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Topic Date User

Mild Peril - Rated PG 11-May-2010 At 9:17:34 AM f_ladou

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On 11/05/2010 pmonks wrote:
>No wonder - those ropes are doing a nice impersonation of DNA!
>
>If anyone's wondering why friction is a b1tch, check this out.

Hi Peter,

Very, very cool video! Friction is indeed a surprising phenomena. I remember from my engineering days learning that friction when wrapping a rope around a cylinder (i.e. abstract belay tree in climbing jargon) grows exponentially with the number of turns. Meaning if there is hardly any slippage with one turn, put another in and you will uproot the abstract cylinder before the rope slips.

BTW, what's your view on clipping double ropes? I normally clip both when going straight up. Here, I had to traverse left and then up again. So, I decided to clip alternate ropes as it seems to reduce drag. Any thoughts/advice, anyone?