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Gris Gris banned at Sydney Indoor 23-Aug-2006 At 1:30:47 PM garbie

Message

On 23/08/2006 dave h. wrote:
>Hey Garbie,
>
>did you get a chance to look at the Eddy? does anyone else have any feedback
>(I know nmonteith has already said he liked it).
>
>Dave

I've had a quick go of an Eddy, & it seemed harder to feed slack than a Sum - it kept locking up - but I'd need to give it more of a go - I've been told it takes a day at least to get proficient. I've been using a Sum sinced we banned the Gri & have been happy with it. Pros - quick to pay slack, easy to grab the tail end to catch a fall, although I've never really felt the need to - it has locked every time. Cons - a bit more awkward than a Gri to lower. It can still be threaded the wrong way - can't see how you could design out that possibility, though. If its threaded wrong, it ends up upside down with the handle underneath which would be enough to alert you I think - maybe they could write "try again"on the bottom of it.

Overall I think the grigri ban here at SICG has been a success so far. Maybe its biggest positive is that its made people think about safety, no matter what device they're using. Just shows that the brain is really the "belay device" & anything that gets it to focus has to be good.

Re the position of the draws here, sydneymatt, as we discussed the other day, that one draw (out of over 100 here) had been adjusted for the comp. We follow the euro climbing wall standard (EN12572) which specifies maximum quickdraw spacings - here's the formula:.

x = (h + 2)/5

where x is the maximum distance to the next draw (in the path a tight rope would travel)following the draw situated at the height of h, where h is measured between the point and the ground or an obstacle, whichever is closest, measured vertically in m.

so if h(0) - the first draw - is 3m, x(o) is therefore 1m, so the next draw is at a height of
h(1) = 4.0m, etc.

For a vertical climb, if your first draw is at 3.0m (under the standard, max height of the first is 3.1m) then the next are at 4.0m, then 5.2m, 6.6m etc. They are at closer vertical spacings for overhanging walls - I have some diagrams if anybody's interested. Under the formula the spacings can get bigger as you get higher, but here we keep the max spacing to 1.4m after the fourth draw.

This formula which takes into account rope stretch etc would be useful to get your head around if you bolt routes outside, or even when placing gear!