How'd it go today?

[lxskllr]

DST is a steaming pile of shit. Getting rid of that would be the very first executive action I made if I were president. If I did nothing else for the four years, I'd be the best president in recent memory.

 

[SeanKroll]

Spent a good bit of the day in bed. Got up earlyish and did laundry, then went out for groceries. Ate a bunch of sugar and grease then crashed hard. I was more tired than I realized I think, and the leg cramps weren't helping. I was gonna play with my climbing stuff, but never got motivated enough to get it out. Maybe tomorrow...

Been puzzling over my hitchclimber issue. I'm thinking I may have my hitch tied too short, and it isn't splaying out appropriately. Does that sound possible? The hitchclimber is semi fixed chunk of aluminum, whereas a simple pulley is smaller and more mobile. The pulley would tend to fall away more/faster allowing the hitch to spread. That doesn't account for the altitude limiter I experienced, but that could be explained by the hitch being put into a poor shape by multiple ascents. Since it happened at about the same height every time, that would have been a regular number of footlocks til it gained it's poor shape, failing at the same height each time. I'm curious to check it out...

Spliced eye or a long-hole bowline work with a hitch climber.

Pics!



Make a wooden or metal rope wrench, fashion a stiff tether, and get a foot ascender! Inexpensive.

 

[FireFighterZero]

 

[lxskllr]

I like that kiwi shirt :^)

 

[FireFighterZero]

 

[FireFighterZero]

 

[FireFighterZero]

 

[stig]

The apprentice topped out a dead Aspen behind my house during winter.
My plan was to wait till after haying, then fall the rest and drag it down in the forest, since it is near useless as firewood.

Well, my wife had a different idea:

 

[FireFighterZero]

Some sort of weird Swiss-Danish totem....

 

[lxskllr]

Will all those bird houses be occupied?

 

[stig]

As I was taking off my harness, a pair of Great tits Parus major flew into the top one and checked it out, a few minutes later another pair was checking out the orange one.
Once the starlings show up, I think there will be a rush on them.

 

[stig]

Jim, it looks like your wife can use her hand again?

 

[FireFighterZero]

Jim, it looks like your wife can use her hand again?

Getting there.


Still doing physical therapy twice a week.


Its probably at 30 percent now.

 

[lxskllr]

30%'s not that great. Do you think she'll get close to 100% when it's all said and done?

 

[Dave Shepard]

As I was taking off my harness, a pair of Great tits Parus major flew into the top one and checked it out, a few minutes later another pair was checking out the orange one.
Once the starlings show up, I think there will be a rush on them.

That really catches you off guard if you've never heard of that bird before. I was passively listening to a YouTube of a woman talking about her garden allotment when she said she had a pair of great tits in her garden. Yeah, makes you wonder who is naming these birds.

 

[Mick!]

I believe they’re called chickadees in the US.

Tits as a word for breasts is much more recent.

 

[stig]

That is why I put the latin name in there.
I figured someone would go off on a weird tangent otherwise.

 

[Mick!]

That is why I put the latin name in there.
I figured someone would go off on a weird tangent otherwise.

How come you used the English name as opposed to the Danish or American?

 

[stig]

I started using an English language field guide back in 76 when I started travelling.
The names still stick.
Besides, there is no American name for Parus major.

I taught myself the latin names for most European species, makes life easier when one hangs out with birders of different nationalities.
Also, it simply gave me something to do.

 

[lxskllr]

Spliced eye or a long-hole bowline work with a hitch climber.

Pics!



Make a wooden or metal rope wrench, fashion a stiff tether, and get a foot ascender! Inexpensive.

I didn't get a pic of the failure, but this looks like a winning combo...



What was happening was my termination hitch was interfering with my friction hitch, keeping it in a relaxed state. I don't remember exactly how I set it up to do that. I could push the friction hitch and get it to grab pretty easily, but that's not a cool setup for obvious reasons. It should work without any input from me.

I also finally gave the ropewrench a working try(thanks again Jed & Jonny!), and it worked well. I could get up the rope without too much difficulty. I didn't spend a lot of time fooling with this stuff. I tweaked my back a little pulling on my boots, and I don't want it to really go out. Actively climbing actually feels pretty good on my back, but hanging in the saddle, or twisting around is a little sketchy.

I'm gonna keep using this working setup for awhile instead of constantly changing stuff. That'll make it easier to keep track of problems, and narrow down issues. I want to give srs and the ropewrench a good try actually working a tree, and compare it to the typical mrs system I've used so far. Just getting up the rope didn't seem drastically different, but I didn't get up really high.

 

[SeanKroll]

That's set up all wrong, defeating the engineering.

 

[lxskllr]

You mean the sideloaded prusik? If I center it over the pulley, the termination knot interferes with the hitch. Those two need to be physically separate, and I couldn't get a working system with the prusik centered.

 

[Mick!]

Why not just use a Blake’s/Prussik?

There’s no need to use variations of systems if you’re unclear what’s going on.

 

[SeanKroll]

Terminate with a bowline, tail secured, with a long hole/ eye.

 

[lxskllr]

I tried a Blakes really briefly, but didn't like how it performed. It seemed disinclined to grab the rope. Might be the type of rope I'm using :shrugs: I've been using a split tail since I started.

edit:
I'll try that out with a bowline next time I go out Sean. That'll get away from having a knot next to my hitch.