy with then that's AOK; I like to try new* stuff and adopt it if it seems better.

* It's not "new" though, having been around for over 12 years. 

I entirely agree; it strikes me that too many folk on this forum are quick to take offence, when none was intended. I'm just asking out of curiosity. I think it's fair to say that most British cavers use some form of Frog system, but it's intriguing to see all the minor variations of it.

My personal preference is for two separate cow's tails ? one very short, one longer ? with an entirely separate attachment to the fooloop jammer; that way, the cow's tails are both ready for instant use without the faff of having to unclip one from the jammer. But hey, whatever suits.

My personal preference is for two separate cow's tails

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Oh this.
You have two cow's tails so that you can have two points of protection when you're hanging around somewhere changing kit off/over/past whatever. Nearly everyone I know has the two cow's tails made out of one piece of rope with one knot at the Dring. This is not a two point protection!
(And as a minor point you can have two differently coloured ropes so that you can instantly tell which is short and which long.)

You've only got one D ring, harness and rope 

Nearly everyone I know has the two cow's tails made out of one piece of rope with one knot at the Dring. This is not a two point protection!

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Point taken; but for the most part you'd only be on one cow's tail anyway, so if it fails ? you're stuffed.

bootlaces have no place in srt.

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oh i dont know when you drop your jammer taking it of your cowstail you might change your mind about that! (although accessory cord is better)
just out of interest whats wrong with keeping your footloop on the same crab as your safety?

well perhaps you should read more it is not a good thing to have your tails cross the climbing rope or the footloop you are warned but its up to you

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shit your probably right one day ill get the hang of this SRT lark. thats the problem with my SRT rig in practice it works but in theory who knows....

yes which in the french system is the long cows tail similarly i use this as a third cowstail rather than a replacement im interested to know why inorder to use it purly as a cows tail the foot loop needs to be removed?
is their a reason why you use 12mm cows tails?
two other problems (aside from droping your jammer) i can see with the french system is that:
you either have to have a screw gate on the cows tail which is fine but i dislike the fact that the sleeve can prevent the gate closing properly if nocked and doing the gate up every time you move it past an obsitical would be a massive waste of time or B you have a snap gate which is fine but i definatly wouldnt use this in in a muddy cave where youre gear is coverd in shit and the gate may stick open if nocked.

it leaves you with only the short cows tail to clip in with when passing obsticals i can see this being a pain on tightly rigged pitches (ala exploration stylee) especialy if you have a short short. and is probably going to stop you cliping into anything other than the rebelay loop when moving your jammers across?  not somthing you nescerily want to do as this will give an increased fall facter and the pitch has probably been riged tight because the bolts are shit....

In the US frog system it is common to use the long end of the cowstail (if cowstails are had at all) for the upper (footloop'd) ascender. We all carry a second handled ascender (the "QAS" - quick attach safety) as an optional 3rd point of attachement for passing obsticals, changeovers, etc. For example passing a knot on rope one would just stand up, throw the qas above the knot (weighting it), move across the upper (footloop'd) ascender, climb until the croll will clear and then pass it across too. At all points there are 2 points of contact and never a cowstail needed. It's not uncommon to have both ascenders just on a single length of rope, often adjustable either by prussik running through the knot or a Blakes hitch (see an earlier post I have with photos of both in this thread). I opted to still have the cowstails, but that's something slowly disapearing here since we use QAS's.

Kinda mute now though...last night just tied myself a single bungie ropewalker 

ianball11 said:

CapN Chris, when using only one cowstail, have you ever encountered a problem at an awkward pitch head?

I always regarded te karabiner on the hand jammer as an additional cowstail not a replacement.

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I find two cowstails are fit for purpose; I can't recall ever being in a situation where I've required three cowstails but there have been times when I've threated my Stop as a pulley on a traverse line to keep in nice and close - also I have occasionally clipped a krab through the end of the Stop to serve as a static clipping in point but this is rare as hen's teeth and for arcane situations.

Two cowstails and no CoS = fine by me.


12mm cowstails? - blimey! You like things on the chunky side of chunkdom.

I find two cowstails are fit for purpose; I can't recall ever being in a situation where I've required three cowstails

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If I understand you correctly, by two cow's tails you mean one 'free-hanging', as it were, and one clipped into your footloop jammer? Whereas I favour two separate ones plus a safety to the footloop jammer . . . so by our own terminology we each have two cow's tails, but in your case one is clipped into your jammer? (And by my terminology you have only one, but by your terminology I have three?) (You understand I'm striving for clarity here, not in any way criticizing your set-up.)

The only problem I could envisage with your system (if I understand it correctly) is that if you need two cow's tails on a pitch-head traverse, using them alternately along the traverse with intermediate bolt anchors, then you have to unclip one from your jammer ? with the concomitant possibility of dropping the jammer back down the pitch????

Amy ? do you guys rig traverse lines at pitch-heads to safeguard your approach? If so, what do you use to clip in if you don't have cow's tails?

At pitch head: clip foot loop part of the footloop to krab on harness/waist, then unclip cowstail krab from handjammer end of footloop and clip away for stowing. Cannot be dropped. Less clutter wins the day for me. Also, there is no hard-and-fast *need* to remove the handjammer from the cowstail to negotiate a traverse; you can if you wish, but it still works if you don't.

People who stow their Stop on the side of their harness presumably use this same clip-to-cowstail (or nearest krab) and then clip-to-harness-side-loop technique to avoid the paranoia of dropping it somewhere irretrievable.

12mm cowstails, they were a cheap end of reel, but dont tell the cowstail HSE monitors!

CapN why CoS (tm)?

IIRC I first came across the descriptive term Cord of Shame on the Darkplaces forum, describing the rope connecting the handjammer to the central D (whether or not it is a single rope which also continues to form a footloop from the handjammer, or whether it is a short connector performing a similar function) and it made me smile; I'm not entirely sure who originated it and to recognise that it might be someone else's invention I often put the [tm] afterwards.

Personally I don't have a CoS [tm] on my rig but will happily use one if that's what's available on the day.

Carrying your descender on the side of your harness is a real bad idea, I do not do that anymore. On thrutchy pitches/climbs it comes off, trust me. Once it got wedged half way up a tight climb and I did not notice for 10 minutes meaning I had to backtrack through some real awful stuff to find it. It also did the same on a pitch in Cresant.

Needless to say if it needs stowing I always put it in a bag now.

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i usualy clip a cowstail through the descender and the gear loop before getting involved in thrutchy stuff that way if the descender is uncliped or the gear loop rips of the descender doesnt plumit into the abyss.

Ascending narrow struggling territory I clip extraneous kit on the end/bottom of the footloop so it is more easily retrievable, if needed.

CapN  CoS,  I'm going to have to have a look at my kit and see if my CoS and hand jammer are the smae length as my long cowstail!