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Clipped bolt plate came off carrot bolt

pecheur

2-Oct-2013
10:23:08 AM

On 1/10/2013 rightarmbad wrote:
>Eggy, most good or bad plate/biner combinations are well known to more
>established climbers.
>You don't need to continually test each one.
>My carrot draws will only come off the smallest of bolt heads and then
>only in very specific orientations.
>Those situations ring alarm bells and you deal with them appropriately.

I agree with this, however how does a newbie get to know these combinations without testing? In my experience PFH 45 degree hangers are the least likely to come off anything, of course they are also a struggle to put on some bolts.

As with what Mikl said, any modern biner, anything marketed as: lightest, streamlined, optimised, smallest etc, is probably going to be bad on carrots.

For carrots I use Positron biners, cheap, solid, and fat enough that in combination with PFH 45s I'd only worry on seriously undersized carrots, ie 8 mm or smaller bolts (which I'm also concerned about holding me in a fall), or ones that stick out too much (which I chuck a wire behind). However due to variations in bolts and roofs you should have the four most common hangers in Oz (PFH 45 and 90, RP 45 and 90), though in Vic mostly I use the PFH 45s, this is probably due to the limited number of 12mm bolts being used as carrots here.

rightarmbad

2-Oct-2013
9:13:41 PM

If I had to choose one plate and one plate only for carrots, it would be RP45's.
And Neil hit the nail on the head, have a set of old thicker biners set up especially for carrots.
Especially note the profile around the hook area.
Any biner that can lay flat and slide the nose over the bolt head is dodgy.

If you don't understand how this happens, get somebody to show you the mechanism and then it is quite easy to make a judgement for yourself as to how any unknown biner will perform.

Just like anything else, ask to be shown, there are plenty that will gladly demonstrate.

This is well known and has been held up continuously as a reason to rip all carrots out and place rings or U's, so saying that you never realised has me wondering exactly which rock you have been hiding under.

So I now also wonder if you know that draws can magically unclip themselves from rings and U's?
This is actually easier to demonstrate than plates magically jumping off.

mikllaw

2-Oct-2013
9:33:46 PM

On 2/10/2013 rightarmbad wrote:
>Any biner that can lay flat and slide the nose over the bolt head is dodgy.

This happens mosty with carrots that stick out a bit.
If you are clipping a line of carrots, the consequences of inclipping are small. If it's a single bolt that you really don't want unclipped, put a wire over it also (clipped) as a backup. This also helps becasue it stops the bracket from riding away from the rock. Or use a fat screwgate

>So I now also wonder if you know that draws can magically unclip themselves
>from rings and U's? This is actually easier to demonstrate than plates magically jumping off.

A lot of this can be magicked away by clipping away from you. If you have both biners on the draw oriented the same way, it reduces the chances of the bottom biner uncluipping from the rope too.


ajfclark

3-Oct-2013
7:57:12 AM

Since it's come up a couple of times in this thread and some people might not be aware of the mechanism. Here's a picture with a fixed hanger, but a similar thing can happen with rings and u bolts:

It can also happen with the carabiner clipped the other way if the direction of movement is reversed.

This is a similar issue with the gate getting caught on the bolt itself:

I imagine this is more likely with expansions with lots of thread exposed.

technogeekery

14-Nov-2016
3:55:14 PM

Saw this happen this weekend at Tarana (Shark Fin Special first bolt). My partner clipped the first carrot, moved up, and as he pulled up slack to clip the second carrot, his first draw and hanger just lifted off the bolt and slid down to the somewhat bemused belayer. I saw it happen, the rope just gently lifted the draw vertically.

He was using my draws, which have fat old biners specifically for using with carrots. Hanger was a PFH 45 degree. Bolt head didn't look small and wasn't protruding unusually. Partner re-clipped the hanger on rap and was unable to flick it off by hand.

Just lucky, I guess... No real shock, we know carrots can unclip - just a nice reminder to self that bolts do come unclipped.

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