WIN 10 DMM Screwgate Karabiners!!

[Pegasus]

WIN 10 X DMM PERFECTO SCREWGATE KARABINERS

WORTH £160

Many thanks to DMM for this generous prize of 10 shiny Karabiners 👍

Manufactured in the UK by a company renowned for quality.

Read more about DMM here: About DMM
There's an excellent video too: DMM video

To enter, tell us your rigging tales - learning, teaching, refining, tips, what went well, what you learnt from....

Photos most welcome.

Top tales to be chosen by me, then over to random.org to pick a winner.

Closing time/date 10pm, Friday 22nd November.

2 entries per person.

Good luck!​

 

[marsrat]

Rigging off a fence post is not ideal, and many would say it is dangerous.. but if that one wire fence post comes out of the ground - you have 50+ more to pull out before you'd lose an anchor

 

[Fulk]

Some time ago a friend and I went up to GG when the Bradford were holding their Winch Meet and we asked them if we could go down Dihedral Route (not with much hope, as we figured that they wouldn't let us down when the winch was running). Anyway they said 'Yes, that'll be OK'. Well, I'd got it into my head that a new rebelay was needed (this was long before the era of modern bolts) for the final hang from the roof of the Main Chamber, and I'd gone prepared with a bolting kit to put in a nice new Y-anchor (using Spits). Well, to my horror, as I bashed the Spit home, I realized that I'd drilled the hole too close to the edge of the rock, and a substantial chunk of rock (maybe half the size of a caving helmet) parted company with its surroundings. I desperately grabbed it, and somehow managed to stuff it into my tackle bag before it fell and brained somebody. I must have got down somehow (using the existing single-bolt rebelay?). I never did fess up to the BPC at the time.

 

[langcliffe]

Mike Wooding and I went up to do Long Kin West one winter's day, and found that all the spits were buried in deep snow. Undeterred, and to my horror, Mike proceeded to create a large snow belay, and wrapped the rope around that. I still remember being attached to that rope, and having to bounce up and down on the snow bridge to break through to the 90 metre pitch.

Fortunately, it hadn't thawed by the time we emerged four hours later.

 

[Pegasus]

These tales are great (if a bit horrifying 🤣🤣)

 

[langcliffe]

Not totally relevant, but in the "chains" thread there was a discussion about pulling-through Swinsto before the days of resin bolts. On Saturday we were obliged to wait at the top of the split pitch for another party to descend, and whilst there we noticed jammed into a bedding on the true left, the large lump of wood that we used to wrap our rope over, still shewing the rub marks from the ropes being pulled-down.

I felt quite nostalgic for those long gone halcyon days...

 

[wellyjen]

I first learnt to rig caves for SRT in the 80s. This was using spit anchors and natural features. Lighting back then was by carbide, for most Dales caves, which gave a lovely yellow glow, but not much penetration in to the distance to see the shape of the shaft and how this might affect the rigging. The Petzl Laser carbide lamp came with an almost useless electric backup that could be zoomed right in to penetrate a little further in to the gloom. Spit anchors, being ideally flush to the rock, where hard to spot till you were almost on them, with the exception of Dave Eliot's red eye ones and other more dodgy placements, set with half the sleeve proud of the rock.
You learnt to think as you descended, "if I was bolting this, I'd need to put a rebelay there, or deviate off that flake, to descend past this elbow in the shaft", then you'd look for an anchor in that spot and hopefully find one. It taught you how to set up new routes as you followed existing ones.
Putting in a new spit was committing. The area around it would be unsuitable for any further bolting, if you made a mess of it. Once started you had fifteen to twenty minutes of hanging in the darkness hitting and turning the driver till the depth was right, then placing the cone and driving it home. Then you had to trust you'd done a good job, as you used it for the first time.
Much of rigging is still the same decades later, but modern anchors are much easier to spot with bright LED lights. Lightweight electric drills make exploration rigging so fast in comparison with hand drilling.

 

[Fulk]

My first-ever SRT trip: Way back in the long-gone (halcyon???, eh) days, after a bit of surface practice, I decided that Alum Pot would make a good first underground trip, so armed with a figure-of-eight descender and some Cloggers set up for the Texas Prusik, I picked up an old polyprop (AKA plastic) lifeline that had definitely seen better days, and set off for Alum. I chose to rig it at the south-western end for reasons that escape; possibly the rope just wasn't long enough to do the more conventional NW or SE drops. Anyway, I tied the rope to a random tree, draped it over the edge and set of down, encountering the little waterfall that cascades down at that end. Rebelays? What are they? Deviations? What are they? Decent rope? What's that? I obviously survived . . .

 

[davel]

The motorised portable anchor ...

Matienzo, northern Spain, 1975.

 

[langcliffe]

My first-ever SRT trip: Way back in the long-gone (halcyon???, eh) days, after a bit of surface practice, I decided that Alum Pot would make a good first underground trip, so armed with a figure-of-eight descender and some Cloggers set up for the Texas Prusik, I picked up an old polyprop (AKA plastic) lifeline that had definitely seen better days, and set off for Alum. I chose to rig it at the south-western end for reasons that escape; possibly the rope just wasn't long enough to do the more conventional NW or SE drops. Anyway, I tied the rope to a random tree, draped it over the edge and set of down, encountering the little waterfall that cascades down at that end. Rebelays? What are they? Deviations? What are they? Decent rope? What's that? I obviously survived . . .

I had a similar experience in 1972, using Clogs, a figure of 8, and hand-made harnesses that allowed rope walking. I wasn't as brave as Fulk, and my choice of a starter for ten was Jingling. I went up there alone one day and tied my Ulstron lifeline rope to the tree. Getting down went well, but coming up went even better. That kit was fast! When I emerged, there were a number of NCC members sitting around at the top. After establishing what on earth was going on, three of them insisted on having a go, and they all came up buzzing. The following year I was doing 200 metre shafts with that set-up. If we did need to rebelay, we took two descenders and attached the second whilst still attached to the upper rope.

I was introduced to cowstails a few years later, and found them quite useful.

 

[Fulk]

we noticed jammed into a bedding on the true left, the large lump of wood that we used to wrap our rope over, still shewing the rub marks from the ropes being pulled-down

Hi langcliffe, do you remember the other bits of junk that used to be used for belays in Dales caves? The long length of old iron pipe jammed into cracks for the second pitch of Ireby Fell Cavern? The similar bits of junk that used to grace the second and third pitches of Bull Pot Kingsdale? The stemples out over the Battleaxe Bypass traverse in Lost John's (Johns'?)

 

[langcliffe]

Hi langcliffe, do you remember the other bits of junk that used to be used for belays in Dales caves? The long length of old iron pipe jammed into cracks for the second pitch of Ireby Fell Cavern? The similar bits of junk that used to grace the second and third pitches of Bull Pot Kingsdale? The stemples out over the Battleaxe Bypass traverse in Lost John's (Johns'?)

I do! In particular the stemples on Battle Axe. I remember ferrying scaffold poles along there when we were trying to maypole into that elusive passage at the top of Lyle Cavern. None of were on a rope!

The next stage was Alan Brook attaching various lumps of iron to massive bolts at the top of pitches to serve as belays. Many of them are still around - I still clip into the one at the top of the last pitch in Hardrawkin when rigging.

 

[Samouse1]

Twas the day before MUSCmas, and deep in the Peaks,
Three cavers were sitting, their trip planned for weeks.

The shaft was a big one, as big as they come,
But the rigging was simple, and a whole load of fun.

I was the rigger, for I am quite tall,
But the reach is quite long, ‘twould be quite a fall!

The diggers had ropes in, traverse line in place,
So we rigged the y hang, to quicken the pace.

I faffed with the knot in a bit of a tizz,
When down by my feet I heard a whizz.

The rope had escaped, and I felt rather daft,
Watching my rope go off down the shaft.

I took a quick look at the knot in my hand,
And realised that this wasn't as planned.

If all of the rope had escaped from the bag,
My hand and the knot down the shaft it would drag!

So I yelled to my friends, grab hold of that rope,
Or we won't reach the bottom, there isn't a hope!

My friend grabbed the rope, in the nick of time,
And I was relieved, holding onto the line.

The trip then went smoothly, down to the bottom,
To have dropped all our rope would have been rather rotten!


The abridged version
The Friday of MUSCs recent 65th birthday celebration, a group of us headed down Titan for a trip around Ride of the Valkyries (a stunning trip). Whilst stood at the window of the main Titan shaft we decided to save time by only rigging the Y hang as the traverse line was in place thanks to the diggers. As I was adjusting the knot in my hand, the rope started to decide it wanted to be free of the bag and see the Event Horizon quickly. Realizing that the sudden weight of 80m of rope shock loading my hand may not be the nicest experience, I calmly asked Lara to stop the ropes ejection from the bag.* The rope was grabbed and disaster averted. Not the most ideal place for a rigging cock up!

*I definitely kept my cool and wasn't
swearing loudly at the rope, honest

 

[PeteHall]

This isn't my story, but it's too good a rigging-story not to tell and I don't believe that the protagonist is a regular forum user...
I shall apologise now for any inadvertent inaccuracies in my retelling and if by any chance this wins it, I'll pledge half the winnings to the subject of this tale, who you will see, might benefit from a few more carabiners!

Some years ago, an acquaintance decided on a solo, pull-through trip down Rowten, but rather than pull through in the usual manner, decided to rig the first Y-hang and descend the entire pot with no further rigging, with a view to pulling the rope back out from the top afterwards.

Having reached the bottom of the cave, our hero had second thoughts about the free-dives to get out, so proceeded to climb back out on the rope he'd descended, with not a deviation or rebelay in sight!

 

[langcliffe]

This isn't my story, but it's too good a rigging-story not to tell and I don't believe that the protagonist is a regular forum user...
I shall apologise now for any inadvertent inaccuracies in my retelling and if by any chance this wins it, I'll pledge half the winnings to the subject of this tale, who you will see, might benefit from a few more carabiners!

Some years ago, an acquaintance decided on a solo, pull-through trip down Rowten, but rather than pull through in the usual manner, decided to rig the first Y-hang and descend the entire pot with no further rigging, with a view to pulling the rope back out from the top afterwards.

Having reached the bottom of the cave, our hero had second thoughts about the free-dives to get out, so proceeded to climb back out on the rope he'd descended, with not a deviation or rebelay in sight!

How did he get up the bottom couple of pitches?

 

[PeteHall]

How did he get up the bottom couple of pitches?

With great difficulty, by all accounts! Lots of rope stretch and pulling into all the wrong places...

 

[rm128]

I started caving in Fermanagh in 1984. There wasn’t much interest in or, indeed, experience of SRT in my club (QUBCC) at the time. I quickly decided that I needed to get into this SRT thing as quickly as possible as it would open up new frontiers. So I bought the kit and a suitable book from which to learn basic technique and rigging. I must have also convinced some others to buy the kit as I don’t recall being alone on all of my early trips. Somehow I survived the early years, as must have everyone else.

In 1987 I relocated to Manchester, eager to get stuck into some “real” caving. On one of my first trips with MUSS (I can’t remember where it was), no one seemed particularly keen on doing the rigging, so I stepped forward, almost certainly claiming to have considerably more experience than modesty (or, indeed, sense) would reasonably dictate. It must have gone well enough as I tended to be pushed to the fore on many subsequent trips.

It was a steep learning curve. One step change came when I found a copy of Dave Elliot’s red bolt rigging guide at the bottom of Juniper Gulf. Clearly someone must have dropped it from a great height and couldn’t be bothered going back down for it. No chance of reuniting it with its owner in the days before this most excellent forum 😉 It was a bit the worse for wear, having been lying in a pool for who knows how long. For the next week, any pages that could be salvaged were laid out to dry around my student house. Being a penniless student (literally on several occasions), this was my best route to accessing such valuable information.

We steadily worked our way through the caves for which the relevant page(s) were relatively intact. Eventually, however, we had to resort to interpolating between legible sections of rigging. I remember on one particular occasion being stood at the top of the last pitch in Vesper with 2 near-halves of the relevant page plastered over a convenient rock, wondering what I was missing to help me get to the y-hang out over the pitch. Of course, I wasn’t missing anything... but it would have been nice to have the complete page to confirm that.

 

[PeteHall]

For my second entry, I'll stick to my own tale and recall a visit to the back of Brownley Hill Mine in Nenthead.

Towards the (then?) limit of access, the horse level had collapsed and a route up through the stopes above became necessary. Progressing at the higher level, a number of ore hoppers and shafts are passed, leading back into the horse level and we surmised that were we to travel far enough, we may pass the blocked snd flooded section and emerge back into the ongoing level.

I rigged one such shaft from some old rails over the top, which once underneath, appeared to also be supporting a large quantity of fallen rock on some rotten timber boards.

At the bottom, I found the water to be just about a foot above the stone arching of the horse level and one day, I may return with a diving cylinder to see if it goes far before surfacing.

Having survived that one, I rigged the next drop from a bit of iron bar, that was wedged between rocks and held in place by my accomplice, Andy, sitting on it. To get a decent hang, I managed to Riga rebelay from a large bolt sticking out of the wall. Nice and safe!

I survived that one too and I'm pleased to report that most of my rigging is a bit better than that these days!

 

[langcliffe]

It was a steep learning curve. One step change came when I found a copy of Dave Elliot’s red bolt rigging guide at the bottom of Juniper Gulf. Clearly someone must have dropped it from a great height and couldn’t be bothered going back down for it. No chance of reuniting it with its owner in the days before this most excellent forum 😉 It was a bit the worse for wear, having been lying in a pool for who knows how long. For the next week, any pages that could be salvaged were laid out to dry around my student house. Being a penniless student (literally on several occasions), this was my best route to accessing such valuable information.

We steadily worked our way through the caves for which the relevant page(s) were relatively intact. Eventually, however, we had to resort to interpolating between legible sections of rigging. I remember on one particular occasion being stood at the top of the last pitch in Vesper with 2 near-halves of the relevant page plastered over a convenient rock, wondering what I was missing to help me get to the y-hang out over the pitch. Of course, I wasn’t missing anything... but it would have been nice to have the complete page to confirm that.

I love Elliot's book - rigging guides with attitude!

 

[TLH]

Whilst I was able to SRT and had been doing so for a few years already, I began to take on rigging around 2010-11. My first attempt was at Moel Fferna with a reel end rope from Go-Outdoors that turned out to be a few metres shorter than planned. Luckily, there is a ladder half way down, and I planned to tie into it, as I hadn't thought about tying a knot in the bottom!! Anyway, we didn't die, but lessons were learnt.

Then, during a Birthday party in the peaks, I was introduced to a number of Cavers from up and down the country. This led on to some great contacts being made, and from that a great week of introductory Caving in the Dales. It was half-term and so the school holidays for me, and I headed up to Clapham on the train. I was introduced to the delights of several now familiar systems, and even more now familiar faces and friends!
We did classics such as Sell Gill Holes, Jingling Pot and Valley Entrance. I was guided through the various rigging techniques, knots and considerations before it was my turn. My first proper rigging trip - Lost John's! It was made so simple. No overly complicated stress factors or fancy knots, just straight forward rigging. The main thing I learnt was to rig high and tight, but still consider the shortest in your team... well, that's usually me!
The following evening, or so my log says, was a trip to Boxhead Pot. This wasn't for rigging, but was great SRT practice on some fairly airy pitches. I was told that we were going to go and see the digging efforts at the bottom, where a group had already descended and we were just catching up.
At the beginning of this, I mentioned that I had been SRT'ing for a few years... I didn't say how slow I was! By the time I had dropped the several pitches, and inspected each hang, anchor, and considered how I might have rigged this. I heard a relayed message that they were ready to fire. Turns out, that in the time I had taken to get down to the bottom of the shaft, the diggers had managed to drill their holes, set the charges and were ready to retreat to the pub. This now means I have to perform my quickest ever changeover whilst eyes watched and head to the ledge of the Kendal flyover.

It was this night that I found out that even though you might be expecting a loud bang, stay clipped into the rope! I must have nearly jumped off my little ledge as the whole shaft echoed and boomed! It almost felt as though the rope was shook by the force of the boom!

Either way, this was most probably the best introduction I could have ever hoped for. To caving, rigging, and the Dales. I can honestly say that I'm not sure I would be as happy and as confident with my rigging and caving without this week of adventure.

We've since had some great adventures, and I always think back to this when I am guiding new cavers and riggers myself

Tom