Welcome to Masterclass on slings, lanyards and personal anchors from incredibly versatile
to some that you might never use. However, I think that every climber should know their capabilities
and more importantly, limitations, because maybe you won't use them,
but your climbing partner might. And instead of just trusting that
he knows what he's doing, it's really good if you can actually double check him
and make sure that everything is OK. It's good for your mind. All right. Let's begin with slings. A sling is a loop of webbing, which has many applications. Like building anchors. You can also use a sling
to attach yourself to the anchor. You can wrap slings around trees
or rocks to make it as a protection point. Also used in dog bones of the quickdraws. This is also technically a sling. Or to make an extendable quick draw. You can also use a sling
to make a rope holder. For example, if you're rappelling down
and you don't want to throw down your ropes because they might get tangled somewhere, you might make this
and hang on your harness. And then when you're going
down, it's quite easy to pull some of the rope and keep repelling down. Or you can build an emergency harness
out of the slings if you need. So super versatile piece of gear,
which is also very easy to carry. You simply twist it like so then clip to the top loop and it should twist itself like this. And it goes to your harness. Dyneema, Dyneema, Dyneema, you might have heard this Dyneema
name before which is actually a brand name. The material itself is this which you don't need to remember. But the only reason I'm telling you this, because some manufacturers might list this in their specifications of the product,
that it's made out of that, instead of Dyneema. There are other brands
that are producing similar materials. And for simplicity, I'm gonna call
all of that as dyneema. Dyneema cannot be dyed. So the slings made out of the Dyneema
are always white. And the red or blue edges
that you can see, are actually either polyester or nylon fillings. So if you take a sling and it has a lot of white high
chances are it's made out of dyneema So what's so special about this dyneema? Well, it's incredibly strong. In fact, it's 15
times stronger than steel. And that's how this extremely lightweight
and skinny, like a dental floss sling can hold 22 kilo newtons of force. Now, the most important thing
to know about dyneema is that it's super static material. It doesn't stretch at all. So attaching yourself
to the anchor with dyneema sling is exactly the same
as attaching yourself with a chain. It's incredibly strong,
but incredibly static. If I would be climbing
up above such anchor and I would take a fall, chances are I would break something
or injure myself. And that's how you should treat any sling. Never create the situation
where you have slack in the system, which can shock load during the fall. This is very dangerous. This clip was from DMM,
where they dropped 80 kilograms of mass, and that broke a brand new dyneema sling Now, some people complained
about these DMM tests, saying that dropping a rigid mass is not the same
as dropping a human body. And yes, the human body would act
as a shock absorber. And Petzl did some testing to find out
that human creates about two times less force
compared to equal weight rigid mass. However, the forces created on
such static falls are so big, That maybe, if the sling is not going to break,
I cannot guarantee about your back. Also, worned out slings
tend to lose quite a bit of strength. I'm going to cover that
a little bit later in this video. Plus, your belay loop on the harness
is rated at least 15kN. So if your sling is not going to break,
maybe your harness will. And that's what happened to my friend. He forgot to unclip his daisy
chain, climbed up and took a 1.5 fall factor fall,
which broke his belay loop. And the only reason he was able to tell
the story was because his rope was tied into the other
two loops on the harness. So the takeaway is, if you're connected
only via static equipment, you have to avoid slack in that system otherwise you're
risking dangerous shock loads. And that also includes
chains of quickdraws that I see a lot of people are doing. This is equally dangerous. As a cheaper alternative to the Dyneema,
you might find slings made out of polyester or nylon. And independently of what material was used to make a sling All of them must hold at least 22kN
of force And 22kN If you're wondering,
is for two strands. One strand will hold half of that. Since nylon or polyester is not as strong
as dyneema Manufacturers simply need to add more material
to reach the same ratings. That's why nylon or polyester
slings are thicker and heavier. Now, you might have heard that nylon is a stretchy material
and much better for absorbing fals. While it's true, don't buy nylon slings and treat them as a dynamic protection. As a general rule of thumb,
if your equipment is not a dynamic rope or a shock absorbing device, then treat it as a static protection independently
of what material was used to create it. Slings do come in all different lengths. But the most popular ones are
60cm and 120cm. 60cm sling is a great length
for extendable quickdraw. So you can have it 20 centimeters and 60 centimeters sling very easily, while 120 centimeters is great for
building an equalized anchor on two bolts, which is quite common
on bolted multi pitches and longer slings
might be useful in traditional climbing. In cases you need to equalize
more than two points or wrap around a very big block of rock. You might also find that slings come in
different thicknesses, sometimes even for the same brand
and the same material. Here I have to remind that independently
of what material, how much that material was used in a sling,
it has to hold at least 22kN. So the only thing you're getting out of
the thicker sling is more durability. It's basically going to last your longer and has a little bit more,
protection against abrasion. Obviously, this is a soft material
and you should avoid sharp edges. And I was always curious
how hard that is to cut a sling, which is loaded. Ok, That was actually surprisingly easy. OK, let's try some of this
polyester sling. It's super easy to cut it. OK. It's actually surprisingly easy
to cut a sling under tension. Let's try this thing. Mammut sent me these magic slings. It's slightly different construction. It has dyneema core
and outside abrasion resistant sheath. So it should be technically better
for abrasion situations Although, I don't know if it makes any difference
with the sharp knife. So let's see. Oh, yeah, this is much harder to cut. Yes. Just cut through the outside and inside. Oh, OK. Oh, that was a bit harder to cut. But the lesson is avoid sharp edges for your soft materials. So another thing you should avoid
is friction between two soft materials. For example, the rope against
a sling is big 'no, no'. Same goes with rope against another rope
or sling against another sling. So let's see if I can cut this red sling with this piece of rope. t's not that easy
to cut, as I expected. I definitely did a lot of damage
let's try again. Ok, I managed to melt a peace of
my dyneema sling OK, so... cutting a sling is not that easy. But I did a lot of damage to it already. OK, let's try the other way around
to see if there is a difference. And that was relatively easy. Wow. And dyneema is so hot! it's actually, melted a lot. So avoid soft material versus
soft material friction. Ooh, that looks really bad. So the takeaway from my silly experiments is that dyneema
is very resistant to abrasion. And cutting it purely by friction
of the rope seemed to be really hard. However, the sling was still damaged. It started melting. And I wouldn't like to use
such sling afterwards. Now, cutting the rope with thin
dyneema sling was surprisingly easy. And when it comes to really sharp objects,
when I try to cut with the knife, pretty much any sling
was super easy to cut. Maybe, Mammut Magic Sling
was a little bit harder to chew through the outside layer. But once the outside layer was damaged,
the inside core was super easy to finish. OK, let's move on. If you tie a knot in a sling like so, this knot will weaken the sling
up to 60 percent. Now, if you know what you're doing and
you know that you're not gonna subject, this sling to super heavy loads,
this might be totally fine. For example, if you're using your sling
in an extended repel system because the forces here are very low. Or when you're simply clipped into the anchor, since I'm not producing any
heavy loads here, this is totally fine. However, I should be extra
careful to not climb up and create the slack in the system. If I were to take a fall factor one fall where I am at the height of the anchor, such fall has a huge chance
of breaking this sling. So tying knots do significantly
weakened slings. And this applies to any knots. For example, if you want
to join two slings. You can do this. And this also weakens
the slings by 50 percent. If you want to join to slings, but
you don't want to sacrifice the strength. Simply use the carabiner. Now, if you have very long sling
and you want to shorten it instead of tying a knot,
you can simply double it. And this almost doubles
the strength of the sling as well. If you want to shorten it even more,
you can quadruple it. Like so, simple Another problem with knots in slings,
especially in skinny dyneema slings Is that if you load this knot really hard,
it's going to be very hard to untie it. So if you're planning to use
a lot of knots in your slings, then maybe using a nylon
sling is a better idea because untying a knot from nylon
sling is much easier or Mammut Magic sling,
which is also much easier to untie. And it doesn't lose as much strength
compared to the dyneema slings. old, worned out slings,
can lose a lot of strength. Black diamond sling with a
22kN MBS What? What was the MBS? 22kN?
- Yeah... And here is another one. 24kN That did not stretch out much.
Oh... guess... 4kN!!! What zfuck, man? Yeap, The sling broke at 4kN only. So if you would have such sling
on your extended quickdraw and take a hard whipper. Chances are this sling
would break Climbing gear manufacturers say that if you never use
your equipment and just store in a closet under ideal conditions,
you should still retire it after 10 years. Now used soft equipment,
probably going to last you between two and five years,
depending on the usage. And if you want to know
how old your equipment is, you can find a little label
with manufacturing date. And that's another reason
to not cut these labels. And independently on
how old your equipment is, you should periodically check it
for obvious damage signs. And if it doesn't give you confidence
anymore, just retire it. Your life is worth more than
a new piece of equipment. Good, good, good. Now let's look at all different ways
to attach yourself to the anchor. The first one is using a sling,
simply girth hitch your sling to the harness like so and use a carabiner to attach your self Now, what if I want to be attached
closer to the anchor? One solution for
this is to simply double the sling. Double the sling. I am now closer. But what if this is too close now? What if I want to be in between of this
and what was before? Well, in that case,
you would need to tie a knot like so. But as I mentioned before,
knots have a lot of drawbacks. Then some climbers decided to solve
adjustability issue by using daisy chains, a daisy chain is basically a big sling
with multiple loops in between. And since you can clip any of these loops, it kind of solves adjustability issue. Now, daisy chains are designed
to be used in aid climbing. So if you're not doing aid
climbing, don't buy them. The stitching, which holds
individual loops is rated for only 4kN So if you would clip to a loop
of a daisy chain, and take a big fall, chances are this
stitching would break and then the next stitching would break and then you would be stopped
by the outside of the sling itself. However, if you make a mistake
and clip across two loops. Like so, now you are actually held
only by the stitching, and if you fall and that stitching breaks
you're flying. It's very easy to make a mistake
when shortening this thing. For example, if I would clip like so. And I would take a big fall. I would be flying far. Yes, of course. I modified
this sling to demonstrate this. But the lesson is, if you're not doing
aid climbing, don't buy these things. If you are doing aid climbing
and you don't understand what just happened, then
the homework for you is to figure it out. As a better alternative for daisy chains,
you can use these chain links or sometimes they're called
personal anchor systems. They are made of multiple
interconnected sling loops. And that means that you can clip into
any of the loops and shorten it in any way you like. And it's going to be safe. So, for example,
if I clipped into the end loop and I decide, but it's too long, I can simply clip
another loop to shorten it So personal anchor systems
give you a quite good adjustability. But compared to a simple sling,
they are much bulkier and they will take way more space
on your harness. And both - slings and personal anchor systems
share the same problem. They are completely static, So you should definitely avoid having slack
and potentially shock loading them. A classical solution
to a shock load problem, which is still commonly used in multi pitches. is to use a clove hitch. Now I am connected to my anchor,
with a dynamic rope. So in case of the small fall,
I would probably be OK. However, I would still not dare to climb much above the anchor
and take a bigger fall, because the length of this
rope is super short and probably would not be enough
to absorb the full impact of such fall. This hitch is also easy to adjust. You simply pull the belly of the hitch
to the desired length and then tighten the other
end of the rope, like so. And the other benefit
of this is, of course, that you don't need any extra equipment
because you always have the rope with you. Well, at least until you need
to set up your rappel In that case, you will need something else
because you won't be able to use your rope anymore. Alternatively, there are multiple
companies producing adjustable dynamical lanyards,
like this one is from Petzl So you clip yourself and then the only thing you need to do to
adjust it, just simply pull on the tail. If you want to get closer, you pull more. This is super easy to adjust. And if I want to get more away,
I need to tilt it. So in terms of shock absorption, this thing is superior to any methods
that I talk so far, because during the fall not only, I have a dynamic rope but this mechanism would also slip until the end, creating
even greater shock absorption. However, it is still not OK to climb more than the height of the anchor
using this lanyard. So super adjustable, dynamic lanyard. One thing that I don't like about these
is that they are quite bulky and you always have this extra tail
dangling on the side of your harness. So just one more thing
which can get in the way of your climbing. As a cheaper alternative to Petzl ajust, some people use this thing,
which is called KONG Slyde. So this thing is super cheap. I paid like seven or eight euros. Well, plus, in addition, you will need your piece of rope,
which can also be quite cheap. But the biggest downside is that it's not so easy to adjust compared to
Petzl Connect Adjust. It's quite OK, but it's not as smooth, Especially if you want to go
other way around. I find it's quite difficult. But if you're on a budget, this thing could be nice to have. Doo doo doo doo doo doo. So personally, when I'm climbing
single pitch sport routes I don't use any of these tethers simply because I like to have minimal amount of stuff on my harness
when I'm trying something really hard. And to clean a sport route,
I usually just use quickdraws. I'm going to show you how to do that
in one of the future episodes. Now, if I go on a multipitch
I like to take Petzl Connect Adjust. And one thing to know about them is that
there are three different versions of it. You have a version
of the single adjustable arm. Then you have one adjustable arm
and one short non adjustable arm. And this is great for multipitching,
because you can use this to tether yourself and use the short arm
for setting up extended repel. And they also have a version
with two adjustable arms. But personally, I don't
find a use for that. Now, I wanted to quickly mention
that none of these lanyards I've talked so far in this video
are suitable to use in Via Ferratas. because in Via Ferratas the falls,
might be way worse. And these things
don't have enough shock absorption. So if you go on via ferrata buy a lanyard
which has a dedicated shock absorber, and in general, just don't fall on via ferratas,
it's super dangerous anyway. OK, another little
bit controversial topic, how to correctly attach
your tether to your harness. So some experts will say
that you need to tie your soft goods always through your tie-in points,
like So However, you might find that
others are doing this where we attach the tether
to their belay loop. And for some products like Petzl ajust this is a recommended way
to attach this lanyard. So here are some points to consider. Normally tie in points on the harness
are extra reinforced for extra friction with the rope,
while belay loop is not. So if you were to tie your skinny dyneema
sling to your belay loop and leave it there. Never check it and use it a lot. Chances are this dyneema sling over
time would make some damage to your belay loop But personally, since I don't leave my
slings permanently attached to my harness, I don't see a problem of having my sling
directly on my belay loop, because if there would be any damage,
I would probably notice it. Now, if you connect your sling
through your tie in points. The drawback of this
is that it squeezes your sensitive parts. It squeezes the tie in points together which slightly changes
the way you sit in the harness. And I don't really like that. But it's not the big deal. And that's what most of the experts
would still recommend doing. So if you want the safest advice, if you're connecting super skinny
dyneema sling Maybe it's better to use tie in points Otherwise, I don't see a problem
of using a belay loop to attach a sling. And as I mentioned before, always check the manual, because sometimes
manufacturers know more than we do. I'm also going to leave an article in the description which discusses
this topic in more details. If you are interested to know more and if you know more reasons why
you should use one method over the other. Please leave that in the comments. Woah, I hope you learned a thing or two, because my goal is to publish
quality videos here completely for free. So the next time I go climbing
to some remote destination, finding a partner I can trust
would be a little bit more easy. And I wanted to say special
thank you for Mammut and for everyone who donated to me via any methods, because that helps me a lot. And if you want to do that,
here is the link. Otherwise, see you in the next
video and enjoy climbing.
