SRT gear is on order

[Joanne]

Well, I finally saved enough pennies and ordered my SRT gear. I have a 200' pit rope, a rappelling rack, and a frog system on their way. Then it's off to find a good location to practice. (not a mine! Just a good steep ridge face to start with). Hopefully it won't be too long before I'm ready to explore a couple of places that have been "off limits" to me.

Joanne

[Kiel]

I can't wait to use mine again either. I just bought a 20 foot section for 5 bucks to string up in my garage rafters to practive change overs

[Joanne]

I sure understand that! I have a big eucalyptus tree in the back yard that I'm going to use for some practice. I'm not quite sure what the new neighbors next door are going to think....

Joanne

[Rubyredvet]

Better to let them think you are crazy than to remove all doubt by tellin them that you plan to drop down verticle mine shafts. j/k

[Joanne]

Better to let them think you are crazy than to remove all doubt by tellin them that you plan to drop down verticle mine shafts. j/k

Good point....

Joanne

[Stuart]

Congratulations!

Remember to double check your anchor points and use multiples whenever possible. Feel free to ask any technical questions you may have on here.

Good luck and happy frogging!

[Joanne]

Congratulations!

Remember to double check your anchor points and use multiples whenever possible. Feel free to ask any technical questions you may have on here.

Good luck and happy frogging!

I knew I was going to have to drag one of these along, but now I need to take TWO?!?!





Thanks! The thing that I'm most concerned about is finding good anchors in the mines. Many of the mines that I go into don't really have much structure to anchor to. I'm thinking it may take some creativity to rig it up. When I was climbing we normally had great anchors like trees, boulders, or bolted hangers. In the mines there are none of those. I know it's situation by situation type thing, but what types of anchors do you normally rig?

Joanne

[Joanne]

The gear arrived! Now I just have to find a free weekend to go out and get some practice.

Everyone down here looks forward to the cool weather, so everyone is scheduling their events for Oct / Nov. Seems like there's just no time to get out as much as I'd like to.

Have a great Halloween weekend.

Joanne

[Joanne]

I was all ready to go out and practice this weekend, but the weather choose not to cooperate. The temps dropped, the wind blew, and the rain fell.

I work the next two weekends so it's going to be mid December before I have the opportunity to head out.

Joanne

[Joanne]

I was finally able to find time to head out and practice my rappelling and "frogging"skills. My son (on the right) and one of his buddies also went along to join in the fun.



Although it's been a lot of years since I have done any rappelling, it came right back to me. It's still a lot of fun. Ascending using the "Frog" technique was pretty straightforward as well. I didn't try any on-rope transitions from descending to ascending so that's going to be a future practice session.




My son's friend had never been in a mine before so we decided to head over to the Sultan and his first mine exploration experience. I also wanted to locate the inclined shaft that Bill (go_browns79) had told me was just on the other side of the scary bridge. What's not obvious from the photo is the last portion of the bridge is missing and a board has been laid over the opening.




Sure enough it's right where he said it was and is just waiting to be explored.




We could only see about 50' down the incline but it may be significantly deeper than that based on a couple of rocks being dropped down.




Chris from abandonedmines.net is going to be in town to set up some of the famous Las Vegas New Years fireworks, so we are going to team up and head out to do some mine exploration. He's bringing his climbing equipment so this shaft may be one of our adventures. Needless to say I'll be posting up photos!

We plan on heading out on Sunday 1/2, Monday 1/3 and Tuesday 1/4. Anyone in the Las Vegas area is welcome to join us! Just send me a PM and we'll make arrangements.

Joanne

P.S. - My son's friend was STOKED about the mine.Hopefully these guys are the next generation of explorers!

[Kiel]

Thats a pretty intact ladder, I bet people have already been down there. Awesome pics though

[Joanne]

Thats a pretty intact ladder, I bet people have already been down there. Awesome pics though

I'm sure you are right about that! It is a "drive up" mine that is easy to get to so it sees a lot of traffic. I'm sure that the bridge scares off some and the incline scares others, but no doubt some make the climb down. It will be interesting to see how many foot prints, trash, and other signs of visitation are at the bottom.

There's also another small hole that was opened down into a large stope below the main level. It's small so it looks like they may have used it to lower supplies down to that level. Because of its location, it's going to be difficult to find a good anchor to drop into that hole.

Regardless it will be interesting to do some more in-depth (pardon the pun!) exploration of the mine.

Joanne

[Therrin]

Well sounds like you've got a great little kit going there Joanne. The frog is an awesome ascending rig.

Did you get the spelegyca cowstail? or are you using a daisy chain to link your handled ascender to your harness?

You're right about the scarcity of anchors in mines. If they're in-place where you go, don't forget about possibly using rails to anchor to. Even if they're set flush in the ground or partly covered over, you can dig out around the rail section between ties and use it. When you've got a pair of rails spiked to ties, and all of it set into the ground, its ussssssually pretty solid.

I cringe a little sometimes at what's available when it comes to timbers. As was mentioned, setting multiples is good because it shares the load across them, as long as they're equalized. Keep the slack out of any backup slings or cord you run on your anchors, so that if for any reason something breaks, there is no SNAP from slack as the backup kicks in. Keep your 'cute lil angles plenty so between anchor placements. The closer you get to 180degs between anchors the force exerted upon them starts multiplying tremendously.

I'm sure you know all this. (or at least, I hope so!)

OH! But one thing I will add... cuz I think a lot of people overlook it.

If your webbing, cords, runners, etc. are worn, abraded, spliffed, glazed (you get the idea) THROW THE DANG THINGS OUT AND REPLACE THEM!!!
I always see people adamantly sticking to using webbing that is far past its prime, and for as inexpensive as the stuff is and with as much wear as some of it can pick up in the mines, there's no reason not to replace it if you even think it may be having issues.

I think people often also forget to *actually* visually check the webbing on their harnesses before use. Lots of little stuff like that gets forgotten about. I think it's important to maintain good safe work practices.

CHEERS!

[Joanne]

Therrin,

I'm a bit of a nerd so I did quite a bit of reading before I purchased my new setup. I read through "Life on a Line", "On Rope", and a few online references to make certain that I understood what my configuration options were and allow me to make an informed purchasing decision. Chances are I won't be doing rebelays or deviations as cavers often do, but your point of tying two ropes together means being properly configured and knowing those techniques would be invaluable.

I wanted a harness optimized for caving rather than sport climbing so I decided on the Gonzo Guano Gear harness. They offer a complete frog system, so rather than piecing one together myself, I just purchased their package. (plus it was on SALE!) The ascending strap is made from webbing with a sewn in foot loop. The cows-tails are separate from the ascender and made from dynamic rope, as you would expect from a caving setup.

The books I've read spent a lot of time on anchor theory and loading, so I'm with you about the angles and properly configured backups. They really emphasized that the primary AND backup are a SYSTEM. The backup can't be an afterthought or you might find your backup failing because of poor implementation. I went out and purchased a 30' piece of webbing (in addition to my other slings) so I have enough material to keep the angles within bounds even with a challenging anchor. It has already came in handy a couple of times.

Good thoughts about getting rid of "past prime" webbing (and rope for that matter). In the grand scheme of things webbing is cheap and there's no reason for it not to be in good shape.

Anyway, good discussion on the topic! I like threads like this because there's so much we can all learn from each other. Plus, hopefully it's a resource for folks thinking about starting their vertical exploration.

Joanne

Well sounds like you've got a great little kit going there Joanne. The frog is an awesome ascending rig.

Did you get the spelegyca cowstail? or are you using a daisy chain to link your handled ascender to your harness?

You're right about the scarcity of anchors in mines. If they're in-place where you go, don't forget about possibly using rails to anchor to. Even if they're set flush in the ground or partly covered over, you can dig out around the rail section between ties and use it. When you've got a pair of rails spiked to ties, and all of it set into the ground, its ussssssually pretty solid.

I cringe a little sometimes at what's available when it comes to timbers. As was mentioned, setting multiples is good because it shares the load across them, as long as they're equalized. Keep the slack out of any backup slings or cord you run on your anchors, so that if for any reason something breaks, there is no SNAP from slack as the backup kicks in. Keep your 'cute lil angles plenty so between anchor placements. The closer you get to 180degs between anchors the force exerted upon them starts multiplying tremendously.

I'm sure you know all this. (or at least, I hope so!)

OH! But one thing I will add... cuz I think a lot of people overlook it.

If your webbing, cords, runners, etc. are worn, abraded, spliffed, glazed (you get the idea) THROW THE DANG THINGS OUT AND REPLACE THEM!!!
I always see people adamantly sticking to using webbing that is far past its prime, and for as inexpensive as the stuff is and with as much wear as some of it can pick up in the mines, there's no reason not to replace it if you even think it may be having issues.

I think people often also forget to *actually* visually check the webbing on their harnesses before use. Lots of little stuff like that gets forgotten about. I think it's important to maintain good safe work practices.

CHEERS!

[Therrin]

Ahh, good stuff. It's nice to see people who actually read up on stuff before purchasing the gear.

On the other forum, all these people see our pictures and think "I can do that", so they go and spend $400 on shiny new equipment that they have NO IDEA how to use, how it works, or what it's for. It's sooooo frustrating to see them posting up their shiny new gear, thinking that somehow just by owning it, it's going to transform them into a good climber.


I like some of GGG's stuff, I ended up getting one of their double-footloops. It's nice to balance out your thrusting stance in purely verticals instead of only having the single loop for the foot.

I had considered going with the caving style harness... but then shied back away from it. I think they're perfect for the environment they were designed for (...caves); but I've found that, for me personally, 95% of my mining trips aren't anything similar to actually caving. There's typically far more room to work and maneuver in shafts and drifts. Granted there are some pretty tight squeezes, but nothing that's become an impassible problem because of having a harness that's "too bulky".

Especially when doing multiple pitch vertical runs, I tend to hang a lot of gear off myself, and I like having several places to hang gear from not only because it's more comfortable that way, but also so I can equally distribute the weight around my body.
Most of the caving harnesses lack the gear loops which make easily clipping and unclipping gear such a breeze.

Most of us tend to get used to what we use though, and as long as it's not causing problems for us we can write up a list of reasons why we like it =)

Glad to hear that you've got quality equipment and that you're studying up on the stuff. Setting good anchors and anchor systems is a skill in itself, and I think a lot of people overlook it as such. They think of their harness, their rope, and all their vertical equipment as being more relevant, and the anchor as just some spot they throw a piece of webbing over and clip into without another thought.