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General Climbing Discussion

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Call it a blonde moment (with rope and marker pen)


andyR

7-Feb-2007
9:36:32 PM

Yeah but the tape lasts as long as about your first rap on your brand spanker ... then it gets stuck in your belay device! Why they even bother with tape beats me!


comablur

7-Feb-2007
9:56:21 PM

You could just tie a knot in the middle, then there is no way that you could lower someone of the end of the rope, because they could not climb more than 25mt ha ha


Cheesehead

13-Feb-2007
9:55:22 AM

On 7/02/2007 BlstFrnc wrote:
>Not to throw a spanner in the works...but doesn't tape use adhesive to
>achieve its wonderous and mystical sticking properties and thus probably
>has potential to do more damage to you rope than the marker in the first
>place?

You raise an accurate point, but personally I think a lot of this stuff is a load of crap. Stickers are supposed to corrode your helmet. UV light will destroy gear faster than tape. Supposedly storing your fuel bottle in the same house will destroy gear too. I've already posted my thoughts on using a marker pen and buying second hand kit.
We (very understandably) get ansey about the minutest details of the care of the gear that keeps us alive - then we have the gall to actually use it, dragging it across rock, snow, ice, sand and dirt.


Sabu

13-Feb-2007
10:30:25 PM

yea very good point cheesehead!


shmalec

14-Feb-2007
12:26:16 AM

ok how bout this.
get your friend to buy a short length of static or even prussic cord and liberally apply said marker to a small section.
Tie figure of 8 in each end and attach to tow bar of your (friend's) car. Drive car until it breaks. If break is at marker and not at the knot then the pen's doing some bad stuff to your rope.

gfdonc

14-Feb-2007
11:16:28 AM

Don't bother, someone called "UIAA" already did this for you. They didn't need to improvise with a tow bar.

Posting this again ...
http://www.uiaa.ch/article.aspx?c=185&a=78
To save you clicking the link: (bold is my emphasis)

Tests done by the UIAA Safety Commission and some rope manufacturers have shown that marking ropes with liquids such as those provided by felt-tipped pens can damage them; even with those markers, sold specifically for marking ropes. The test results have shown a decrease of up to 50% of the rope strength, more correctly: of the energy absorption capacity of the rope (expressed by the number of falls in the standard test method in accordance with the UIAA Standard101).

Therefore the UIAA Safety Commission warns against marking a rope with any substance that has not been specifically approved by the rope manufacturer of that rope.

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