"Self" lifelining up ladders

[potholer]

For the foot-wrap, the hand holding the loose rope coming from the foot can also be used to hold the rope above the caver for balance - a bit like pretending you have a hand-jammer. Alternatively, if trapping the rope with the other foot, both hands may be available

 

[cucc Paul]

I'm going to try this out. I'm not convinced an Italian hitch will run through as smoothly as seems to be suggested when you try to stand up. However since only a little upward movement of the jammer is required it might be enough.

I'm going to try the foot-wrap method.
In my method you tie the Italian when standing - so all you have to do is remove the unloaded jammer sit onto Italian and off you go.

wont you then be trying to tie a hitch on a loaded rope though

 

[Stu]

No! We may need diagrams soon 

 

[Dep]

I'm going to try this out. I'm not convinced an Italian hitch will run through as smoothly as seems to be suggested when you try to stand up. However since only a little upward movement of the jammer is required it might be enough.

I'm going to try the foot-wrap method.
In my method you tie the Italian when standing - so all you have to do is remove the unloaded jammer sit onto Italian and off you go.

wont you then be trying to tie a hitch on a loaded rope though

No.
Initially you are dangling by a belt and a jammer/shunt on your cowstail.

Tie a large loop in the unloaded tail of the rope BELOW the jammer (above is impossible)
Put your foot in it and tand up.
Your cowstail and jammer are now slack and unloaded, the knot is going to be somehere at your waist level.
Using a spare krab- ideally an HMS type make an italian BELOW the loop-knot to your belt (or short cowstail) - again this uses the unloaded tail of the rope.
Release your jammer.
At this point you are still standing in the loop
Sit down slowly and your weight will come onto the Italian.
Ab down...

 

[Dep]

This has been an intereting debate a few months back between myself and another of our members, he proposed the idea which I think he got from Apline Caving Techniques? -  but (IMHO) he buggered up the demo and found it very hard as he did not (IMHO) opinion do it right - he was appraoching it as an SRT exercise which it isn't and made it over-complex.
I had a go with the minimal kit you would expect in a simple safety on a ladder exercise and had no trouble.
At some point I want to repeat it and if we do I will try to get some pictures.

 

[ChrisB]

I'm going to try the foot-wrap method.

wont you then be trying to tie a hitch on a loaded rope though

No.

I understand the original proposal with the big loop, as just re-stated; that looks to me like it will work.  But I don't see how you can use the footwrap method without loading the rope at the point where you want to tie the Italian; I though that was what Paul was querying.  Unless of course you tie a big loop from above your waist and then wrap it round your foot, but that would be pointless...?

 

[Dep]

I think that what Paul means with the foot-wrap method is to hold the loop in your hand, stand on it, briefly unload the jammer and reverse-prussic it down a bit.
Re-position the foot-wrap lower down and then repeat.
No Italian involved at all.

Paul: is this what you meant?

In theory this should work as a simple but risky (it's possible to fall off) reverse-prussic technique - but it requires strong hands!
We have an SRT practice session next week, if I get time I'll give this a go.

 

[ChrisB]

Thanks Dep, I understand what you meant now, and agree.

 

[cucc Paul]

I get it now and agree that would work well with the knott loop option, with the foot rap I think you would have to tie the hitch first then stand up and release the jammer though unless your have strong fingers.

All makes perfect sense...  : lets all go play in the trees like chimps.

 

[Stu]

Right...!!!


Question was raised:

If on a ladder you were to use a jammer as a means of self belaying and the ladder broke and you decided the only way was down... you have three options.


The much already mentioned "tied foot loop" method with an Italian hitch below the knot, works a treat. It's very quick - 8 seconds was my best time from a faked "slip", doesn't depend on getting anything just right and allowed a quick retreat. The only down side would be if the rope was only just touching the floor; would you have enough to get off safely? Well the foot loop takes up approximately 80cm of rope - I'll take my chances dropping off.

You can down prusik with a foot loop - sloooooooow. Even climbing down a ladder  was slow when having to push the jammer down (I did this as an exercise in bailing on a ladder climb e.g. rising water/flooding pitch).

Now, the one that threw me. Hang on jammer, place Italian hitch on rope, do a foot wrap and stand to release. No matter how I set this up I couldn't get it to work. The only option was to add a krab i.e. two krabs then Italian. This works but is so dependant on (firstly not dropping the krab!!) getting everything just so. Without the second krab I think this is impossible. The additional krab method was far slower and needed three or four "stands" before I worked out a position for the hitch to be in that allowed me enough up movement to release the jammer.

So what did I learn? Well, if on ladders (or SRT for that matter) if you're going up make sure you have a down option - on string going up, I always have the Stop on my maillon, why risk dropping it? If laddering with just a single self line i.e. no double rope life line systems - leave 1.5m of rope extra rope down below as a buffer. Have at least another HMS krab and.... practice.

Would pictures be useful folks?

 

[Dep]

Right...!!!


Question was raised:

If on a ladder you were to use a jammer as a means of self belaying and the ladder broke and you decided the only way was down... you have three options.


The much already mentioned "tied foot loop" method with an Italian hitch below the knot, works a treat. It's very quick - 8 seconds was my best time from a faked "slip", doesn't depend on getting anything just right and allowed a quick retreat. The only down side would be if the rope was only just touching the floor; would you have enough to get off safely? Well the foot loop takes up approximately 80cm of rope - I'll take my chances dropping off.

You can down prusik with a foot loop - sloooooooow. Even climbing down a ladder  was slow when having to push the jammer down (I did this as an exercise in bailing on a ladder climb e.g. rising water/flooding pitch).

Now, the one that threw me. Hang on jammer, place Italian hitch on rope, do a foot wrap and stand to release. No matter how I set this up I couldn't get it to work. The only option was to add a krab i.e. two krabs then Italian. This works but is so dependant on (firstly not dropping the krab!!) getting everything just so. Without the second krab I think this is impossible. The additional krab method was far slower and needed three or four "stands" before I worked out a position for the hitch to be in that allowed me enough up movement to release the jammer.

So what did I learn? Well, if on ladders (or SRT for that matter) if you're going up make sure you have a down option - on string going up, I always have the Stop on my maillon, why risk dropping it? If laddering with just a single self line i.e. no double rope life line systems - leave 1.5m of rope extra rope down below as a buffer. Have at least another HMS krab and.... practice.

Would pictures be useful folks?

Nice one Stu.
First method worked fine for me when I tried it a few months back.
The second I have yet to try - although your described experience is roughly what I anticipated.
The third is what the Alpine Caving book seems to suggest (I think) - the person I watched trying this didn't get very far - as soon as you stand on the loop you effectively lock the IH and cannot therefore get any sort of raise to release the jammer. Thus the IH must be the lowest part of the setup so it can run freely.

Your conclusion is an important one - leave plenty of slack in the tail of the rope - and always have a plan C (the subject at hand being itself the plan B of course!)

One valid conclusion my fellow member did come to though was this:
Never self-lifeline unless you know how to recover from this sort of situation - there are plenty of narrow shafts or rigging situations where people above or below will not be able to help you and you MUST be able to rescue yourself.

 

[cucc Paul]

For the third point you could use a screw gate on the belt then the HMS this should give you enough "slack" when you stand up to release the jammer, but by which time you could have tied a foot loop then untied it again

 

[Stu]

For the third point you could use a screw gate on the belt then the HMS this should give you enough "slack" when you stand up to release the jammer, but by which time you could have tied a foot loop then untied it again

...... go on, have another read of the post  :read:

 

[cucc Paul]

Sorry Stu  :-[

 

[cucc Paul]

Late night semi brain wave... Have an unclipped HMS tie italian hitch while only on jammer. Make foot rap clip on hms, remove jammer  might drop the hms though  :-\ or it spin off the rope and plumit when tis not atached to you but your weight passes through it  :thumbsdown:.... maybe this method is just bad

 

[Stu]

Bad? Very probably!!!

 

[cucc Paul]

Played in the tree dismorning  :thumbsdown: im with Stu

 

[potholer]

It does seem that the tied loop is probably the best (least likely to screw-up) method, especially with minimal gear, though the thread does raise the question of how minimal gear should be for safe self-lining, and/or how much experience is needed if using minimal gear.

 

[Dep]

Late night semi brain wave... Have an unclipped HMS tie italian hitch while only on jammer. Make foot rap clip on hms, remove jammer  might drop the hms though  :-\ or it spin off the rope and plumit when tis not atached to you but your weight passes through it  :thumbsdown:.... maybe this method is just bad

not 100% certain, but if you weight the HMS/IH krab it will slide down, the rope TAIL needs to be loaded to lock the IH.

Just off out in a minute to play.